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TR: Mentawai Islands, Indonesia


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padang seems to be cranking along fine. i don't want to sound callous, as many people died in the quake, and many are still affected by it, but it appears to be business as usual.

there's a lot of building down, and some areas are pretty destroyed, but it's always been a hodge-podge 3rd world city an it doesn't seem much different now. just a bit more mess and carnage than usual.

pariaman (a small city to the north) is apparently much much worse, with something like 90% of buildings destroyed.

still, i'm kinda sketching out in padang. if i have to go into a big building, i'm keeping a firm eye on the exits. i won't go deep into the markets either (above the markets, the matahari department store is a crumbling wreck. people still operate stalls and shop there, but the don't really have any choice in the matter - what else can they do.

one of the big shopping malls - plaza andalas - looks to be almost repaired, but basically they've just plastered over the cracks and put a new lick of paint on it. i would be very very reluctant to go in there. it's already been badly damaged a couple of times

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Cant blame you for being cautious Spook. I wonder what the casualty toll would be in places like Padang after a quake if they constructed their buildings like we do in the developed world. it comes down to economics in the end I guess.

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cheers mitch. stoked you like the pics

hmm. seem to having problems linking pics in from facebook. maybe fb hae changed something with their site. anyway, here's a couple of shots from last week

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if you want to see more, search for "Pitstop Hill Mentawai" on facebook and sign up as a fan. I upload a bunch of pics every fortnight.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hey Crew

 

The surf's been pumping up here for the past week. We have had some serious swell, which has been a welcome change after a month of small-ish conditions...

Anyway, one of the best things about swell is that it opens up a bunch of spots. We scored one of the region's premier lefts for 2 days by ourselves, and backed it up with 2 days at one of the better rights in the area. Stoked is the word that comes to mind!

Anyway, having trouble linking pics at the moment. Used to do a surf report for a big surf site, but unfortunatey that is no longer.

The pics below are linked from my website. They're about a month old now but it's all I got at the moment.

Gonna be linking in a few short vids a bit later too...

 

Josh Kerr at Bankvaults:

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Same wave, a couple of my best mates a few days later:

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The beach out the front...

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Sam and Andi. These guys are legends:

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nothing so sinister as politics... budget cuts and i guess we were the ones to get dropped... i think a lot of stuff on that site is done for free in exchange for advertising or other such stuff

got a crazy deep 5 second pit a few days ago. still buzzing on that one!

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Spook I heard a rumour that the Indos placed a $200 000 fee on all foriegn registered vessels in the Ments and it caught a few operators by surprise. One guy told me he was on one of the few vessels operating and scored uncrowded waves. Any truth to that?

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There's been all sorts of rumours about this, but I'm not in the boat industry so I don't know for sure...

Late last year there was word that foreign registered boats had to change to an Indonesian flag or put up a bond of 95% of the boats value. I don't know if this is something in Padang only, or all of Indonesia.

Anyway, a few boats were held up for early season trips as they came to grips with the new rules, many people flew to Jakarta and got the info from the source, and I actually have no idea what the outcome is/was.

It seems to be business as usual out here. There's been plenty of boats around, both Indo and foreign registered.

Mantas - I reckon your mate just scored some early season uncrowded waves. There's been lots of that lately, but I can't say that it's got anything to do with less boats being allowed to operate

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yeah TB, he pretty much has a new haircut every week. it's hard keeping up with him...!

mantas, indo - you guys spent anytime on sumba? just been looking at some pics of the surf there. looks pretty heavy, but some epic set-ups

 

we've had a fair bit of swell over the past week. surfed chunky e-bay and closing out pitstops yesterday. met some other crew who went over to nokandui. they paddled out, saw an 8ft set then promptly paddled back to the boat. i woulda done the same i reckon. that wave has me rattled

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Yeah it looks like it just wants to eat you. Must be hard on your back hand.

Nah, by-passed Sumba mate. Only surfed Timor/Rote and Sumbawa down that way.

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Originally Posted By: spook

mantas, indo - you guys spent anytime on sumba? just been looking at some pics of the surf there. looks pretty heavy, but some epic set-ups



Yeah mate, I have spent a lot of time there. Lots of surf spots but can be hard to access. Camps usually limited to one wave unless they have boats too.
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i just saw a pic of tarimbang/miller's right and it got me thinking about the place. it seems like pretty rugged terrain, quite a barren island.

thought it might be good to check it out for a few weeks in late august/september.

yeah, seems like each area only has one spot to surf. i guess it's just a case of sitting and waiting. as long as there's interesting stuff to check out it could be ok

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Waves here aren't too flash at the moment. small swell, suss winds, penty of crew hunting surf.... but having said that, we can be prett spoilt up here. I mean, there's still waves to be had.

Looks like some fun swell will hit over the next few days, and then a massive swell due to arrive in a bout a week. Gonna be seriously big. Depending on our new guests we might hit something solid or run and hide somewhere more protected. Either, we should score something epic as long as the winds cooperate

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Mantas, I was down in Sydney on Friday till sat arvo so I missed the majority of the swell. 3-4 here yesterday & clean but I had a crap surf (Still drunk??) & we were invaded by QLD'ers on their long weekend. This morning te low tide is not doing us any favors..

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Originally Posted By: Mantas
What's your biggest board there Spook?


I normally ride 6'3" and my big board is 6'6". I reckon I've taken off on a couple of 8-10 footers at Bankvaults and have been fine on a 6'6". But there's no freaking way I'd be surfing Hideaways or Nokandui at that size.
I'm not enjoying the draining lefts so much this year. I keep getting rattled. The lack of an exit on most waves isn't something I'm that into at the moment.... I'd rather be surfing a few of the rights up here at 4-6ft that are still heavy, but a bit more user friendly

Indo - how often do you get in the water these days? Is your time pretty flexible?
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Originally Posted By: spook


Indo - how often do you get in the water these days? Is your time pretty flexible?


I am out in the water pretty much every am for the early if it is on. I still wake up so I am trying to run on the beach when it's not happening. I can get out at 8:15 and make it to work which gives me more than 2 hrs at the mo. If it's cracking I can sometimes stay a little longer smile
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