It's been a summer of mixed fortunes across the Australian coastline. Although we're less than a week away from February, Queensland is still yet to see any swells of significance light up its fabled sand bottom points. As a bare minimum, we'd normally expect to see at least one or two respectable groundswell events by now, with persistent easterly trade swells filling in the gaps between. Instead, Queensland's been dealt an extended period of small beach breaks with periods of unseasonable northerly winds. There are a couple of reasons for the lack of swell in Queensland and Northern New South Wales. The subtropical high pressure belt has been positioned a little further north than usual for this time of the year, and the semi-permanent high pressure system in the Tasman Sea hasn't been able to anchor itself in place for any great period of time - which has allowed it to be easily influenced by migrating lows and fronts pushing up from the Southern Ocean. In addition, the South Pacific Convergence Zone has remained unusually quiet so far this season. The combination of all of these factors has led to an absence of the typically strong trade winds we normally see through the Southern Coral Sea, Northern Tasman Sea and Southwestern Pacific. These winds are the crucial ingredient for keeping Queensland's coastline topped up with swell. On the other hand, the slightly more northern-latitude of the subtropical high pressure belt has allowed the Southern Ocean storm track to ride a little more close to the mainland than we usually see in summer, and a series of impressive low pressure systems have generated plenty of surf for Western Australia, South Australia and Victoria. This weekend is expected to deliver one of the better swells of the last few months, thanks to an incredible progression of frontal systems in the Far Southern Ocean, originating near Heard Island earlier in the week. As per the weather charts below, a broad belt of westerly gales presently covers several thousand kilometers of the Southern Ocean, and the resulting swells are expected make landfall in Western Australia on Thursday, South Australia late Friday, and Victoria and Tasmania early Saturday. The prolonged duration of this weather progression means that the swell will remain active across southern coastlines for at least a couple of days - check out the latest regional forecasts for more information. And.. if you're currently on the East Coast reading these notes and formulating an extended weekend road trip down south - halt those plans! The South Pacific is finally showing signs of life, and we're looking at a particularly juicy east swell next week. I'll have a fresh article on these developments tomorrow; in the meantime check out Craig Brokensha's Sydney forecast, or Steve Shearer's Queensland forecast for the goods. //BEN MATSON