Around this time every year on Australia’s East Coast that the temperature begins dropping, the days get shorter, the winds swing offshore, and surfers begin restlessly stirring.
Autumn has arrived and with it the first real swells of the year. Surfers, who have subsisted mainly on summer wind-swells and beach breaks now shift their gaze to the local reefs, where they’ll soon be reacquainted with waves that offer both consequence and reward.
The East Coast was recently battered with a weather bomb that delivered rainfall measured in metres rather than in millimetres, and once the dousing was complete, surfers were treated to a couple of days of offshore winds and solid swell.
Nowhere was this more apparent than on NSW South Coast, where one of the stretch’s most menacing waves fired up after a long summer slumber.
In this clip, Tim Bonython captures a hardy crew taking it on, including Russell Bierke, Scott Dennis and Matt Dunsmore.