There’s no getting around it. The lure of the Mentawai’s high season is nigh on impossible to ignore for most surfers who want to give the world’s most wave-riddled archipelago a crack. The upshot: working harder to escape the crowds from June- September. The solution: stick two fingers up to the high season and lock in a late season jaunt aboard the Kuda Laut.
Doing just that, boat owner/resident Indies Trader pot-washer Tim Everingham assembled a crew of Bali expats and a couple of old Newy pals to cast off from Padang and venture out to the islands for ten days of cruisy barrels and cold Bintangs.
After a day of roping 3ft lefts to warm up on, we buzzed out on the tin boat to the first of Tim’s many fishing secret spots, immediately hooking in to a 25kg+ Trevally on the popper. First cast BANG. Coz that’s how we do.
From there we headed south for a fun session at a tucked away right, the Newy boys making use of the cross-shore wind and going head to head for the best air, before moving over to a nearby swell-pulling left for the LAGO.
With glassy winds on the menu for the next day, we checked out a left slab in the vicinity breaking perilously close to the razor sharp reef. Perfect yet terrifying at the same time, the heat was easily taken out by the booger boys tucking in for a few pits in literally 2 inches of water.
From there we strung up the trawling rods and headed further away from the usual milk run to score a rarely surfed area of the chain, stuffed full of barreling lefts and the odd right for the regular footers. On the way we caught more Spanish Mackerel than we could stuff in the fridge, gorging ourselves on incredible fish dishes whipped up for lunch and dinner – sashimi pokey, GT steaks on the bbq, beer battered Spanish… rock star food without question.
With the swell peaking from the south for the last two days, everyone made the most of it with solid improvements from the intermediate guys, and a barrel count well into treble figures for the Newy rippers.
A final session on the upstairs beer deck rounded off a belting trip as we pulled the pick and headed for home. All-time, all stoked, yep, off season definitely goes off.
