Kevin VoegtlinIt was shoulder-to-shoulder at the premier spots, but secret gems did go unridden ... but not unwatched.

Blown out. Played out. Over-crowded. Polluted. Morally bankrupt. All are reasonable descriptors for California ... on a summer day, when it's 2 feet and the waves are crap, the 405 is sweltering and knobs from the Inland Empire litter the lineup. But come winter time, or more specifically -- come a fitful run of northwest swells -- it's a completely different story.

California's Gold

When California's good, it's really good. Gallery

As we've seen over the past week at spots like Maverick's and Todos, the West Coast has its fair share of big-wave offerings, but lets be honest, who really wants to tackle a 20-footer? How does overhead and running sound? Rincon was working, as was any number of points throughout the state. Pulsing beachbreak wedges? Plenty of that too. There really was no shortage of surf terrain to tackle on this last run of swells.

But ultimately it was hard to tell who was more excited, the surfers or the photographers. Here's an offering from some of our contributors who were out there on the Coast Highway firing away.