Padang Padang Swell Window
Bali, Indonesia · part of the Padang Padang spot guide
- Swell window (from)
- 170°–270° (S–W)
- Best direction
- ~205° (SSW)
- Period sweet spot
- 12–16 s
- Open-ocean height (Hs)
- 5–15 ft
- Resulting faces
- 5–15 ft
Open-ocean vs. the face: the heights on buoys and forecast models are significant wave height (Hs) in deep water. What you ride is the breaking face, which depends on period, direction and this break's bathymetry — that's why the two rows above differ. PierMonkey's spot ratings already do this conversion for you.
The window runs from south-southeast through west, with the working sweet spot in the south-to-southwest band where the Bukit’s swell corridor sits — a more southerly angle lines the sections up better and straight west is the outer edge. It wants long-period groundswell of roughly 12-to-16 seconds and up; short-period wind swell does not produce the barrel.
This is a size-threshold wave — it will not break properly under roughly five feet of open-ocean height at long period, so alerts are set high. The face amplifies over the shallow reef and can noticeably exceed the offshore height, so the reported "feet" are not the model height.