The Kandui crew

As I sit here in the lobby of the airport hotel on 6 hours of much needed sleep, I thought I'd start wrapping this journal up in a multiple part mini-series and share with you probably the best part of the trip: the people.

There were 6 of us that stayed at the resort for the entire trip. Jeff and Ken are the 2 oldest guys and hail from North County; Encinitas and Leucadia, if memory serves me. Real cool guys that were fun to hang out with and surf with. We'll for sure be getting together for some surf in the future down in their neck of the woods.

The 2 "footy" players (Australian rules football, or AFL for short) are Ben and Phil. Ben calls Perth home and Phil currently lives in Melbourne though he grew up with Ben back in Perth. These 2 guys are awesome. They're a year younger than me and by the end of the trip we were best friends laughing, surfing, drinking and telling stories. They're 2 crazy dudes, that's for sure, but it makes the experience with them that much better. Ben is regarded as probably one of the 5 best AFL players in the game and has garnered MVP honors several times and his team won the league championship last year in front of a crowd of over 100,000. Phil retired this year from the AFL and will be surfing for the next year, at least, and is probably the best non-pro surfer I have ever seen in the water. We had a crazy fun night in Singapore 2 nights ago and shared lots of laughs and beers with the Wave of Compassion guys and it was a bummer having to say goodbye but we've already got the ball rolling on meeting up in Oz or in SoCal in the near future.

Ben, Bryan, Phil

Michael was my roommate and he, too, hailed from Australia in New South Wales. He's an older guy who practices osteopathy back home and at age 45 is in better shape than 99% of those guys 1/2 his age. Extremely talented surfer, right up there with Phil, and all around nice guy. We spent a lot of time chit chatting in the uma before bed or in the morning and share a lot of things in common. I was stoked that he was the other solo guy on the trip as the aforementioned surfers all came in pairs. He was a perfect roommate for me.

Michael, Amen, Me

In addition to the 6 of us we had some visitors that were around for part of the time. Dr. Dave from SurfAid and a notable donor to SurfAid named Bruce from Brisbane dropped in when the Wave of Compassion guys motored through on the Indies Trader III and stayed 4 days. So, we also had the Wave of Compassion guys drop by for a couple days when they were parked out front on their way-too-cool boat but they just came in for drinks and food and such and stayed out on their boat the rest of the time. The captain was Tony Elthrington (I think that’d how it’s spelled) but everyone called him Doris. He’s the saltiest guy I’ve ever met; exactly how you would cast a salty boat captain, though Doris was absent of the peg-leg and parrot on his shoulder but the rest was spot on. Apparently back in the 60’s he charged hard; he supposedly was in the finals of the Pipeline Masters and was in several surf films of the era. Gerlach and a few other lesser-named pros were on the boat along with some photographers and other guys rounding out the total zoo that was the Indies Trader III.

Then we had the staff at the resort. The most visible guy and a real friend to all of us was Ray, our surf guide who knows the Mentawai’s like noone else. Our other surf guide and guy that helped around the resort was Amen. He’s from Hawaii and he charges. There are photos of him out at Kandui’s on 10’ days just standing nonchalantly in gaping death barrels. Johnny and his wife Ainsley were around a lot as well as our 3 Indo bartenders Leah and Eki and Margie. Add some boat drivers and various other people around the resort and they were the perfect staff. By the end of the trip the 6 guests and the staff were inseparable. We all became great friends and shared lots of laughs and stories along the way.

Ray and I

Leah and Eki

I really do mean that the people were the best part of the trip. I made 5 new friends in each of the guests and I consider everyone at the resort to be new friends, as well. We all meshed so well with one another and everyone at some point in the trip made the comment that we were a really fun crew. Some of us charged, some of us were there for some fun and relaxation and all of us were there to make new friends. It’s the memories we shared together that made this trip so wonderful and much like the surf, nobody knew what we were going to get. I guess when you’re alone on an island with 5 other people and a handful of staff on a regular basis you’re bound to spend a bunch of time together but this was different because I've heard some horror stories of boat trips being hell cuz the people never got along. Everyone there made a genuine attempt to get to know one another, including the staff. I, too, really opened up to my new friends. I shared much of my life story and trials and tribulations, goals and aspirations which I'm not quick to do with complete strangers but I felt totally comfortable with them all.

Next post, we’ll wrap up the surf and travel part of the trip.

Front row L-R: Jeff, Ken, Ainsley, Johnny, Ray
Back row L-R: Bruce, Dr.Dave, Phil, Amen, Ben, Michael, Me