Day 1

After a long day sitting on planes and waiting at airports, we finally arrived on the Indies Trader just after sunset. Albert, the captain, made the call to pull anchor and we set sail. By morning we should hopefully awaken to some sick pits.

We had one of the nicest cooked fish dinners I think I've ever had so it was a great start to our trip.

Day 2

I'm pretty sure there is no better way to wake up in the morning than to see perfect surf, and that's exactly what happened. It was going off. Four-to-six feet with the odd bigger set. Some of the waves I caught and saw today were dead-set perfect, not a drop of water out of place. I put in a pretty big effort for the first day. I surfed for about three hours for my first session then backed it up with about a five-hour session. It just got better and better all day. We had lots of sun and a little bit of rain and hardly any wind all day. We ate like kings and now I'm just about to hit the sack because I can hardly keep my eyes open. Looking forward to getting shacked of my head again tomorrow.

Day 3

We stayed the night and were up early only to find that it was onshore. It stayed onshore for most of the day, until about three in the afternoon when it went glassy. The swell was still there, four-to-six feet but unfortunately today didn't even come close to how good yesterday was. We all got a couple of fun ones but nothing epic. The sun went down and we made the decision to move on. It should only take three to four hours to get to the next break so we'll be there for the morning session.

Day 4

I woke up early after having a terrible sleep due to it raining all night and the sound of water pouring off the roof kept me up. Well it was still dark and it seemed on this Saturday morning the weekenders were out in force. There were about 10 guys in the line up. I decided to have some breakfast and check it all out for a bit. It only got more crowded while I was having breakie so I just kept an eye on it. Around 10 it thinned out, so I hit it. The waves were inconsistent four-to-five foot but the most fun I think a left-hander could be for me. A couple of tubes and a million backside cracks. Some good footage from the land and the water, we had it all. A big lunch was to follow and then a little lie down to combat the heat.

I don't think there's a better way to finish a day that to have a sick session. It was a little onshore but so fun, four-to-five feet and so beltable it wasn't funny. I had a great time. All the boys were shooting from the tin boat but the sun only showed itself for about five minutes. I think Horny might have been shooting black and white so it might turn out good anyway. Surfed 'til dark then everyone went in. I love this place!

Day 5

Up early again only to find the swell had dropped and so we decided to move on south. We did a bit of fishing on the way but didn't have any luck. About five hours later we checked a place out but it look pretty bad and onshore. Good old captain Albert said it could be good around the other side of the island, so off we motored. From a distance it looked pretty small and super fast but we pulled up and the cook (Micko) and I paddled out to see if it was worth staying or not. Well, after about half an hour I had about five or six sick stand-up pits and I think one of them was one of the best waves I've ever had in my life. It didn't take long to make the decision to stay. I don't really know how to describe this wave, maybe a reef version of Kirra. On the sets you take off and race as fast as you can in the pit. It lets you out most of the time but is supper hollow. It was a lot of fun. It was cloudy most of the morning with the sun coming out just for a little bit around lunch. Hopefully we would have scored some photos. The tide dropped out pretty fast which made it very dangerous. We wrapped it up and headed to the boat for some lunch and to wait for the tide to come back in. Lunch was excellent again! After lunch a huge storm blew in and it rained cats and dogs and turned onshore. All kinds of funny things were going on in the line up so the Captain made the call to head into port to refuel and get permits all locked away with the local authorities. Being a Sunday it was roast lamb night and it was incredible. I think the plan is to refuel and then head back out for the morning. I can only hope it is going to be as good as today!

Day 6

We anchored just outside the port last night so we had a couple of hours motoring this morning to get back to the break. It was smaller than yesterday but still super hollow. All the boys hit it but I decided to have a go at shooting some water footage. Pav set up his 16mm film camera for me and off I swam. I got a couple of good shots including a really sick shot of my brother. I hope it turns out. It has rained all day, not one ray of sunlight has been seen. I surfed after lunch and it was low tide and inconsistent. I think one wait was for about an hour, but I finished off the session with a handful of pretty nice tubes. I'm not quite sure what our plan is from here. The wind is pretty strong and the captain said this is the only offshore place around with this wind. I hope the wind will pick up the swell and we surf here again tomorrow.

It was a bit of a travelling day today, but I seemed to get a lot done as well. We started down south then we traveled north to another break. But it was really small with about 10 guys, so we motored further. We had a bit of fishing action on the way, a Sailfish or Blight or even a Marlin. I got a look at it a couple of times when it was jumping in the air. The excitement only lasted about two minutes because we got spooled, which means the fish was too big and there wasn't enough line on the reel. The beast simply swam away with all our line. The captain said it would have been about a 150kg fish and from what I had seen it look about six or seven feet long. Oh well, maybe tomorrow. When we arrived at the left, the wind was pretty strong so Mick and I made a run to a little right-hander on the other side of the bay, but it wasn't very good either. After lunch I went for a scuba dive with Pav, Horny and Craig the Reef Check man. We did a little reef check and all was looking pretty good, lots of fish everywhere and little bits of coral around. In the afternoon the waves got pretty good, super glassy and some really nice tubes. It was only small about three-to-four feet on the sets. I surfed 'till dark and we had the most incredible sunset, it was a great way to finish off the day. Well, that's what I thought until later on the night. I'll paint the picture for you - the nearest safe overnight anchorage is about five kilometers away. So on dark we left and made our way over to anchor for dinner. Earlier that afternoon a charter boat rock up with Richard Lovett, Luke Stedman and a whole bunch of others. After dinner the cook and Mick make up this big plan to go egg their boat. So we load up the tin boat with eggs and flour bombs and we hear a tin boat coming from somewhere in the dark and it's a couple of the boys coming over to say g'day, so we let them have it. Then the war began. They took off back to their boat but we were right behind them. All their tin boat did was take us to the mother ship but the others were ready for us and we ended up having a great little war. Their mother ship got so worked it wasn't funny, 150 eggs and about 50 flour bombs. I think we came away with the win! One for the Indies'. It was the funniest night that I've had in a long time. Pav's got the video and it's even funnier than I remember.

Day 8

After the egg fight last night we pulled anchor and started to head north. In the morning we found a small, three foot break and since it was such a nice sunny day with a light offshore we ended up surfing for a couple of hours. Horny shot from the water and said he got a couple of shots so we were all happy. After the surf we hung out at this tiny island, which was so cool. We did another Reef Check and it was unreal; heaps of fish and live coral and it was great to have another scuba dive. After the Reef Check we motored on, still heading north. I'm just about to go to sleep and we are still motoring so we are going to be in a whole new place in the morning.

After travelling all night we arrived at a new group of Islands, lots of waves everywhere and no one to be seen. We drove around a little and then came across the left-hander. It was a long wave with a big end section that bends in at you. There were a couple of barrels but mostly just beltings. It was probably the sunniest day we've had. My back is so sunburnt because Horny kept on making me take my T-shirt off so he could see the boardies better in the shots. All the photographers were pretty stoked with the morning session. Around lunch a couple of the local boys came out in their little canoe boats trying to sell us fish. One of them had a Sailfish, which was about six-foot long. God only knows how they got it into the boat! All the other boys had a surf in the afternoon but I was pretty burnt out. The glare was really bad and it wasn't half as good as the morning so I gave it a miss. After everyone had finished surfing it was time to move on, again to the north. We had another crazy sunset which topped off the great day all round.

Day 10

We traveled most of the night and in the morning we arrived at a break. For most of the morning the wind was hit so we all just sat around and did basically nothing. After lunch we all hit it but as soon as we jumped in it started to rain. It lasted for about an hour so Horny couldn't shoot from the tin boat but Pav was under cover on the land and got a couple of nice shots. We surfed for a couple of hours but it didn't seem to get any better. Anyway, the call is to stay here for the night because there's a swell predicted and it could be pretty good tomorrow if it picks up a couple of feet. Tomorrow being our last day, I hope we score something good.