Look at Ocean Beach from a land angle when it’s firing. Once the perfection of peaks and barrels dotting the shoreline surrounding San Francisco settles in, you’re slapped with a question that can’t be overlooked: how in the hell does anybody actually get out there? Well, most of those pulled-back shots featuring an empty Pacific Ocean look empty for a reason — the waves are big enough that nobody (or nearly nobody) even bothers to try. But wake up on a day with a favorable swell interval, some impressive but still manageable size, and a rip or two, and half the city’s surfing population will show up to get theirs. Still, it’s the half that’s willing to endure one of surfing’s most brutal paddles.
Videographer Jamy Donaldson managed to capture a day at OB that skipped all this overthinking. Taking us over the lineup by drone we see that plenty of people made that paddle on this early December day and plenty of people scored a wave or two that would be worth any hellacious battle against the sea. You also get a view of what’s out the back without having to squint through hundreds of yards of whitewash: perfectly groomed peaks, welcoming corners, open tubes, offshore winds, and a lot of people catching their breath and reaping the rewards of waves that were definitely earned. The work pays off here.
