Victorian Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Friday December 27th)

Best Days: Keen surfers Surf Coast tomorrow and Sunday mornings, exposed beaches Monday morning, next Friday and Saturday week

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Weak W/SW swell for this afternoon and tomorrow with a N/NW tending W/NW breeze, shifting S/SW late PM
• Small mid-period W/SW swell Sun and Mon AM, easing
• NW winds Sun AM, freshening from the S/SW into the PM
• Light, local offshore winds Mon (N/NE to the east, N/NW to the west) ahead of sea breezes
• Smaller Tue with light W/NW tending S/SW winds
• Moderate sized mid-period W/SW swell building Wed PM, peaking Thu
• Possible variable tending fresh S winds Wed, gusty S/SW tending S/SE winds Thu
• Larger W/SW groundswell filling in Fri, peaking through the day with E-E/NE tending fresh S/SE winds
• Easing swell Sat with NE tending SE winds

Recap

The swell backed off to the 3ft+ range across the exposed beaches yesterday but cleaned up nicely through the morning before becoming a bit more wind affected into the afternoon. The Surf Coast was a peaky 1-2ft through the morning, tiny after lunch.

Today we’ve got tiny surf and a shift in wind to the west but we should see some building W/SW swell into this afternoon but with freshening W/SW winds.

This weekend and next week (Dec 28 - Jan 3)

Today’s frontal system will be the source of W/SW energy this afternoon, with it due to back off in size through tomorrow morning from a weak 2ft+ or so on the Surf Coast with surf to 4ft+ to the east.

Conditions will clean up nicely tomorrow morning under a N/NW offshore, shifting W/NW later morning ahead of a S/SW change later into the afternoon.

Our pulse of mid-period W/SW swell for the afternoon and Sunday morning looks a little weaker and smaller now, with the source coming in a touch weaker than forecast earlier in the week. That being a frontal system currently moving south of the Bight today.

A continuation of 2ft+ surf is likely on the Surf Coast, 3-5ft to the east and with NW offshore ahead of slowly freshening S/SW winds into the afternoon.

Monday will start around a similar size to Sunday but then start to ease along with better, light, local offshore wind ahead of sea breezes. This looks the pick for the exposed beaches.

Following small surf Tuesday with weak W/SW-SW winds, the outlook for the middle to end of the week is better swell wise but winds look to be an issue.

A couple of healthy, back-to-back frontal systems firing up in the Southern Ocean, south-west of Western Australia should move east towards us and under the country over the weekend and early next week.

The first will generate a fetch of sub-gale-force W/SW winds with the second system generating stronger gale to severe-gales.

This should produce two successive pulses of W/SW energy, the first being mid-period in nature and arriving through Wednesday, building into the afternoon/evening and peaking Thursday morning with a stronger groundswell pulse for Friday.

The first pulse should reach 4ft across the Surf Coast and 6ft+ to the east on Thursday with the secondary pulse for Friday due to reach 5-6ft on the Surf Coast and 6-8ft to the east.

Local winds on Wednesday morning ahead of the building energy may be variable before freshening from the S’th with gusty S/SW tending S/SE breezes due into Thursday. Friday may see winds ease and tend light E/NE through the morning but we’ll confirm this on Monday.

Next weekend as the swell eases, we should see N/NE-NE offshore winds across the beaches to the east on Saturday while a trough might bring a S’ly change Sunday. See you Monday and have a great weekend!