Victoria Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Wednesday 17th December)

Best Days: Early Thursday east of Melbourne, most of the day to the west, early Friday Torquay, Saturday morning Surf Coast, Sunday morning to the east

Recap

Yesterday was small and clean across the Surf Coast through the morning before winds swung temporarily onshore and then back to a strong to gale-force W'ly as a strong cold front pushed across us.

The Mornington Peninsula was also clean at dawn but winds quickly swing around to the West, before amazingly doing an about face back to the E/NE around midday, cleaning conditions up again. Come mid-afternoon though winds went onshore again and with strength, writing off the surf for the rest of the day.

Today a better increase in W/SW swell seems to have come in slightly under the expected 3ft+ across the Surf Coast with clean but smaller 2-3ft waves across most breaks. The Mornington Peninsula was bigger and in the 6ft+ range but poor with the W'ly breeze. The swell should hopefully kick a little more in size through the day on the Surf Coast but winds will go onshore from the W/SW into the afternoon.

This week and weekend (Dec 18 - 21)

With this morning coming in a little under expectations, this shouldn’t affect the forecast for tomorrow's reinforcing W/SW swell, as it was generated from a different source – on the tail of the system that pushed through the Bight and across us yesterday afternoon.

This should produce a fun pulse of W/SW groundswell tomorrow morning with inconsistent 3ft sets continuing west of Melbourne and 5-6ft sets on the Mornington Peninsula.

Conditions will be good across both coasts early tomorrow morning with a N/NE breeze around dawn east of Melbourne, swinging more N/NW through the morning and then lighter W/NW ahead of a late W/SW change.

The Surf Coast should be nice and clean most of the day before that mid-late afternoon W/SW change hits.

The late change will be linked to a strong cold front that's currently pushing just south of the Bight towards us, generating a fetch of strong to gale-force W/SW winds through our swell window.

Sunday will be the day to surf east of Melbourne with the swell dropping back to a more manageable 3-4ft+ early, smaller later and under offshore NE winds. Get in through the morning though as fresh SE sea breezes will develop from around midday.

Next Monday onwards (Dec 22 onwards)

Monday will start tiny and with a lingering light onshore across both coasts but there should be glassy/lumpy waves across the Mornington Peninsula through the morning.

A slight lift in distant swell is due through the afternoon but conditions will be bumpy in any case.

Into Tuesday fresh onshore winds from the S/SW are expected with small to tiny amounts of swell, while a good SW groundswell is due into Wednesday. This should be generated by a broad but not overly strong polar front projecting up towards us over the weekend and come in at the 3ft and 6ft range respectively. Winds look as if they'll kick back around to the East but we'll review thus Friday.