Praia do CDS

Best Surf Season (October - March)

At Praia do CDS the surf year is all about the North Atlantic. From October through March, the storm track deepens and low-pressure systems roll toward Iberia with impressive regularity. The average wave height sits between 5.5ft (1.7m) and 6.5ft (2.0m), with periods from 11.3 to 13.0 seconds, giving the beach the kind of long-period, powerful WNW, NW and W groundswell it is built to handle. The phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation matters too: negative phases often push the storm track into Iberia, generating even more of the west-southwest through northwest swell that lights up this beach. This is when the spot has real size and juice.

The winter trade-off is wind. The ideal offshore SSW/SW/WSW/W wind only blows 20-26 percent of the time during these months, and the prevailing NNW cross-shore plus occasional NE/ENE onshore flow can easily chop up the lineup. You need to pick your windows - usually around frontal passages and high pressure clear-outs - but when the wind turns offshore, the combination of big Atlantic swell and clean conditions is as good as it gets on this stretch of the Portuguese coast.