We've all seen the sign on the internet, and many of us have made the pilgrimmage to see it in person.

But how many of us have actually witnessed a king wave?

I saw one yesterday. It scared the shiz out of me.

I was at Canal Rocks, fishing off the walkway. I'd read reports on the internet that you can climb down from the walkway and stand further out if you want to. At the time it was just starting to get light so I decided to stay on the walkway. I'm glad I did.

This was pretty much my view, minus the people and a lot darker:
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There was a good 3-3.5 metres between the bottom of the walkway, and the water channel there. Occasionally a wave would break over the rocks to the far left of the picture, and water would flow through the channel, much as this picture shows. Most of the time the water was reasonably still, there was a bit of movement, but not really moving very much.

I'd been there for about an hour when I heard a loud crash from a LARGE wave breaking, I looked at the bridge, and saw a fkn tsunami bearing down on it. The whitewater was over the walkway, and went halfway up the railing. I'm so glad I decided to set up away from the bridge -- I don't think it would have washed me off, but I would have gotten really wet. Had I decided to fish further out from the walkway on the rocks, then there is no way I would have stayed on the rocks. The set only had 2 waves in it, the second one was almost as big, it still washed over the bridge. After that had gone, everything settled down back to normal.


So that's a first -- I've actually seen a king wave. I'm not sure if you'd recognise it if you're surfing, you might just think "Fark I'm getting the hell away from that one" but in the context of standing on rocks, this one was as clear as day.


Has anyone else seen a king wave?