 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
As told by Christie Carter.
On winter break from College during my 19th year, I was in Gisborne, New Zealand when the opportunity arose to work on a yacht in Thailand. Although I had sailed all my life, a 65 ft. professionally run yacht is different from Dingys or Hobies, so I pretended I knew what I was doing and shipped myself off to Thailand. The move was at the expense of my job (Central Coast Surfboards) my girlfriend (Naera) and my playing bass in our punk band (The Pathetics).
I joined the crew as first mate on the 65ft. Swan, and ended up almost 2 years working on the boat, sailing to Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Sabah, Philippines and eventually found myself in the Mentawai Islands of West Sumatra in Indonesia.
The plan was actually to deliver the yacht to Sulawesi, as the owners of the boat were keen divers. However, the chef, captain and myself were all surfers, and we knew there were waves somewhere along the west coast of Sumatra, aside from Nias. "Surfers of Fortune", a video put out by Quiksilver, was a huge inspiration to me and I had sneaking suspicions where some of the waves were. We bought all the charts from Northern to Southern Sumatra and started marking on the charts where we thought the waves were. A "tiki tour" down the west coast in May 1998 revealed many, many good waves. Some in places that were suspected, and others in bewildering locations. By the time we reached the Telo islands, we decided to convince the owners to fly into West Sumatra, rather than taking the boat all the way to Sulawesi. Of course there were no waves in Sulawesi, but that had nothing to do with our decision. Honestly.
I will never forget my first glimpse at the WavePark. That first day we almost ended up on the reef 3 times, and I have gray hairs from our near misses for sure. The swell was absolutely smoking, and I never imagined waves like that existed on the planet. Kandui Left was 10 ft. and flawless with nobody out. Jaws on the ground doesn't really cover extent of my emotion seeing it like that.
My first surf in the WavePark was Kandui Left, solid 6ft. all by myself. I tried to convince the punters onboard Sirius to join me, but one of them had enjoyed a trip over the reef the day before, and they were all spooked. I tried to convince the captain and chef, but they wanted an easier righthander. That day will live with me forever, surfing for hours in perfect waves, snapping my only board (that I had shaped myself). "Welcome to the WavePark" is what destiny told me that day.
We surfed that area for 3 weeks before the owners arrived. At that time there were only 4 charter boats in the entire island chain, and it was special to see anybody else, let alone surf with anybody else. We didn't have the locations of waves, or know the names, we just drove around in the boat and surfed whatever we could find. Ask anybody on those first trips, there was definitely a feeling of magic in the air everyday.
During the next 4 months in the area, the idea of finding some way to spend more time this beautiful area held more and more appeal. With the obvious potential in charter boat areas, I decided to go against the grain and think about land-based appeal, rather than boat-based. The decision was made in October to quit the boat and make my way back to Padang to start a surf resort.
We are standing by to make your dreams a reality.
