Nias

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We've heard of this wave before, a classy right hand point break off the coast of Sumatra on the island Nias called Lagundri Bay. A little bit of asking friends of their past experiences and we basically came up with the idea that we fly to Medan, get a SMAC air flight to Nias, drive for 3-4 hours and ask for Frezzy-the losman owner and we are there.
I found out about this trip on short notic whilst in Barcelona with Kez and a couple of days of stuffing about trying to get a cheap flight and I was there. It was all sorted-I had to fly from London to Muscat(Oman) and get a connecting flight to Jakarta to meet up with mates from home;Briza, Ricko, Neil, Dinno and Jeff. This went all without a hitch and after meeting the lads in Jakarta I decided that the airport in Muscat I would call it the chook shed. There was no organisation there at all and my flight to Jakarta was not called out over the speaker or nor was it displayed on the TV screens it was just pot luck that I went for a walk and saw the number flight on a small tv screen inside the waiting lounge downstairs.
When I got to the Jakarta airport the best moustaches where being supported by some of the lads-loved it
We all then got our tickets to go to Medan and had to wait a while for the flight. A McDonalds, KFC and Baskin@Robins in sight we all pigged out and slotted on the floor surrounded by a sea of surfboards carefully concealed in board bags that had a fresh look about them, and waited for the flight.
Our flight to Medan was quick and we we're all happy about the hotel of choice but unaware of what the rest of the night had in stall for us-we needed a beer and so we went into the pub on the bottom floor of the hotel where we ordered a beer and were hit with a bill you could expect at home for beers. We decided to go see the town of Medan by night in all its glory. Not much going on, holes in the side of the road big enough to swallow a car and no beer, just a heap of locals staring in awe at the unorthadox way we chose to travel-by foot. Everyone in Medan rides motorbikes or drives a car and it wasn't long before we headed back to the hotel and got the bell boy to get us a taxi and take us to a pub. What we got was 3 side car motorbikes for 6 lads and a ride to the most seediest place in town. No lights in the street - just neon signs that read Bir Bintang and we thought this'll do. Upon walking into the first bar in a single file I think all of our ideas of getting a cold beer in a descent pub just flew right out the window. The place was pitch black and the door man tried to lead us to a seat using a flash light. We were straight out of there and in a taxi back to the hotel bar where we stayed all night and payed extorsion prices for beer- but I tell you the place was empty with the exception of 6 of the best karaoke singers in Medan singing along to every crap song ever written. In the morning we had to organise a charter flight to Nias island with SMAC air. The hotel staff gave us a price for the flights but we went down to the airlines and bartered our price down to a losy million rupiah each. It was at the airlines that we met Mike, Benno and Edward from California who were on there way to Nias aswell.
We all got the same plane and later flew out of Medan to Nias island.
The plane was a little rickety and loud but the food was excellent. No safety speech prior to departure - I couldn't believe it but I guess if this plane was to go down you may aswell put your head between your legs and kiss your arse goodbye.
Touchdown in Nias air strip filled me with joy as we were a few hours away from the wave we came to surf. The next thing was getting 8 people with 2-3-4 surfboards each to the other side of the island- more bartering and we got what we thought was a good deal but only to be told by a well spoken indo that we payed to much--500,000 instead of 200,000 rupiah. Anyway we took off with Ricks Ipod throwing out some familiar beats to us but I think the Nias locals were like--what the f$%k are thay listening to??
Almost there and our car started stopping and at one point the car was dead until the driver did something and got it going again. We think it was the fuel slightly mixed with water as we stopped for fuel on the way once or twice and maybe the locals like to stretch a 44 gallon drum out to more than 44 by adding liquids in it.
Once we were at Lagundri Bay we had no idea where to go but once we mentioned we wanted to go to Frezzies losman a little kid jumped onto the roof of the car and lead us there. Perfect, we met Frezzy and were given 6 beds, mozzy nets, met the other 3 Aussies in the losman(Mark, Craig and Lennon) who were already there,and sat around a bit ,had a feed then went to bed hoping to wake upto a perfect right hand point break.
We woke up and although it wasn't the biggest wave it was still a great wave and we were into it. In the next few days we met a lot of folk in the line up and on land and were well into having a surfing, eating, drinking and sleeping holiday. I could go on for days about all the waves, size of the waves and moves pulled off but I wont. It was fun.
The weather changed a fair bit from humid to rainy to sunny just about every day.
A couple of days into it the waves died off a bit so the idea of drinking lead us into a tin shed that had pool tables and table tennis and thats where we drank for the night with the locals. Neil excelled at table tennis with the quickest game ever played (3 games to 21) with Vinnesse who was a friend of Frezzies and ours.
After a few more days Briza twisted his knee on the way in from the surf and that proved to be a piss off for him as he didn't surf Nias at all after that.
The next big event was Dinnos birthday and the idea of getting a pig for it sounded great. A few of us were worried about eating the pig for health reasons or some had the shits but in the end we all ate the pig and it was the first descent meat we had eaten all trip. After the feast we Dinno lit the bonfire and we sat and drank beers for a while watching Neil and Rick jump the fire and Dinno breath fire.
Still with plenty of days to go we asked Frezzy to sort out some plane tickets for us to get back to Medan- we thought we were ok. We left it for a few days and surfed, ate donoughts(stale of course) and bought various wodden things. One of the days we went to a village nearby on top off possibly the tallest point on Nias. The truck ride was excellent, the motor pinging all the way, the smell of diesel and most impressively hot steel (maybe oil not in motor). In this village we were welcomed by what seemed to be the village mafia.We payed our money and went in. Every kid in the street surrounded us and they all had the same thing- knecklaces-I think we all bought some. The village displays stone jumping for visitors and it was great. A small rock as a spring board and a large rock to jump over(about 2 metres high) without touching the big one at all. We also went into the Kings house and had a look , not bad, oh also Sunday is washing day in Nias- all clothes lye on the streets to dry, no hills hoist here!!! Overall a good experience
The time on Nias was coming to a close, the mosquitoes bellies were full and the spaghetti dish was wearing thin and then on the afternoon of the 16th we found out that there was no flights until the 24th---not good. So Frezzy got on the phone and organised us a ferry ride from nearby to Subolga(southwest Sumatra). We packed our gear in a record time, said our thanks, and got a ride to the ferry.
We all had different views of what lye ahead--our tickets said cabin numbers but that was not the case- the boat was shite and the numbers were lye down allocations on the wooden shelves either side of the boat. We eventually payed 80,000 rupiah extra and upgraded to two cabins with four beds in each not big enough to swing a cat. That ride lasted for 14 hours and then once in Subolga we had a car ride that lasted 14 hours again and left us at a hotel that was cheap and along with cheap comes very classy. On Ricks bed it said "I own all the kisses" in texta which was freaky. The next morning we woke up and got taxi's to the airport --got a flight to Jakarta and were gone in 1/2 hours time. Once in Jakarta Dinno headed back to Perth whilst the rest of us went to Bali and met up with Coman (Ricks mate)
He took us to the Bounty hotel and we finally had a shower and a descent bed. The first night we went out we got plastered and didn't go to bed til 6 ish. The next day we were all delerious so we had a few brekky drinks in the pool bar before venturing out into the streets for about 1/2 hour then back to the hotel for a sleep. The next day we got Coman to take us for a surf --Ulawatu was packed so we went to Dreamland and got a few waves and chilled out. For the rest of the trip we drank and ate and bought cheap stuff. Briza and Jeff went home on the 21st and Neil and Rick left for G-LAND that night. I stayed in Bali, got tattoed, drank, watched Freo get whooped by Sydney, Eagles dominate and went to tranny shows.
I returned back to London the same way and went back to "The Porch"
Overall a great experience lads--lets go again--sometime--somewhere--somehow

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