Surfing New Jersey -- catching waves at Belmar, a surprise surf session.

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Surfing New Jersey

I wasn't planning on surfing New Jersey. On vacation visiting my friend Brian for a few days in the middle of summer, I figured waves were out of the question.

On the second day of my trip, Brian and I bumped into a surfer friend of his at a bar. When he found out I was a surfer from California, he gushed about the great surf and clean beaches around New Jersey. “In fact,” he said, “I bet they’re cleaner than your beaches.” Uh . . . OK. Maybe relative to the days when they found medical waste on the beaches. I didn’t want to get into a pissing contest about how MY beaches are better than YOUR beaches, so I let that one slide. I just wanted to know my chances of finding swell on this trip. There was a surprise weather system off the coast, he said, that would probably kick up some small windswell in the next day or two.

surf map New Jersey Brian had to go to work the next day, so I had him drop me off at Belmar for the day. It’s one of those boardwalk-carnival towns that you see up and down the East coast (I know California has them too, just not near me). It was a sunny, windless weekend, the beach was packed with people, and sure enough, there were waves.

It wasn’t big – probably 3-4 foot and a little mushy, but definitely ridable. I frantically asked surfers where I could rent a board and kept hearing, “I don’t know” and “not around here.” Finally one guy said he had an extra one and his friends would get it. The friends never showed up, so he said to just take his. Nice guy.

I grabbed the board and eagerly paddled out. A wave came in and I paddled, popped up, and felt my feet slip right out from under me. This board needed more wax. I frantically paddled back in and borrowed some wax from some girls. After waxing the board, I paddled back out and surfed for about an hour. Though the surf wasn’t great and I was cold without my wetsuit, I had a blast. When I saw the nice guy packing up his stuff, I came back in, returned the board, and profusely thanked him.

Unlike when I surfed Australia with huge expectations, it was my total lack of expectation this time that made surfing New Jersey so fun. The whole thing was just a pleasant surprise.

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