Northen Baja Day Trip: Stand Up Paddling Baja Reefs

Northern Baja's got surf. If you've never been there before, let me fill you in. That part of the coast is full of hidden reefs and tucked away point breaks. The coast is being heavily developed, giant hotels and condo slab-complexes are being built right along the cliffs. These beige monsters block from site the waves that are peeling off below them. It's a perfect spot for stand up paddlers- you can paddle into waves that are basically off limits to ninety percent of the guys surfing down there. If you can find a spot to drop the boards in you can surf four or five good waves in a two hour session.

A couple of days ago, Emerald City Surf Shop owner Kelly Kraus started floating the idea of a day trip to a couple of reef breaks north of Rosarito- I was instantly in on the idea. Here's a few shots of our trip:



Photo: Here's how it starts for me: 6:40am, coffee gurgling away, 7-11 big mug and some Von's label powder stuff- I call it surf fuel, stoke fluid... you get the idea.



Photo: Kelly's got a line on a surf-shack wedged onto the volcanic cliffs just to the south of a nice split peak. Here's the Lurk-Van with our boards inside... this is our off-load point. It's good to have the boards inside... we could be plumbers, we could be surfers... who knows?



Photo: A quick peek at what's waiting for us out there. Off in the distance, that's a little left running off along a reef and right dumping over some boils... fun stuff!



Photo: One more shot looking out from the surf-shack we used as our launch point... check out Kelly's sweet, custom 9'2" Rusty stand up board- that's a fun board.

More to come!