the detailed forecast has friday only up to waist,but the line graph shows bigger? why? also, why is cape may proper often forecast to have decent swell when it's flat there?
cape may is a tricky forecast, so please use the swellinfo forecast for this area as a guidance to help you make your own decision. This swell looks to have a fair amount of East in it, so this is good given the North current isn't too terrible. As far as if they swell/surf plot lines dont match to the detailed forecast.... This will happen if the swell direction is outside of the swell window for the forecasted location. So where cape may faces south, and the more east facing breaks will see larger surf. Due to the location inside the mouth of the bay, this is an extremely tidal surf area. You really need to have some local experience in order to know how it works best. Because there is only a couple of main areas to surf, your best bet is to do your homework and test out the waters.
thanks a lot as always,swellinfo! you confirmed what i've been trying to figure. when it's a long lasting swell to the south of cape may,an east swell could push it in there. beachbreak,central jersey could be the land of the closeouts with east swell. i'm thinking sometime late friday or sometime saturday could be good in cape may. i've seen it go from tiny to good to flat in a flash a bunch of times with that cape may tide effect.
oh yeah,i forgot to mention you might have misunderstood. the two conflicting forecasts on the page are both for cape may. the detailed forecast on the left side of the page says a lot smaller than the line graph forecast to the right. can you please explain that?
cape may is as tricky as it gets forecasting wise. ive been surfing there for 5 years and still and still get it wrong. its strang becuase although it is a south facing beach, it picks up a (building)NE swell the best. S swells must lose their power in the deeeper water just south of the cape and never really provide the waves you'd think it'd get. as for the tides, high can make it flat and low can provide head high barrels all within a couple hours....or it might be the other way around
I go Cape May alot. The last time i went it was ok but up near atlantic city I got glassy shoulder hig
to the tide,swell and wind all look right for cape may to be good at some point between sunrise and noon tomorrow. what do you think?
I've had the opposite experience...I've consistently been dissapointed on NE swells at CM and really scored on south swell/north wind setups. Conditions like today (NE wind swell) have been real let downs.
