Forecasting good conditions

As a new surfskier I'm trying to figure out how to predict when the conditions are good. I've been using the abundant surf forecast sites and am just starting to understand the differences between waves good for surfing vs waves good for surfskiing... From what I'm starting to gather, we need waves that have a period of under 7-8 seconds so they're not too fast and a height of 1m or more, typ these are generated by wind not very far away. It's almost the opposite of what surfers are looking for: long period waves typically generated a long distance away. So does it come down to "don't look at waves, just look at wind"? I'm in southern california and wind & waves often don't align very well...

This may sound to simple but I just go and look. As hard as we try and as far as we've advanced in weather technology nothing works nearly as well as seeing it with our own two eyes.
I grew up on the west coast if Florida and nearly every hit afternoon a nasty storm would appear out of nowhere, showing that experience in your areas weather patterns is a big plus.

"Go out and look" is always good advice, but can be a bit difficult to follow when it takes an hour round-trip to do so. I am also trying to figure out how to plan ahead. It's pretty clear that the various surf forecasting sites enable surfers to plan a number of days ahead and I'm looking to do the same.

I am also very new to surfski. The combination of the two is what works best. You look at the weather forecast and that gives you a mental picture. When you get there it either confirms what you had in mind or not. Over time you learn to interpret the forecast based on your experience of the conditions.

I am getting the point now where I can look at the forecast and have a very good idea of what to expect if I were to head out. Luckily for me the stretch of coast I paddle is only a few kilometres away. Forecasting is getting better all the time but is by no means an exact science that is where your experience of the area comes into it's own.

HTH at least a bit.

M

More or less what you said seems right to me. I surf too, so the waves that each sport "likes" are definitely different. I think most people mainly look at the wind first with the waves being secondary. If you have 15+kts of wind in a good direction, you know it will be a pretty decent downwinder no matter what any groundswell might be doing. Groundswell might affect the currents and make for some chop, but that's something that depends on where you are and the tides too.

In SoCal you have arguably the most wind and wave forecasts in the world, so its just a matter of combining the experience between the readings from various buoys, stations, apps/websites and correlating that to what you will see in the real world. You will find some over estimate, some under, some skew, etc. so you just need to note that. A physical journal/notebook is actually really helpful.

NOAA buoys 46622 and 46624 are good for real-time data.