Part of that was due to lousy conditions. That prompted Lizzie and I to head up north to a little hamlet called Balian. The spot had come highly recommended by a couple from Santa Cruz I met in Balangan (he was a glasser and had worked for the shop that glassed one of my boards). The story was that Balian is super peaceful, nestled in rice paddies and located along the coast in such a way to pick up swell that wasn’t hitting the south. All of that was true.
Each day, the surf got a little
bigger, building from 2-3 feet on Tuesday to 8-10 by Friday. Sadly, my injured
foot kept me out of the water the entire time.
Even walking was painful so I dedicated myself to rest which wasn’t so
bad once I accepted it.
The surf did look really fun
though—big and powerful but not too steep and crazy. The break was right in
front of a river mouth. And it poured several times we were there—I mean,
pouring for hours and hours. Get your ark stuff. Which meant lots of stuff
flowing out into ocean and you know what likes that… One of the guides from our
former camp saw a shark out there 2 days in a row. And then a guide at my new
camp here in Canggu said it’s not just (harmless) reef sharks—there are bull
sharks up there. And there have a been a few attacks, which is very rare in
Bali as a whole. Needless to say, that
stuff about Balian is hush hush and not on the brochures.
That aside, Balian is a pretty amazing oasis.
While obviously the Aussies have discovered it, there are only 4 or 5 small
villas there at all so it can only get so crowded. Development seems to be happening slowly for now at least. And if the Balinese are just a ridiculously nice people in general, there are beyond nice in Balian. Every single person you pass smiled at you with 1000 watts. Everyone seems excited you are there. Our little place was
overbooked and we actually had to spend one night in the house of our hotelier,
which was an experience (largely because that was the night of the worst rain
and we were sorta trapped inside).
In the small world category:
Three Americans turn up at the small place we stayed. One of them says, “You
look familiar. Do you surf?” Yes. “Do you surf Bolinas?” Turns out they are
from Mill Valley, born and raised. How
crazy is that? Since I was hobbled and there weren’t great boards for rent, I
offered the guy use of my Mystic. He was stoked. He was even more stoked after
his 3 hour session and was raving about the Mystic. I’m sure—that wave just
looked perfect for that board.
Now down south again at Canggu,
the next camp. Vaguely surprised I made it. I’ve pretty much become numb to the
driving here, but yesterday was truly hair-raising. The roads here are barely
two lane but are driven as though they are four. There are schools of scooters,
trucks, buses, mayhem. Our driver made repeated accelerations around huge
trucks and buses into blind corners. On numerous occasions, it seemed he didn’t
see the onrushing wall of hot metal death and sort of “woke up” in time to
lurch back behind whatever we’d been trying to pass. I understand there are 8
scooter fatalities a week here. Not
surprising one little bit. Safer to go rub yourself in meat and swim at Balian.
Scene here is very surf campy. Everybody (not me) went out last night and got
hammered, returning around 4am. I woke up early thanks to the loud return of my
fellow guests. The foot felt ready to
test and so I headed out to beat the crowds. There is a short walk to the beach
with several breaks right here.
I scored a bunch of really fun
waves this morning—big, thick waves with very long, walled up open faces. Not
very technical and an easy drop which meant they were great waves to practice
cuts and turns on, since you weren’t trying to survive a nasty closeout. It was so good to be back in the water (even
though this water is really gross due to a lot of run off—definitely a bummer
after all the pristine reefs I’ve been surfing).
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