South Australian Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday June 3rd)

Best Days: Mid Coast tomorrow afternoon and Wednesday, Mid Coast Friday and Sunday, South Coast tomorrow and early Wednesday, again Saturday

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Moderate sized, inconsistent W/SW groundswell filling in tomorrow, peaking into the PM, easing Wed
• Mod-fresh NE-N/NE tending variable N winds into the PM tomorrow
• Variable offshore winds Wed AM, shifting S/SE down South, tending S/SW on the Mid and S/SE later
• Smaller Thu with mod-fresh S/SE winds
• Inconsistent W/SW groundswell for Fri, easing Sat
• Variable offshore winds Fri ahead of sea breezes
• Freshening N/NW winds Sat
• Small-moderate sized W/SW swell for Sun with E/SE-SE winds ahead of sea breezes

Recap

Friday’s rapid increase in swell from the strong mid-latitude low moving through the Bight cleaned up quickly into Saturday while starting to ease in size with pumping 2-3ft waves in the gulf and solid but lumpy 4-5ft surf across Middleton.

Sunday was smaller but still a fun 1-2ft in the gulf with plenty of size still to 3ft across Middleton.

Today we’ve got smaller leftovers down South with, bumpy waves inside the gulf though with the odd stray set of west swell.

Pumping surf (for the Mid), Saturday morning

This week and weekend (Jun 4 - 9)

Looking at the period ahead and it’s a bit of a tricky one with less reliable, inconsistent W/SW swells with initially favourable winds for the Surf Coast tomorrow, then becoming flukey thanks to instability hanging around the region.

The incoming west energy has and will continue to be generated by strong mid-latitude frontal activity over in the Indian Ocean, west-southwest and south-west of Western Australia.

It’s at more of a distance from us so expect less consistency than the swell seen on the weekend and late last week.

The first is due tomorrow, with a peak into the afternoon to an inconsistent 2ft+ on the Mid Coast, 3-4ft across Middleton. We should then see the well easing into Wednesday from 2ft and 3ft+ respectively.

Looking at the local winds and a moderate to fresh NE-N/NE wind will create bumpy conditions in the gulf, easing and tending light into the afternoon, creating improving conditions. The South Coast will be clean and great all day!

Into Wednesday as the swell eases, a trough is due to bring a S/SE change, but we should see early variable winds across the Victor region, offshore across the Mid Coast, likely going sea breezy then S/SE thereafter.

Thursday looks smaller and with moderate to fresh S/SE-SE winds, there’ll be nowhere to recommend.

A small, inconsistent mix of tricky W/SW swells are due into Friday, but the sources aren’t as good as the next two days, with more fractured fetches of strong to gale-force W/SW winds in our medium-long range swell window due to provide infrequent 1-2ft sets in the gulf, 3ft max across Middleton.

Winds should shift back to the NE down South on Friday morning, E/SE across the Mid Coast ahead of weak sea breezes, with fresher N/NW winds due on Saturday as the swells ease.

Into Sunday, a small to moderate sized pulse of new mid-period W/SW swell is due, generated by a small low forming under Western Australia Thursday.

The Mid looks to kick back to 1-2ft again, with 3ft sets off Middleton along with what looks to be E/SE-SE winds and sea breezes. We’ll confirm this on Wednesday.

Longer term, early next week looks slow until a strong mid-latitude low forming in the Bight brings what looks to be a bout of stormy surf mid-late week. More on this in the next update.