Surfing Waves

Do you get better waves if the tide is going in or out?

that is a depended on where u are surfing it changes from spot to spot depending on the banks and sand bars and rocks if your surfing reefs and points

usually early morning and late afternoon...

From what I understand, usually if the tide is lower the waves are higher and if the tide is high the waves are lower. (At least here)

dpends on the break. So local knwledge of a break is really really usefull

can really go either way... one of my fave beaches doesn't even have a wave until mid to high... another very similar beach round the headland works until just before high then doesn't even break for about an hour after high tide...

crepuscular wrote:usually early morning and late afternoon...

As someone who surfs just down the road from you, I know why you're saying that, but thats only true somewhere with a large flattish land mass and a warm temperature.

Wikipedia's page on sea breezes

Somewhere where the land mass is small (eg UK), not that hot (eg northern europe), or mountainous (er, I dunno. Somewhere mountainy) this effect will be much smaller and will usual be secondary to the weather systems.

LucasG wrote:From what I understand, usually if the tide is lower the waves are higher and if the tide is high the waves are lower. (At least here)

Close but no cigar...

At a beach break, waves tend to be steeper and faster as they break over the sandbanks in shallower water. Not necessarily bigger though.


Another variable to throw in is where in the world you are. In the UK, the tidal range is huge (8m+) and so the effect of the tide is huge too (generally a better wave on the incoming tide, and much smaller on the outgoing tide). But here in Oz, for instance, the tidal range is only ~3m. So here the effect is much smaller.

LucasG wrote:From what I understand, usually if the tide is lower the waves are higher and if the tide is high the waves are lower. (At least here)

Same in the panhandle, so it seems

drowningbitbybit wrote:

LucasG wrote:From what I understand, usually if the tide is lower the waves are higher and if the tide is high the waves are lower. (At least here)

Close but no cigar...

At a beach break, waves tend to be steeper and faster as they break over the sandbanks in shallower water. Not necessarily bigger though.


Another variable to throw in is where in the world you are. In the UK, the tidal range is huge (8m+) and so the effect of the tide is huge too (generally a better wave on the incoming tide, and much smaller on the outgoing tide). But here in Oz, for instance, the tidal range is only ~3m. So here the effect is much smaller.

Yeah, it's a beach brake over here.

some beach breaks tend to close out at low

joem wrote:some beach breaks tend to close out at low

most waves here come up broken, LOL

just to throw a spanner in the works, the beach break we surfed in France got gnarly and hollow at hight tide not low.

yep tynemouth has some of its best banks at high

LucasG wrote:From what I understand, usually if the tide is lower the waves are higher and if the tide is high the waves are lower. (At least here)

nope, the beach break in newport doesn't work like that. It seems like the jetty is making it big in big tide

ok then... probably best to ask the local surfers