Surf Forecast Surf Report
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
app storeplay store

Contreira Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

The figure describes the range of swells directed at Contreira through an average March. It is based on 3460 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind or surf right at the shore so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Contreira. In the case of Contreira, the best grid node is 22 km away (14 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell directions and swell sizes, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but without direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These occurred only 7% of the time. Green and yellow show increasing swell sizes and red represents the highest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the dominant swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was NNW, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the N. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Contreira and away from the coast. We combine these with the no surf category of the bar chart. To keep it simple we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Contreira, you can select a similar diagram that shows only the swells that were expected to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. In a typical March, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Contreira run for about 93% of the time.

Also see Contreira wind stats

Compare Contreira with another surf break

Nearest
Nearest