El Huayaco • Statistics for January

January: A Summer Lull With Hidden Long-Period Power

The austral summer is in full swing, and El Huayaco sees average swell heights of 4-5ft (1.4m) with a 13.0s period - solid, long-period groundswell from the South Pacific. A remarkable 98.8 percent of the swell arrives from the optimal SSW and SW window, with the bulk falling in the 3-6ft (1-2m) range. If you can find a clean corner, the ocean is far from flat.

The catch is wind. S and SSW flow combine for over 78 percent of the observations, with SW adding another 12.6 percent, and these are directly onshore at a beach facing southwest. Winds are mostly light to moderate from 0-20kph, but only 1 percent of the time does the wind align offshore from the NNO/NO/ONO/O quadrant. Daily air temperatures average 20.6°C (16.7-26.3°C), water sits at 19.0°C, and precipitation is almost non-existent at 0.15 mm/day, so the best play is to wait for a dawn light-wind window and grab one of those clean, lined-up SSW sets.