A ferocious late winter storm is currently pounding the Tahoe area. Yesterday, as the leading edge of the storm flirted with the Sierra Crest, the winds gusted to well over 100 mph. Such strong winds over the lake can mean only one thing – surf!

Rocks at Sand Harbor

You might wonder what kind of person would purposefully dive into 40 degree water in 40-50 mph winds, when it’s 30 degrees out, in March, with a huge snowstorm bearing down on them? Crazy, right? You’d be correct in that assumption. I called up legendary Tahoe surfer and renowned ski filmmaker Scott Gaffney, and sure enough, he was planning on heading out in the afternoon. Scott wanted to wait a few more hours to give the wind the chance to whip up the waves.

The coming storm

We met in Incline at Burnt Cedar beach, and sussed out the waves. They were peeling pretty good around the private pier to the west of the parking lot, but Scott didn’t like the look of them, and the wind was howling. By howling I mean “blow you over” howling. So we hopped back into the car, and headed east through Incline and on to Sand Harbor.

Sand Harbor was looking….messy. But surfable. In fact, there were two guys already in the water, bobbing up and down in the waves. The wind was not quite as strong here, but it was still freezing. Scott and Mike from Squaw suited up and get ready to jump in.

Scott about to paddle out

The surf was…small. But the guys managed to get up for some short rides. More for the novelty than anything else, but I could see the potential for some serious waves at a few places around Sand Harbor.

Gaffney on a wave

Does this count as a bottom turn? Hard to say…

Shredding!

I unfortunately had to head back to Truckee at 5:15, so I only managed to fire off a few frames of the action. The sky to the west was growing ominously darker, and by the time I left, raindrops had begun to fall from the sky. Scott told me alter on that the waves got bigger and better after I had left – oh well.

Riding Tahoe

Next time, I’m going to invest in one of these and hop into the water myself and try to get some perspective shots from down low with the little s90:

s90 Waterproof Housing

Check out Scott’s sweet website he stopped working on in 1998 http://www.scottgaffney.com. He’s also got some more up-to-date information at MSP’s website – http://skimovie.com