Newcastle Surf Report June 14th
The wind is icy cold from the South today and it is blowing a gale. The wind would blow a dog off a chain, as my old captain used to say. This morning the wind was coming from the south west at eighteen knots. The water temperature is nineteen degrees which is relatively bearable for this time of the year in winter.
The forecast from the Weather Bureau is for winds from the south west of twenty five to thirty five knots inshore ranging to thirty five to forty knows offshore. I hope that the ships off Newcastle have gone out to sea a bit because this time last year the Pasha Bulker got washed up on Nobbys Beach after a huge storm that went into folk lore in the Hunter. Seas are supposed to be in the range of three to four metres with a South to South East swell getting bigger up to two to three metres.
I headed off today about 10 am and went along the harbour, trying to see if there was any swell getting into the harbour wall. No such luck as the swell is not big enough to be breaking inside the harbour breakwall. There were a few brave souls out at Nobbys but it was smallish and wind swept to the maximum. The swell on the open beaches was about four to six foot and messy because of the very strong winds. Merewether and Dixon Park were large and messy with the waves closing out, so no opportunity for a surf there.
I went up to the look out over Burwood Beach and had a look there but there were no decent surfable waves coming in there. I did not go to Blacksmiths because the wind was just blowing too hard to bother and I did not think the swell would be getting in there anyway. If the swell increases, there may be good waves at the obvious places around Blacksmiths. I will have a look tomorrow. Low tide was at 10.47 am today and high tide will be at 5:30 pm tonight. At 1:20 pm the wind was twenty knots from the South West. The swell forecast has the swell maxing out tomorrow on Sunday to about six to eight feet.