By Anonymous , 03-09-2010

HT Madman - Met a guy named Eric who stays at HT's anyone know how to contact him?

By Petrus , 05-02-2009

Going on May09 - I am going to Katiet on May09. I will not stay on any surf resort. I always preffer to have an integration with thw local people, exchange experiences and save money. I just want to know, if I pay the extra US15/day, will I have problems on this Trip? Surfing is ok on HT? Or I will have to "fight"against the capitalist surfers?

Tank you for your help.
Regards
Petrus

By nick , 08-07-2008

marty - a while ago i arrived in siobahn i was waiting for a cannoe ride to katiet. All the local canooes were out doing other things so i hung out till i could get a ride, turns out the fat dude mrty who owns the katiet villas resort had lobed into town for some supplies. I asked marty what the chances of scoring a ride were, he said yeh mate no probs 50 bucks. At the time i thought no dramas, so i jumped on knowing i'd be at lances for the late arvo glass off! Turns out martys $70,000.00 you bute centre console twin motor vessel had shit itself and me marty and his indo mate were stuck between Siobahn and Katiet with know help in sight, marty suggested i get one of my boards out and paddle to the nearest village and ask for help! good onya marty! turns out we got a tow from a couple of canooes, can you imagine what his resort would be like...?!?! can you imagine the reception marty got from the boys staying at mammas ..... Well marty i would have never written this if i hadn't heard that you have tried to buy out mamma and pappa housn, or if i didn't think you had somthing to do with the local pigs charging crew 15 bucks a day to stay in the village.... In short anyone going to katiet ... the locals are friendly enough, you should be able to work out a deal with accom... as for the cops and their fees... fuck em! support the local community buys a bit of this or a bit of that... look after the family your staying with don't expect to much.. and i'm sure you'll be swept under the rugh when they come looking for their money...... ps katiet villas looks like a shit setup any way.

By ben , 19-02-2008

gone - since the new resort has been put in it has stuffed the area. the police come every week and now charge the people who are staying in the village 15 US dollars a day to stay in the area. thanks for the resort fuck heads

By tread lightly , 15-02-2008

staying with the locals at Katiet? - Could anyone give me an update re staying with the locals at katiet. I speak Indonesian and have stayed at Siberut a few times. Is it still possible to stay here given the new resorts in town? Please email me and don't put up instructions on how to get there on the web.

By pilou , 08-07-2007

bungalows - Hi guys, i'm planning to go to the Mentawais soon but dont want to use those surf charters which I think are way to expensive for indo & surfing... Do u have any good advices where to sleep? I would like to find some bungalows around Lances if possible. Thanks ; )

By pdiidy , 27-02-2007

piglets - if youve ever been to indo u know too well that there will never be "private" or exclusive surf breaks. they are just too open to bribery, if one party offers x amount for exclusive use they will sell out to the next person offering y amount untill it becomes clear that they have no control and all bets are off leaving free waves. and if an indo was smart enough to stay loyal and make an arean exclusive the goverment would crack down on that shit because in indo, if someones makeing money u can bet the goverment will want a cut. Apart from that, i dont think the people of the mentawais could really give a fuck as long as you buy a wooden carving at a modest price and u sling em a few bintangs and kit-kats they seem preety fucken happy. by the way this waves not as easy as it looks.

By tradewindsbali@hotmail.com , 15-02-2007

the ocean for everyone - The rumors of making public surf spot into private ones in Indonesia especialy the mentawais is impossible. Maybe possible to keep non Indonesian sufers out of the breaks but its agaisnt the law to keep anybody (indonesian)away from surtain areas in the ocean.Thanks to some westerners trying to bribe Indonesian officials promising them a cut of the cakes in trying to bend the law for there own interest this could become a problem, and here we are saying how corrupt the Indonesian are well me aim a Indonesian and I have important connections in Jakarta and cant wait for the day Iam kickt out of the water by some foreign back milisia. I,ll get the bule and kick him out of my country in one piece if he is lucky, keep your shitty bisnesse manners in your own fuckt up countries.

By If You Have The Capital... , 14-01-2007

Owning the Ocean can Be Done - Much if not most of the world does not abide by the Western ethos (might I say pathos) of a public ocean for all to use. Ownership of Fijian shores and offshore waters, or Native American coasts, for example, are often claimed by local tribes for their fishing grounds - a practice that has been going on for centuries. In Samoa, even if the surf is cranking on Sunday or at 6PM EVERY DAY, local customs dictate you will not be able to paddle out at 99.9% of the spots, - if you do, you risk beind stoned upon your return, and with rocks, not with the local grass. In other places, such as Pt. Magoo, S. Pt. Loma, or even Hawaii (Zombies), the military restricts or bans entirely public ocean access. The same could be said for many other heavy-handed/sensitive militiry areas such as spots in Angola or places like Yemen and Israel. Then there is the classic 'exclusive rights' set-ups that can be found in places like Savaii, Samoa, or Tavarua, Fiji, where the surf camp operators have been able to cajole the local government into granting their operations exlusive access, perhaps by means of kickbacks or for attractive 'safe' tourism reasons. There are also cases, such as The Ranch, Double-Point, and Ralphs, where either vast private or military owned-property or no real land-based access means only those who can afford a boat can get to them. Then you have your classic Malibu Colony snob ethos where a wealthy suburb by the sea will erect fences and require a key, gotten by special priveledge (i.e. - being rich or a hobnobber) to access the surf. You all may not like to hear such tales of NO SURF ACCESS, but I think it is necessary for you to hear, in order to destroy the surfing public's Ivory Tower, incorrect (not currently or historically practiced) view of "the ocean is free for everyone to use." The ideal of open access sounds nice and while I agree to it philosophically, in reality it simply is not the case, in America and beyond. You may be able to get your local legal organization such as Surfrinder Foundation, which BTW is a remarkable organization, to battle the lack of access and perhaps win you some significant inroads to the surf, but the bottom-line is, money talks in this world, and if you want your own, exclusive-access surf spot, you can bribe a foreign or perhaps even local government to help you establish it! The best way is to set-up in a place like Bougainville, Mombazique, Nigeria, Columbia, Chile, Russia, Malibu, OC or PNG... i.e. - someplace already are beyond the pale of Western-style ethics - find a nice point break, buy the surrounding land, then simply bribe the local authorities or central government to grant you exclusive rights to the surf. You would probably be able to include a portion of thier military or local armed policing body in the deal, however illegetimate, in order to enfore the 'private sanctity' of your offshore waters. You may get a liberelized yacthie from Marina del Rey or Costa Rica complaining about it on the Internet, but the fact is, if they tried to drop anchor and surf your break, your local, privately owned or subsidized military would simply shoot at them or set fire to their craft. Again, I know you all hate to hear this, but I am simply stating an example of how fickle are your claims to worldwide, public surf access. Heck, you may as well include places supposed to be public, like many spots in Hawaii and California, but the locals, at least in the 80's and even now at times, were so aggro, outsiders were just not welcome, and outright beaten down if they infringed upon what the locals perceived as thier own, exclusive surf. Thus, even within your own surfing body, you have some major dissenters. So please, spare me your Utopian rhetoric... unless, as an example, the Shias and Sunnis and Iranians and Kurds and Americans really want to share the resources and power, you will never have your Garden of democratic Eden, or oceanic 'Imagine' aka Lennon.

By Anonymous , 12-01-2007

what? - how's that possible? how could you own the ocean????????