Honeysuckle Point Surf Stats

This picture illustrates the range of swells directed at Honeysuckle Point through an average October. It is based on 3471 NWW3 model predictions since 2006 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast wind and surf right at the coastline so we have chosen the best grid node based on what we know about Honeysuckle Point, and at Honeysuckle Point the best grid node is 10 km away (6 miles). The rose diagram illustrates the distribution of swell sizes and directions, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks 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 were forecast only 3% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red represents the largest swells, greater than >3m (>10ft). In each graph, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell happens. The diagram implies that the prevailing swell direction, shown by the biggest spokes, was SW, whereas the the most common wind blows from the WSW. Because the wave model grid is offshore, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Honeysuckle Point and away from the coast. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To simplify things we don't show these in the rose graph. Because wind determines whether or not waves are clean enough to surf at Honeysuckle Point, 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 October, swells large enough to cause surfable waves at Honeysuckle Point run for about 54% of the time.

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