South East Queensland and Northern New South Wales Surf Forecast by Ben Matson (issued Monday 9th November)

Best Days: Wed PM/Thurs AM: low chance for some small, inconsistent lines of S swell in Northern NSW, only at south swell magnets. Sat PM/Sun/Mon: small combo of building S/SE and E/SE swells, with developing S'ly winds, best suited to the semi-exposed points in Northern NSW or outer points in SE Qld.

Recap: Surf size remained small in SE Qld over the weekend but Northern NSW picked up some fun waves from the south. Winds remained mainly light on Saturday even as a southerly change pushed up the coast, and Sunday delivered periods of SW winds at times in and around some impressive thunderstorm activity (hope the bloke at Suffolk is OK!). Today we’ve seen the weekend’s swell sources fade however the trough associated with the weekend's southerly change has remained close to the region (spawning yesterday's impressive rain), maintaining fresh S/SE winds about the coastal margin. This has also slightly increased surf size across the Gold and Sunshine Coasts with bumpy 2ft+ sets on offer. A small south swell has padded out exposed beaches in Northern NSW with small peaky waves.

Synoptic overview

Nothing major throughout the forecast period.

The trough across SE Qld will contract northwards through Tuesday so our current source of local SE swell will ease over the coming days.

A series of small, poorly aligned but very long period south swells may light up south swell magnets in Northern NSW with occasional waves mid-week, but nothing overly special is expected due to the poor storm track.

Another coastal trough forming along the East Coast this week will initially remain outside of our swell window however a ridge will build across the north-eastern Tasman Sea, which will generate a small east swell for the end of the week and the weekend.

The weekend looks a little more dynamic with a Tasman Low expected to form off Southern NSW around Friday as the trough pushes eastwards, which should generate S/SE swells for the weekend.

A strong ridge between New Zealand and Fiji this weekend should maintain swell to moderate easterly swells for the region early next week.

This week (Tuesday 10th - Friday 13th)

Southeast QLD: The coastal trough lingering across SE Qld has maintain a little more strength than Friday’s models expected, so we’ve seen a little more size today than was predicted. However this system is already weakening and so Tuesday will see a slow easing trend (from what’s a small base to begin with).

Winds should be light SW tending moderate SE throughout the day but there’s a risk that the Sunshine Coast won’t see this early light favourable winds. In anywise you’ll need to aim for the beach breaks for the best waves.

The rest of the week looks tiny. A very weak ridge across the Northern Tasman Sea will probably stop the SE Qld coast from becoming totally flat; in fact we’re still looking at a minor strengthening of E/SE winds around Wednesday which may lead to a small bump Thursday (mainly the Sunshine Coast, 1-2ft exposed beaches tops and smaller on the Gold Coast).

But in general the rest of the week looks very small and unattractive indeed. Light winds are expected all week until the northerly flow resumes around Friday.

Northern NSW: No real size for the next few days. The coastal trough off SE Qld is poorly aligned for our region so we can expect a prolonged period of very small surf. 

The only feature to watch out for is a series of small, long period south swells generated well below the continent over the last few days (in fact, one of them mid-last week SW of WA).

These swells are generally poorly aligned within our swell window and will be very small in size once they reach the coast but there is some hope that the last of the swells - arriving across the Mid North Coast on Wednesday afternoon and the Far North Coast overnight into Thursday - may produce some occasional 2ft sets at south swell magnets owing to a long swell period of around 16-18 seconds. However the extreme travel distance will result in very lengthy breaks between sets.

I’d be very cautious about getting your hopes up for anything worthwhile (on a positive note, the wind outlook is generally good for south swell magnets both of these days, especially the mornings). 

I’ll be keeping a close eye on the orientation of the developing trough over Southern NSW mid-week, as there is some potential for a swell increase out of the E/SE on Friday. But right now it’s a line-call, and could swing either way (if anything happens, it’ll probably be favoured towards the Mid North Coast and not so much the North and Far North Coasts).

Let’s wait and see what happens though, as northerlies are also expected on Friday.

This weekend (Saturday 14th - Sunday 15th)

It’s a little too early to have confidence for the weekend outlook, however it does appear that the mid-week small spell will be broken, by way of a developing Tasman Low off Southern NSW. This will result in a southerly change pushing up the NSW coast on Saturday (with N’ly winds ahead of it at first, in SE Qld), with building S/SE swells in its wake. 

We’re also likely to see a small building E’ly swell form a ridge across the northern Tasman Sea though no great size is expected.

Right now, the most likely outcome is for some small peelers on the semi-exposed points in Northern NSW and the outer points in SE Qld, under the developing S’ly flow, probably best suited to Sunday. But I’ll have more on that in Wednesday’s update.

Next week (Monday 16th onwards)

Whatever the Tasman Low does from Friday onwards, there’s a reasonable chance that its influence will hold into the first half of next week. Hopefully this will maintain small point waves across Northern NSW and SE Qld. 

Otherwise, there are suggestions we’ll see some tropical developments in and around the Fijian region this weekend, which, in conjunction with a strong ridge between it and New Zealand, could lead to a building E’ly swell throughout next week - initially small but with some stronger size potential for the middle part of next week. I’ll have more on this on Wednesday.