CONTINUOUSWAVE

I like this [recording of a boat which is perhaps a Boston Whaler MONTAUK 17 entering an inlet made at] Shark River Inlet (North NJ):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YCWvkFxTuk

Guy handles it with good technique. Positioning and speed are obviously key. Bow up; slow down. Most important: TAKE YOUR TIME! You don't have to drive your boat like a bulldozer.

Looking at the recording, I see that the small skiff--about the size of a MONTAUK 17--probably should have waited for one more wave. He is being followed into the inlet by a huge wave behind him. It would probably been easier to ride the back of the crest of the big wave into the inlet, rather than running ahead of it.

And that boat does look like a Boston Whaler, but I can't see it clearly enough to tell for certain.

It's a Montauk

The guy seems to be intentionally trying to get on the forward face of a wave and surf. I would not recommend or endorse that technique. A better approach is to ride the back side of a large wave entering the inlet, adjusting boat speed to remain in a position ahead of the trough and the next wave coming along behind.

He is trying to surf which is not what you should do, but it looks like he is just playing or at least trying to figure out how his boat reacts.

As Jim mentioned, you should ride behind the crest.

The New Zealand coast guard put out a nice instructional video explaining how to handle these inlets. See:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNTk2IejfFE

The motion-picture presentation mentioned above is a nicely produced presentation, and much better instructional quality than the initial video that begins this thread, which shows some guy fooling around at an inlet, and trying to surf down the front of big waves.

However, you need to skip the first 7-minutes and 45-seconds of blah-blah-blah, to get to the actual information in the New Zealand presentation. And at that point, the video describes how to LEAVE an inlet and go out to sea.

Later in the film, returning to the inlet is demonstrated. This begins at about 10-minutes-20-seconds into the film.

This link will take you to the information about returning to the inlet, skipping about ten minutes of preliminaries:

https://youtu.be/uNTk2IejfFE?t=628

In this film they talk about "crossing the bar", which refers to the typical shallowing of water depth due to sand deposits or sand bars that are common at many inlets. Wave height builds up as the bottom shoals approaching land, and this is a situation found in many harbor entrances. The film does not talk about waves stacking up due to the influence of an outgoing current from the river or from a tide. Tide effects or other outgoing current effects are very briefly mentioned, but never explained. Also, at the inlet shown, there is not a narrow channel with boulder rip-rap defining the channel. The channel is a broad and open entrance.

The important points mentioned in the narration are:

--pick a wave to cross the bar
--stick with one wave and stay with it; no fooling around with any other waves

Although not explicitly mentioned in the narration, the boat is to be maintained behind the crest of the wave you are following into the bar. This is shown in an animation illustration, but the narrator does not reinforce the importance of this location.

--stay focused on what is ahead; another crew watches behind for any waves catching up with you
--if you don't stay with the wave you have chosen, you will fall behind, risking the next wave catching up to you and capsizing your boat
--proceed straight-on and at adequate speed
--you will know when you are across the bar when the water becomes calmer