VANCOUVER ISLAND WINDTALK

I am interested in spending more time on the water this fall and winter and clearly Centennial Beach is a good option ( like tomorrow afternoon for example!). I've been there once and it is clear that one has to take into account the tide level as well as the wind.

Can someone tell me how high the tide level should be to enable windsurfing at Centennial? What's a good url for the tide at Centennial? Is Point Roberts a better bet on a ESE wind? Oh, and is a weed fin required all year round? I was there in March and there were no weeds. Maybe it was just a lucky day (being that it was 5.0 conditions and there were nice big rollers!) Thanks. mb

for a good tide/current predictor that is free and no need to install anything go here - http://www.tides.com/cgi-bin/tcweb.exe then bring up nearest loction to Boundary Bay which is Blaine(Semiahmoo Bay) ... according to my charts Boundary dries around 1.4 to 1.8 meters(depending on what part of the bay you're in) so i'm guessing you'll need at least 2.0 meters and up

tomorrows tide

thanks for the inforrmation, and I'm sure that MB guy will also say thanks, firstonlastoff

Thanks Pimp Hand. That's good technical information. Very useful for plotting strategy once the Forecast put's us on alert!

Does anyone know whether Crescent Beach is a better alternative for launching on a SE-S-SW wind? It looks like deeper water there. I haven't heard of anyone windsurfing at Crescent Beach but then again no one tells me anything! Is there a windshadow?

Thanks again PH.

mb wrote:Can someone tell me how high the tide level should be to enable windsurfing at Centennial? Oh, and is a weed fin required all year round?

Tomorrow looks very promising for Centennial. For tide anything above 2.5m is good, that's after 1:30pm tomorrow. A weed fin is a very good idea.

You can sail from crescent on south winds but if there is any east in it the wind is cut off. We're most likely going to sail from Centennial tomorrow as the forecast is showing SE winds. If it turns SW it's only a few minutes over to the ferry terminal without taking your wetsuit off. ;) Ask on the http://thewindsurfer.com as I haven't sailed at crescent beach yet and I know there are a number who have that frequent the site.

So that would be anything above 6 or so feet on the Tide Chart posted above? On that basis it looks like it would be good from 2pm to about 9 pm (not that I'm into night sailing in a storm!).

Thanks for all the good advice everyone.

For Centenial you need about 9 feet or you are walking a long way. Crescent can be sailed on any tide depending on the wind direction. In a south or SSE you can sail in the channel. The water will likely be billiard table flat if the tide is out. Weed fins are essentially mandatory. The swells are better at Centennial but it really needs to be SE. Crescent can be sailed from SE round to North.

It was great 5.0 sailing at Centennial on thursday. Went out at 12 even though there was a bit of a walk to the water. Well worth it, perfect 1.5m side onshore waves. I was sailing a 4.2 completely powered up on a 70L board. Weed fins definitely needed.