Sumatran Surfariis - Surfing Indonesia: Mentawais, Telos, Hinakos, Nias, and beyond...

NORTH

Hello folks. Well, planning for the first leg of our trip, deemed the “Hawg Reunion”, began well over a year before the trip actually began in mid-October, 2005. I believe the genesis for the term “Hawg” came from the fact that a majority of the guys on this trip worked at the same restaurant down in the Dana Point area where they all grew up, and the restaurant had sometime to do with Hawgs. I wouldn’t know for sure, as I’m more of an “Honorary Hawg”, as I went to college with two of the Hawgs, Lars Olsen and Chris Reed, and they’ve remained two of my favorite people on the planet ever since. Over the years, I’ve gotten to know all the remaining members of the Hawg Crew that joined this trip, including Rob Nava, John Sayers, Anders Olsen, Thomas Campbell, and Chris “Reno” Hurst. They are some of the most creative, caring, and flat out cool people I’ve ever met. The last passenger of the crew, Manny Caro, is more of an Honorary Hawg like myself, as he’s become friends with the Hawgs that now reside in Santa Cruz. But deep down Manny has Hawg blood, as he too is a very creative guy and becoming a very influential shaper in the Santa Cruz area (Mandala Custom Shapes). The Hawgs, real or honorary, are very spread out around the world, coming from areas such as Southern California, Central California, Northern California, Tahoe, Oregon, and Australia. So, it was a real endeavor getting everyone together. Chris Reed, who’s been with us once before, was the real catalyst for getting everyone together, and I’m so glad he was because it turned out to be such a special trip.

A quick note if you want to skip my longwinded story and just look at the photos: everyone on this trip surfed a ton. It wasn’t too often that one of us who had any photography skills wanted to stop surfing and take photos when the waves were cranking. When they did, they often took the water cam out and tried to get some creative, fresh ways of looking at waves. So, my point is, if you think the photos make the waves look good, they were often WAY better than that most of the time. Put succinctly, we scored. Oh, and there’s another reason why we didn’t get as many insane shots as we could: the weather. If you want to see what the weather was like pretty much every day, click here. Yep, it rained each and every day. It was uncanny. But that’s actually a blessing in disguise because the water is still totally warm and you don’t have to worry as much about getting sunburned. It actually makes things comfortable, and when the sun does come out finally you’re thinking, ‘Fark, it’s hot!!”

I hope these photos give you an idea of what a total trip is like. For many of us, it starts with a long, long journey just to get to Indo, and when you finally get to the hotel you’re both elated and exhausted. When you get on the boat, inevitably someone falls asleep holding his nuts and someone takes a picture (falling asleep holding your nuts seemed to be a common theme on this trip). Then, you can’t really sleep well that fist night because of the time zone changes and you’re so excited, so some people get up early and stretch and shake out the cobwebs. Then people see land and they get even more excited, so they start pulling the boards out of the bags. Everyone ooohs and aaahhhs at the site and smell of new boards, funky airbrushes, different designs and still curing resin. When you finally get to the first surf spot, you’re dying for the crew to get that speedboat down off the back of the boat so they can hurry you out to your first surf. Inevitably, someone can’t wait long enough and jumps off the side of the boat and begins to paddle out to the break (that’s me you see jumping off the side of the boat; it was like that on both trips, ha ha!). And that’s when the trip officially starts.

Looking through the photos, I’m reminded of some of the great times we had, and there were definitely several more that weren’t captured on film. It reminded me that the majority of waves we had were rights, so Manny, Anders and I (the three goofyfoots) really got to work on our pigdogs and backside turning. One thing the photos also remind me of was that we pretty much got to practice these things in total isolation. With the exception of Lagundri Bay and a couple people staying at the Asu camp, we basically surfed alone the entire time. And the waves were goooood, too. It never really got macking, but we were never at a shortage for waves, either. When the waves were smaller and/or some of the guys were just surfed out, they’d go fishing. After an initial skunk or two, the guys managed to score a good number of fish that made for some delicious meals. I think we caught a total of 9 or 10 on the 14-day trip, which is about an average total, but plenty to keep Ed the cook busy and happy. If Scuzz was feeling particularly festive, he’d bust out the ice cream and chocolate wafers to make a really sweet desert. If Scuzz was acting particularly cheeky, I’d remind him who’s boss by putting him in a Guillotine Choke. ;)

When the waves got junky one afternoon at Lagundri, the guys took the speedboat to Nias so they could walk around land and check it out. Just trying to walk to the restaurants and bungalows took a lot of effort as there’s so much new reef. The changes really are quite shocking. The guys took a trip to the top of the island, and you can see a photo showing that there are still villagers taking refuge up on the hill, afraid that another tsunami might come. The changes at Bawa were even more drastic. When we first pulled up, I wasn’t even sure it was Bawa. When you get out in the lineup, you’re thinking, “Uh, where do we line up?” However, when you take the speedboat in to get to land, it’s WAY worse than it looks from the water. You practically have to climb a mountain of coral just to get out of this small keyhole the crew brings you up to. And the crew encourages you to HURRY before a wave comes, and it takes 3 or 4 of them to guard all sides of the boat and make sure you’re off safely. I can just imagine now how difficult it must have been for Scuzz and all the relief workers to do this the first time, and unload a dingy full of cargo at the same time. Once you climb up about 2-3 meters of coral, there are literally hundreds of meters of new beach to walk across just to get to where the beach used to begin, most of this new beach being sharp coral. The trek is made even harder when your flip-flops are wet and you’re a bit land sick. I’m glad we made the trek, though, because I finally got to see our fruit and veggie garden. It’s truly an amazing site. It’s about a square quarter mile, and the area they cleared was extremely dense with trees and foliage. It must have taken so many man-hours to do so, but it’s now reaping rewards as fresh chops of corn and other veggies were showing while we were there.

Before an after our trek to the veggie garden, we had a couple of really magical sessions at Bawa. This was particularly important for Thomas, as this was the first time he’s gotten to surf the place since filming the climatic scenes there for his movie Sprout. It was just Thomas, Rob, and myself out there in the beginning, and it was definitely a bit tricking figuring out where to line up. It didn’t take us long to figure out where the inside slab was, though, as we all took the biggest set of the day squarely on the head. But after that, we all got it sussed and just had a great time. The rest of the guys got back from fishing and rushed out to join us before dark, and we all traded off some amazing rides. Scuzz paddled out with Lars’ little mini-cam and got some great water shots. And then about an hour before dark, the sky put on the most amazing display I’ve seen yet in all my trips to Indo. In one direction, it was as if the clouds were on fire, with just amazing beams of yellow, orange and red bouncing off the wispy clouds. In the exact opposite direction, there was a DOUBLE rainbow, one of which you could actually see from start to finish (the full “beginning and end” of the rainbow). I can’t put into words how awesome it was. The waves were solid but not scary, good quality, sheet glass, with the most amazing scenic display I’ve ever seen as the backdrop. With a nickname like Slayer, you can probably guess I’m not an overly gushy guy, but I was practically in tears at how beautiful it was.

Our karma must have been really good, because we had so many magical experiences. Towards the end of the trip, I think Scuzz reckoned no amazing boat trip was complete without at least one good go at The Dice Game. People were about 50/50 as to whether they wanted to even play, but once they started, it was on in a big way. Scuzz, being the initiator, must have felt it was his obligation to lead by example, as he went big early and just kept going. Reed wasn’t too far behind, and the next thing you know, everyone was off their gourds. People got so sloppy that we didn’t even come close to finishing the game. I was the only one who officially made it out of the game, but that’s probably because I don’t drink, and by that point I don’t think anyone cared anyway. People were cranking their favorite songs on the iPod, dancing on the tables; Rob started pretending he was Daisy Duke. I finally decided I had to put everyone in his place, so I pulled out the old guitar from behind the couch, reached into my CD holder, pulled out Slayer’s Reign in Blood, and turned the volume up to 11. The next thing you know, I was leading a full-tilt karaoke version of “Angel of Death”. Thomas, who was somehow sleeping through the night up until this point, was certainly woken up by all our screaming and headbanging. We followed it up with an encore of the title track “Raining Blood”, and we called it a night not too long after that. Some people fell right to sleep, while others battled the elements quite a bit (wink wink Scuzz!).

The last day of our trip we got to surf a certain righthander that shall remain nameless, but you can also see footage of it in Thomas’ movie Sprout. It was going ARF! Thomas came in saying something about being the most scared he’d ever been, then proceeded to grab a different board and paddle back out and get pitted off his arse. I certainly didn’t see any fear in his eyes once I was in the lineup - just determination. Everyone was charging, but Reed, Thomas, and Reno was particularly going nuts. Reno’s bravado led to the first, and somehow only, board causality of the trip. But that didn’t stop him; he took the speedboat back to the main boat, picked up a slightly bigger board, and picked up right where he left off. Eventually, it got a bit bumpy, so we went around to a different island that offered three choices. Some of us had our last session on a long, heavy right reef, some of us ended our trip on a fun punchy right point break, and one of us ended his trip on the newly named wedgy righthander called “Digitor!!!” I dare you to try and find it. ;)

Also on the last day the official results of the Mustache Contest were announced. Reno and I made valiant efforts, but you couldn’t really even see our staches unless under a good light with the aid of a microscope. Thomas also lacked true density, but made up for it in creativity, going for a sort of French Maitre d' look. But it was clear early on that the rest of us were battling for second place, as Ranger Christopher Reed took the title in a landslide.

Anyway, it was truly a magical trip. It may be a long time until we can all hook up like this again, but I’m certainly looking forward to it. Can’t wait to see you all again in the warm, tropical barrels.

- SLAYER