Victorian Surf Forecast by Craig Brokensha (issued Monday 4th April)

Best Days: Wednesday morning east of Melbourne for the keen, Saturday until mid afternoon all regions, Sunday morning

Features of the Forecast (tl;dr)

• Small, inconsistent mid-period W/SW swell building tomorrow PM, peaking Wed, easing Thu
• Light W/NW tending S winds on the Surf Coast tomorrow, light S/SW tending S east of Melbourne
• Light E/SE-SE tending stronger SE winds Wed
• Gusty E/SE-SE winds Thu and Fri with a small SE windswell
• Inconsistent, mid-period W/SW swell Sat with N/NE tending E/SE winds, easing Sun with strong N tending N/NW then S/SW winds
• Small, short-lived pulse of SW swell filling in Mon, easing Tue
• Light N/NW tending S winds Mon, gusty S/SE Tue

Recap

A poor weekend of surf with a mix of easing mid-period S/SW swell and localised SE windswell with fresh SE winds on Saturday, lighter yesterday. Today conditions are clean across the Surf Coast but with tiny leftovers, bumpy and 2-3ft to the east.

This week and weekend (Apr 5 – 10)

The next couple of days look to remain poor for surfing in general with waves for the desperate if you're really keen.

Tomorrow will start tiny with light W/NW winds on the Surf Coast and a light S/SW breeze to the east but we should see a very inconsistent and small, mid-period W/SW swell moving in through the afternoon, peaking on Wednesday.

The source of this swell was a persistent but weak mid-latitude frontal progression pushing through the southern Indian Ocean through last week and into the weekend.

The Surf Coast should build to an inconsistent 2ft tomorrow afternoon with moderate S'ly winds, 3ft to the east with Wednesday seeing 2ft+ and 3-4ft sets respectively. The Mornington Peninsula and Phillip Island will be best dawn Wednesday with a light SE-E/SE breeze before a strong high moves in during the day, squeezing against a deepening surface trough off the southern NSW coast. This will bring strengthening SE winds, shifting E/SE through the day.

Strong E/SE-SE winds will persist through Thursday and Friday as the trough remains slow moving off the East Coast and swell wise, Wednesday's swell will be on the ease, mixed in with some poor SE windswell across the Surf Coast.

A small pulse of mid-period SW swell is due Friday but it'll be below Wednesday's and with those average winds.

Some slightly better, inconsistent mid-period W/SW energy is due Saturday, easing through Sunday generated by another relatively weak but elongated frontal progression that's currently firing up towards Western Australia. Fetches of strong W/SW winds will be aimed through our medium-range swell window, with inconsistent sets to 2ft generally expected on the Surf Coast with the odd 3ft'er on the magnets, 3-5ft to the east.

Winds will improve as the high starts to move east on the weekend, bringing a light N/NE breeze with fresh E/SE sea breezes and stronger N winds Sunday morning ahead of a trough and evening S/SW change.

This trough will deepen into a weak low on approach to us during the weekend (quickly dipping south-east), producing a small short-lived pulse of mid-period W/SW swell for Monday afternoon and Tuesday though at this stage only to 2ft to maybe 3ft on the Surf Coast and 4ft+ to the east. Winds look N'ly early but another trough looks to bring a S'ly change when the swell peaks through the afternoon.

Following this there's still nothing significant on the cards as weak polar and mid-latitude systems push through our swell window. We'll have a closer look at the outlook for the rest of next week on Wednesday though.