Nazaré is known for extremes: one season a sleepy fishing village, the next a death-defying big-wave arena. Somewhere in between it even dishes out user-friendly beach break barrels. But one side it hasn’t shown for more than a decade is a rare right-hand slab.
When the photo popped up on my feed, the last place I would’ve guessed it came from was Nazaré. To get the story, I hit up local photographer Helio Antonio.
“It was September 2013. The summer was ending and a huge, rare sandbank had built up on the south side of the headland. There was so much sand that it actually created a beach connecting North Beach and the town beach — something the old locals said had last happened in the early 1900s.”
With the first swells of September, that sandbank came alive.
“There were three different sessions while it lasted,” Helio told me. “On one of them, the waves were gnarly. Not massive, but super heavy — thick barrels running along the narrow sandbank straight toward the rocks. The best ones were five to ten seconds long with no room for error, or you’d end up on the cliff. I don’t think that specific spot had ever been surfed before.”
When it was smaller, the wave softened into something far more inviting.
“The other two sessions were pretty fun. It only broke on the final sandbank, which had a huge beach with lots of room to fall and no rocks. A totally different vibe.”
But the slab was fleeting.
“It never broke like this again. A very uncommon phenomenon. We sometimes get a decent sandbank further down the cliff near the main beach, but it’s a completely different wave and nowhere near as consistent. We were lucky — maybe a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I’m just grateful I was there with my camera.”
Nazaré is a place of many faces, but even for the locals, it can still reveal something new.
