BSC/ROOTS BJJ 5.2

Empty perfection @ Mentawais......if you have a guide who knows where and when to go, you will definitely find it !!!

And once again the tradition was kept in 2011 and for the third consecutive year the BSC/ROOTS BJJ trip happened in style at the Mentawai islands. My good friend Ale Nollis had once again the pleasure of celebrating his birthday in these paradise islands of Indonesia.

As usual he organized a boat trip with the BALI SURF CONNECTION where I went as a guide and he brought with him a group of lucky friends from Brazil the majority living in Australia.

In the group were Ale Nollis, Me, Amilcar Pinto, Felipe Mascarenhas, Saul Furtado, Iura Oliveira, Guillermo Castro, Louis Caramaschi, Marcel Sodré and Virginia Moraes.

Unfortunately our great friend of many trips Paulo Guimarães, owner of ROOTS BJJ in Australia could not come on this trip this year due to reasons of personal urgency matters that forced him to cancel the trip and return to Australia but his place was filled on the last minute by our great friend and hardcore bodyboarder based in Bali Vica.

With prevailing winds from the South and East for more than two months on the islands, we had many choices of good waves, in the majority lefts, with the swells that blessed the trip from the 2nd to the last day of the expedition.

It was 11 days of dream between old and new friends with a single goal in common ... the search for perfect and empty waves at the Mentawai islands.

The trip started on Siberut (Playgrounds) with very small waves where the crew broke the ice at Beng-beng on a small day with little waves that provided a few turns; On the following days we went through Sipora (7 Palms and Lances) with the swell peaking up and getting better each day delivering some barrels and providing some good turns on the waves on many perfect surf sessions specially at Lances where we stayed for 2 days getting barreled deep and burning the rail hard on every wave till the channel close to the boat. Then with the forecast for a drop on the swell we went to a small Maccas and we kept going down south reaching Pagai (Thunders and Roxy) where many barrels were surfed with only the guys from our boat in many surf sessions where everyone got stoked!!

Thunders changed significantly after the earthquake and tsunami of 2010; The vegetation and trees were literally pulled from the beach showing signs of nature's power and the reef came up a bit making the wave shallower and hollower. Now in almost every wave at Thunders you can get barreled on the outside and on the inside no breaks pretty close to the reef.

Many sessions with high surf solitary waves and several tubes marked the days when we were anchored in the region.

On the way back, with the prediction of a swell with perfect direction and favorable winds, the trip was blessed with small and perfect Telescopes with perfect little barrels early in the morning just after the sunrise before the crowds hit it and then we kept moving to Icelands that was big, perfect, heavy and with no one!! Again only our crew in the water in many sessions to close the trip with a style.

Another year of kept tradition, another trip of great waves, great vibe and good energy amongst friends surfing perfect waves in the Mentawai islands.

* I leave here registered my special thanks to my friends for one more dream trip booked with BALI SURF CONNECTION in paradise!!

Bring on 2012 and BSC / ROOTS BJJ 5.3 ....... the search never ends!

Rodrigo "Digone" Mascarenhas - BALI SURF CONNECTION

( http://www.balisurfconnection.com/ )

*Photos by: DIGONE/BALI SURF CONNECTION