Brett Barley lives in a wonderful place. Within spitting distance of his house is an expanse of ocean that offers up incredible waves and incredible fishing, both of which are things that Barley lives for. There’s a place, though, that stands out for him: Cape Point in Buxton, North Carolina.
It’s the pinnacle of Cape Hatteras, and due to the Labrador Current and the Gulf Stream smashing into each other just offshore, some interesting things go on there. All sorts of waves, “from a right point to a left point to A-frame shorebreak wedges,” as Barley says.
In the video above, he runs down the variety of setups the sandbar has gifted East Coast surfers over the years. Most notable of the bunch is Shelly Island, which was created back in 2017 and produced some of the area’s craziest left-handers in recent memory.
It’s a fickle place, though, and it constantly changes. “The sand changes every single day. The shorebreak this morning was a completely different set up than the shorebreak last night. It just is what it is. What’s rad is that even though you score it one day and the conditions line up for the next day… you might not score. It’s just crazy fickle.”
Barley even goes so far as to call it “the craziest sandbar in the world,” and after watching the footage it’s hard to find holes in his thesis.
