Yesterday we went to Horseshoe Bay beach, for two reasons. First, to check out the volleyball tournament. And second -- okay, actually this is first -- to swim in the waves being generated by incoming Hurricane Florence (it was still a troical storm at the time, but has now been upgraded to a Cat 1). Upon arriving at the beach, we were greeted with this sign:
Still, I had to go in. There was a handful (maybe 20) people swimming in the waves, which were quite large at times. It was quite fun. Some of the waves were just massive, and you had to submerge and let those go over you, lest you be smashed into the sand below.
You could fee the rip current most of the time. Rip currents don't pull you under, but rather pull you out to sea. At first the rip current was pulling sideways, but later I got caught in a stronger one that was pulling out. It did not pull me very far, but suddenly when I cam down from a wave, I couldn't touch the bottom. Knowing that I must be very close to standing depth, I tried to swim back a few feet. But the current wasn't cooperating. It took close to ten minutes to swim those few feet, and only by the help of a few larger waves did I finally make back to standing depth. Here are a few photos:
And a video: