There are plenty of places throughout the world, mainly in the Northern Hemisphere, that would be a sure bet to score solid surf numerous times during the month of January. Like, for example, and not limited to: Hawaii, the West Coast, Caribbean, and Europe. In the heart of the winter season, both the North Pacific and North Atlantic hold the highest potential to produce their strongest frontal storm systems of the year. However, after checking over the long-range models, California is shaping up to be not just a sure bet, but a best bet.
We have a series of strong storms that will set up in a conveyor-belt-like fashion through the rest of 2011 and into 2012, marching one after the other from west to east across the North Pacific and straight at the West Coast. With a more southerly and direct track of each gradually intensifying storm, solid back-to-back West/WNW groundswells are lining up on the horizon for the entire Golden State. Starting on the Near Year's weekend, this run of successive swells looks to continue through at least the first half of January. Although these storms are still pending development, at this point, a couple of the systems are looking very likely to deliver the largest swells of this winter season, thus far. (Check the CA forecasts.)
