Anybody want to do a wind forecast for LA Xmas?

[kevinkan]

Will be coming down for a few days... would love to sail? Is it gonna be windy???

I figured I'd tap the local knowledge base for forecasts... how's it looking?

[swchandler]

Here's the marine forecast looking into the future a bit.

.wed...se winds 10 to 20 kt with occasional gusts to 25 kt.
wind waves 2 to 3 ft. w swell 3 to 5 ft. rain likely.
.wed night...se winds 15 to 25 kt with frequent gusts to 30 kt
becoming s 10 to 15 kt after midnight. combined seas 7 to 9 ft.
rain likely...mainly in the evening.
.thu...w winds 10 to 20 kt. wind waves 2 ft. w swell 5 to 7 ft
subsiding to 3 to 5 ft.
.fri...w winds 15 to 25 kt...becoming n 10 to 20 kt. combined
seas 4 to 6 ft.

[kevinkan]

Yeah, I was looking at the NWS marine forecast, but I don't know how those numbers correlate to wind on the beach. Where do you guys sail on storm fronts? I'll be staying close to Cabrillo Beach, but I'm willing to drive. Last year was great at County Line the day after Xmas!

[MikeUzi]

Who knows? But there is some potential with all this storm activity.

Right now its blowing from the west at 25 at SB channel buoy but ENE at 10 at Leo...weird?

[jp5]

[swchandler]

Hi Kevin,

I live in Santa Barbara, so for clearing winds I normally focus on C Street if I go south, and SB spots like El Capitan, Haskills, IV and Ledbetter. Also, there's always Jalama if I want to burn gas.

However, like you, I will be in the LA for Christmas visiting my mother in the Hollywood Rivera area right next to PV. Wind at Torrance beach directly west is straight onshore so it's super hard to get off the beach, especially if there's any kind of swell. My past trips to Cabrillo during clearing winds always seemed to be a bit too offshore and sketchy. Sunset or Huntington Beach area might be a possibility, but I've never been sailing down there, although I did a lot of surfing in the Huntington Beach area while in college. From my experience, the wind would be quite onshore in nature.

In my opinion, regarding sites reasonably close to LA, the only spot that reliably does well on clearing winds is County Line. In fact, I was returning to SB after Christmas last year when you got that day there. However, my timing was too late in the day to really sail.

[allen]

Topanga and Sunset Point (just south of Topanga at the end of Sunset Blvd) also can work well in clearing winds.....The Sunset launch is from a sandy beach, much easier than Topanga.....

[isobars]

[windoggi]

kook

[swchandler]

I was thinking total airhead.