La Espasa — local surf knowledge

The wave

La Espasa is a beach break in open surroundings, with nothing sheltering it on either side. That sets its character: when the conditions line up it works very well, but any wind that does not come clean from the south shows up straight away.

Right behind it, practically at the back of the beach, is the Cantabrian mountain range, and that geographical detail explains its best quality: the southerly wind arrives weakened, so an offshore that would already be flattening the wave elsewhere still leaves a good session here.

Size

Heights are given on the scale of the San Lorenzo page, which is the reference every beach in the area is compared against.

Minimum: 0.9 m. Below that there is nothing to work with, however good the rest is.
The good range: from 1.1 to 1.5 m. That is where the beach gives its best.
Maximum: 1.7 m. That is already the limit of what it holds, not its sweet spot.

It is the beach that asks for the most swell of the three in the east: Vega starts at 0.7 m and Ribadesella at 0.8, while here there is nothing until 0.9.

Period

Along with size, this is the variable in charge. La Espasa is not happy just because there is swell: it asks that swell to have some depth to it.

Minimum: 9 s, and that minimum goes hand in hand with the minimum size.
The best values: between 12 and 14 s.
Above 14 s it does not get worse, it is simply rare for it to happen.

Of the three eastern beaches it is also the most demanding here: Vega works from 7 s and Ribadesella from 8.

Swell direction

Best: between 315° and 359°, from north-west to north.
With a straight northerly swell (up to about 10°) there is hardly any difference: it still gets in nicely.
The margins are practically those of San Lorenzo, so with a more open north-westerly swell (from 290° on) it is still surfable, even if it is no longer the same.
A westerly swell: the beach sits side-on and loses a lot.
An easterly or southerly swell: it does not get in.

That wide window is what separates it from Ribadesella, which only works in a very narrow sector.

Wind

Good: the whole sector running from 115° to 241°, that is, the southerlies in the broad sense.
The best: a straight southerly, around 180°.
Strong southerlies do not spoil it. Sitting right against the mountains, the southerly wind weakens a good deal before it reaches the water.
Cross-offshore affects it quite a bit. In open surroundings, the edges of the good sector — the south-east and the south-west — are no longer worth what a straight southerly is, especially if they blow hard.
Bad: northerlies.

Tide

It is surfed on any tide. It is not a beach that depends on the tide.
On a low it breaks a little closed out, so mid tide is the safest bet.
As at every sandbank beach, the banks change through the year and there is no exact tide that always holds good.

How it compares with Vega and Ribadesella

The three get exactly the same swell report, because they fall on the same point of the forecast grid. All the difference is in how each beach responds:

La Espasa asks for more swell than the other two: 0.9 m against 0.7 at Vega.
It asks for more period: 9 s, against 7 at Vega and 8 at Ribadesella.
Its swell window is the widest, almost that of San Lorenzo, while Ribadesella only works between 324° and 10°.
It holds less at the top end: it is too much at 1.7 m, when Ribadesella still works at 1.8–1.9.

In short: it is the one that gives the fewest good days of the three, but when a north-west swell of a metre-plus comes in with a long period and a light southerly, it is one of the best waves in the east.