Surf Forecast Surf Report
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
  • Country flag icon
app storeplay store

Playa Ballena Surf Stats

All swells

(any wind direction)

Good Surf

(light / offshore wind)

The rose diagram describes the combination of swells directed at Playa Ballena through a typical March, based on 3362 NWW3 model predictions since 2007 (values every 3 hours). The wave model does not forecast surf and wind right at the coastline so we have chosen the most applicable grid node based on what we know about Playa Ballena. In this particular case the best grid node is 52 km away (32 miles). The rose diagram shows the distribution of swell sizes and swell direction, while the graph at the bottom shows the same thing but lacks direction information. Five colours represent increasing wave sizes. Very small swells of less than 0.5m (1.5 feet) high are shown in blue. These happened only 85% of the time. Green and yellow represent increasing swell sizes and red shows highest swells greater than >3m (>10ft). In both graphs, the area of any colour is proportional to how commonly that size swell was forecast. The diagram implies that the most common swell direction, shown by the longest spokes, was SE, whereas the the dominant wind blows from the E. Because the wave model grid is away from the coast, sometimes a strong offshore wind blows largest waves away from Playa Ballena and out to sea. We lump these in with the no surf category of the bar chart. To avoid confusion we don't show these in the rose diagram. Because wind determines whether or not waves are surfable at Playa Ballena, you can load a different image that shows only the swells that were forecast to coincide with glassy or offshore wind conditions. Over an average March, swells large enough to cause good for surfing waves at Playa Ballena run for about 6% of the time.

Also see Playa Ballena wind stats

Compare Playa Ballena with another surf break

Nearest
Nearest