Lack of surf has canceled the annual contest at Mavericks, a spot some 20 miles south of San Francisco where swells the size of five-story buildings rise above the Pacific Ocean during the stormy months of winter. Since January, 24 surfers — including three from Hawai'i — have awaited one day's notice to travel to Half Moon Bay. Tomorrow was the last day to hold the competition.

"This season has been a testament to the fact that Mavericks is unpredictable and this contest is in the hands of Mother Nature," Jeff Clark said in a statement e-mailed to reporters. Clark calls the contest, and was the first surfer to paddle out at the Half Moon Bay spot in the 1970s.

The invited surfers from Hawai'i were Brock Little, Garrett McNamara and Jamie Sterling.

This year's contest would have been the sixth held at Mavericks since 1999. Called the 'Super Bowl' of surfing by organizers, the contest offers a $30,000 prize to the winner. It wasn't held for lack of surf in 2001, and in the two following years because it lacked a sponsor. The contest will be on again next winter, Mavericks Surf Ventures said in the statement.

Mavericks is famed for producing the biggest waves in the U.S. outside of Hawai'i, said Matt Warshaw, a San Francisco surfer and author. In the early 1990s the world's surfers discovered the spot. Until then, they looked to the North Shore of Oahu for the largest rideable waves.

"It was thought of as California's contender for the world's best big waves," said Warshaw, author of "The Encyclopedia of Surfing" (Harcourt, 2005).

This winter has been disappointing to those who waited for tropical currents to fuel storms and send big waves toward California, Mark Sponsler, a surf forecaster and big-wave rider, said in an interview. The bigger Mavericks waves have appeared about a third as often as they do during a good year, he said.

"For whatever reason, this year it's not happening," said Sponsler. "It's like being a junky. You're watching, you're waiting, you just want your fix. But you can't control Mother Nature."

Last year, the event drew a crowd of some 30,000 spectators — more than twice the population of Half Moon Bay. Crowds angled along the beach and the seaside cliffs to watch surfers drop down the face of 40-foot waves.

The surf can be treacherous. In December, 1994, professional Hawai'i surfer Mark Foo drowned while surfing at Mavericks. And Sponsler said most people who surf there have their own stories of being battered or hurt by avalanches of water.