Nias and Sorake Bay

A Right Hand Point Break That Surfers Rate Among The Best In The World, On An Island Whose Megalithic Culture Is Older And Stranger Than The Wave · Teluk Dalam, North Sumatra

SORAKE IS A RIGHT-HAND POINT BREAK AND SURFERS TALK ABOUT IT THE WAY THEY TALK ABOUT A HANDFUL OF WAVES ON EARTH - long, fast, hollow, peeling off a headland into LAGUNDRI BAY over shallow reef, ridden from a takeoff you can watch from a losmen balcony twenty metres away. Travelling surfers found it in the 1970s and it has drawn them ever since. THEN THE 2005 EARTHQUAKE LIFTED THE REEF by a metre or more, and the wave changed - shallower, faster, and by many accounts better, which is an argument that is still running. BUT THE ISLAND IS OLDER AND ODDER THAN THE SURF. NIAS HAS A MEGALITHIC TRADITION OF STONE SEATS, MONUMENTS AND VAST TIMBER HOUSES, and in the southern villages young men still practise FAHOMBO, jumping a stone wall over two metres high. Most visitors fly in, surf, and never go up the hill to see any of it. The reef is shallow and sharp and this is not a beginner's wave; cuts infect fast in this climate and the nearest real hospital is a flight away; and getting here means Gunungsitoli by air or an overnight ferry, then three more hours of road.

Sorake and Lagundri Bay, South Nias, North Sumatra, Teluk Dalam, North Sumatra, Indonesia

REACHED BY FLIGHTS TO GUNUNGSITOLI from Medan, or by an OVERNIGHT FERRY FROM SIBOLGA; TELUK DALAM AND SORAKE ARE A FURTHER THREE HOURS OR SO BY ROAD across the island. LOSMEN LINE THE POINT at Sorake and are simple, cheap and right on the wave; there is no resort infrastructure to speak of. THE SURF SEASON RUNS ROUGHLY APRIL TO OCTOBER with the biggest swells around mid-year. THE REEF IS SHALLOW AND SHARP AND THE WAVE IS NOT A BEGINNER'S - people are injured here regularly. THE SOUTHERN VILLAGES, including BAWOMATALUO, are a short drive inland and charge small entries; STONE-JUMPING IS PERFORMED FOR VISITORS AND ALSO HAPPENS FOR ITS OWN REASONS. MALARIA IS PRESENT.

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