For
the second time in my life I had the chance of enjoy
my birthday at the Mentawaii islands and the gift
this time was more than special…a real solid
swell, the biggest of the season 2009, with duration
of 5 days got everyone stoked and guaranteed good
waves for the first week of the trip that started
on the Playgrounds area.
Our route was to start by Playgrounds and keep going
to the south of the Mentawaii where the swell is always
more consistent which would coincide with the drop
of the swell…a perfect timing!! Spots such as
Telescopes, Macaronis, Greenbush, Lances Left and
Bintangs guranteed the high quality surfing with perfect
conditions for nearly the whole trip.
Before leaving Bali there was a little bit of sadness
for leaving Uluwatu with a prediction of giant waves
(one of my favorite waves) besides feeling like staying
to hang around and surf with my brother that had just
arrived in Bali with a friend…unfortunately
they coulnd’t join me on this trip and besides
the tides not being the best for Ulu’s, like
the owner of the boat said this was probably going
to be the best swell for Playgrounds in a while…simply
I couldn’t let it go by…giant Ulus would
have to wait for some other time same as a family
trip with my brother…maybe with perfect moon
tides?!
This was my first trip working as a surf guide on
the Mentawaii and I would like to register my special
thanks to my good friend Iban for all the help and
support with vital information that helped a lot to
get this new project started.
On the crew there were 3 of my clients that came specially
from Brasil for this trip, Klelcio “Zé”,
Anderson “Mineiro” and Claudio “Chaves”
besides Laurie “Lozza” a good friend from
New Zeland of more than ten years from the good old
days of the Kuta farwest and 3 other friends from
Uruguay from other Indonesia seasons Josepe, Oscar
e Felipe. Two days before the departure date another
Brazilian incorporated the team, the Bahian/Carioca
João, now my good buddy, had come to fill up
the gang and now the crew was complete…
We left Kuta me and João early in the morning
of Sept. 11th on a flight to Padang via Jakarta while
the other trip members were already waiting for us
at Padang or were arriving on the same day from other
destinations; As soon as night fell we were all onboard
leaving by the Padang channel going to the Mentawaii
islands…the expectation was high and my birthday
would be celebrated on the first day of waves of right
on the arrival of the so expected swell, not bad…once
again the stars had aligned in my destiny…
We started the trip on Playgrounds with 4 to 6 feet
waves where we surfed spots like Beng-beng and 4 Bobs
to warm up the engines; Due to the weather and swell
forecast we decided to keep traveling on the same
night and on the following day we got Telescopes with
6 feet simply perfect with a light offshore breeze
and many open and heavy barrels. From there on almost
everyday was marked by good to excellent waves in
nearly the whole trip…
We had many days of perfect Macaronis, twice at Ht’s,
a few memorable days at Lances Left and Bintangs and
a super fun session at Greenbush.
We always had a meeting to decide where we would surf
based on the info that I would pass to the guys about
our best options considering winds and swell direction
besides tides and swell forecast.
One thing that became clear to me during the trip
was that sometimes a good surfguide has to be a bit
radical on his decisions as it’s not possible
to always please everyone and on the same way the
democracy of decisions don’t necessarily always
reflect the best way to go. Experiences that that
we acquire step to step…
This trip was a unique opportunity to everyone to
get to know themselves better, a kind of group therapy
if you will…A 11 days surf trip in a boat is
always a learning experience about human behavior
(relations) because of the reduced space, decisions
that have to be taken daily about where to surf, what
to eat, etc…things that make we put our egos
aside for a bit and think more on the group satisfaction
instead of only on ours.
Its funny to realize how us surfers are so dependent
on the waves…when the waves were perfect the
moods were always high and everyone was grinning non
stop but when the condition deteriorated because of
winds or rain together the collective mood would go
down…the main thing was always, on every decision
of group living, use democracy and common sense…
At night the fun was guarantee with dominoes contests
in teams of two…the loosers had to wear clothes
clips a earings hanging on their ears until win another
round to then take out and pass it on…we laughed
a lot, the crew was always very happy and the vibe
was unreal in nearly the whole trip!!
Besides that we had a very helpful and friendly crew
and a real good cook, vital ingredients for a successful
trip…
From the beginning to the middle of the trip we had
a little rain and some bad weather with few moments
of strong winds…but in general we always encountered
really good waves and every day had many moments simply
absurd of such perfection.
On the second last day we finally had our first orange
sunset typical of the Mentawaii and at night an absurdly
clean sky full of stars opened up in front of us marking
our crossing back throughout the islands; I didn’t
waste any time and enjoyed the occasion to do one
of the things a like the most in my life and there
has been years I haven’t done…travel by
boat far away from everything and everyone with a
sky full of stars as the background feeling the real
feeling of freedom…I putted a Pink Floyd at
full blast on my ipod and took a mattress to the boat’s
deck where I made the whole trip from Lances Left
to Playgrounds (about 7 hours) laying down enjoying
the view; The captain noticed what I was doing and
turned off all the lights of the boat and I traveled
enjoying that lysergic view living intensely the moment
of turning 37 years old the most special way that
I know.
I even tripped out and felt in another dimension when
I visualized our boat. A micro dot cruising the Indian
Ocean at that time at night as I was looking in the
Google Earth and that made me see again how small
we really are facing the universe and specially how
small are our problems that we usually have the bad
habit of making a lot bigger because of our EGO…
Meditations about life are always inevitable and full
of rewards on this kind of trip; Sometimes is necessary
to think about the craziness of the mad rhythm of
the capitalist world we live in…we are prisoners
of so many things…of the system, of business,
cel phones, internet, media, traffic, relationships,
of our EGO, etc…
Nothing like taking 11 days off, cut any and every
form of contact with the outside world and live the
“here and now” in a desolated place where
the time has stopped, surrounded by virgin nature,
untouched and full of life with only one worry in
our minds, the waves!! That makes possible to visualize
life, the daily problems and everything else from
another angle; and many times when we look at our
life from the outside certain things that looked unclear
become clear like water…I feel blessed for having
the opportunity to live this experience that inspire
the meditation and self knowledge and should be something
basically mandatory to every human being do at least
sporadically; A kind of meditative exile in the middle
of nature…
Its funny to notice how our daily problems simply
stay on land during a trip like that; many problems
that look really big become insignificant…a
trip like that always make us think about what really
matters in our lives…
I end this article with a piece of a book of Amyr
Klink that came to my mind during the crossing between
the islands on the second last night:
"A man needs to travel. By himself, not by stories,
images, books or TV. Need to travel by himself, with
his own eyes and feet to understand what is his. To
one day plant his trees e give them their value. To
get to know the cold to enjoy the heat. And vice-versa.
Feel the distance and the absence of a home to feel
good under his own roof. A man needs to travel to
places he doesn’t know to break this arrogance
that make us see the world the way we imagine and
not simply how it is or can be; that make us professors
and doctors of what we haven’t seen when we
should be students and simply go and see.”
One of the most important things that we have in our
lives is free and many times we forget to give the
real value and enjoy to its maximum…our freedom!!
FREEDOM!!!
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