Surfer: Russell Bierke Photo: Arthur Picard

Photographer, Arthur Picard, had pledged to traverse Scotland and Ireland by train rather than be complicit in the airline industry’s contribution to fossil fuel emissions. Public transport made timing his run for waves more difficult, but the serendipity kicked in when he reached the west coast of Ireland. After trekking through the dark and scaling the fabled cliffs of Moher, Aurthur found himself bobbing in frigid waters along-side filmer Joao Tudella. As it happened, the tight pack of surfers taking on Aileen’s that day included Australian Russell Bierke. Aurthur takes over from here in his Frenchy English. “For more than two hours the sets follow one another, and with João, we are at the front row of a magnificent spectacle. The riders are totally committed. The tubes are colossal. The lip of the wave comes to smash on the water with such a power that the noise impresses me. That morning there were few riders at the peak.

After a long lull, a huge set takes shape. Russell paddles on a giant wave! This young Australian of 25 years adjusts his bottom-turn in an extreme under the lip and is wedged in a tube of a disproportionate size…We can put two or three people standing there! I am placed in the axis of the tube, I am concentrated; I press the shutter. Russell comes out of the wave at full speed. Joao and I exchange looks, we are completely taken aback. No words were needed to understand that the wave surfed was incredible. Russell goes back to the peak with a smile on his face. He has just surfed a huge tube with style and elegance. His apparent humility makes one believe that it was a wave like the others, but this wave was …

I make the throat-slitty sign at photographer Nathan Oldfield, dragging four fingers across my neck with a grimace to let him know that we’re done.

Blood is seeping down Dave’s arm from a shallow fin chop. Behind him, another peeling six-foot Nihiwatu set goes unridden like the archetypal surf mirage.

Dave’s shifting his feet unstably up the sand. I wonder how bad this one’s going to be. He collapses in a cursing heap next to me.

We almost didn’t make it to Indonesia at all this year. The endless illnesses of Kindergarten had their way with us, virus after virus. Whether by nature or by culture, as we get older it seems like we tend toward being homeostasis machines. We’re good at reading the patterns and reproducing routes. Routines lay deep neural pathways. Caring for a young child makes this clear. Dave and I both were ready for some newness to crack open the monotony, so we booked a few weeks in Indonesia to getaway from the germ pit otherwise known as school.

Lauren, Dave and Minoa, knee-deep and sun dappled. Photo: Nathan Oldfield.

We couldn’t make our original flight as the three of us – myself, Dave and our six-year-old Minoa – were in a fever dream of influenza A and decidedly unfit to travel. Maybe we should have taken that as a sign….

On Sumba Island in Eastern Indonesia, sea worms are the heralds of the harvest and accompanying festivities. Their annual, wriggly appearance is the cosmological sign that the Kodi people look for – a communication not only between species, but from the ancestors. Mystic marine worms.

“Kodi people perceive the world as one where human humans, dead humans, super-natural nonhumans, and other non humans metamorphose at a particular time span in particular places into one another.”

…

The black camel. It’s got a ring to it, doesn’t it? I’ve never been one to name vehicles, always seen them more as an extension of a lifestyle than their own personal entity, but I reckon this one has stuck.

Never thirsty, always dry, said Nath, a brash, long-haired Aussie out in the surf. And yeah. It feels fitting riding this empty, scorched 500km long road, through barren corn-fields and half-baked fishing villages.

I’m in a hurry to get across this island to its eastern port, but I’m worried that the rush might not be warranted. In the more populated parts of Indo, ferries run to some kind of regular schedule, at least by Indonesian standards. Maybe every hour, notwithstanding the lengthy delays. Here, they run every week. There is no online timetable, no one really knows when they’ll leave. The only way to find out is by riding to the port to ask. I have two days to rest and recover some sensation in my arse, which feels like it’s been welded to The Black Camel’s saddle after the 13-hour ride. Onboard, five long-haired Peruvians are the only other Westerners. They inflate a flotilla of blow-up mattresses in the middle of the top deck, stripping to their underwear and making FaceTime video calls.

The Indonesian passengers around them aren’t really sure how to react; some shoot them baleful looks, wondering what the hell they’re doing half-naked in one of the most Islamic parts in Indonesia. Others swarm the outskirts, setting up little camps and outposts on the edge of their palatial set-up. Meanwhile, I find a quiet corner of the deck. I roll out a little yoga mat and take a good swig from a bottle of local alcohol. Laying back, I rest my head on my backpack, and …

Many people go to the Maldives on their honeymoon. I got married at the back end of Covid-19, and while the island nation was high on our holiday hot list after restrictions lifted, overseas travel wasn’t immediately an option.

Our actual honeymoon in December 2021 was a rained-out few days on the NSW south coast. Both of us are surfers so this could have been a laidback trip in old stomping grounds where I learned to stand up; were it not cut short when the Airbnb flooded. That less-than-idyllic experience has been a source of much laughter and many pub stories since. It also provides an impressive dichotomy, and low benchmark to vault over, when we finally do paddle into the shimmering walls of the Indian Ocean two years later.

Honeymoon decisions in the Maldives – who’s got priority?

Sparks fly

For context, my goofy-footer husband and I – a natural-footer – dated for 10 years before we married. Our relationship is like a 10-foot McTavish at Waikiki. As stable and fun as ever despite plenty of obstacles in the way. My relationship with surfing, on the other hand, is a rocky one. We never have enough time for each other. Weather and swell and work interrupt our dates. Monogamy is impossible, especially after the chaotic boom of learners inspired by COVID’s work-from-home mandates.

After years surfing in Sydney, where I live, our spark has diminished. Time to reignite. Stepping out in Male – the Maldivian capital– is a slap to all senses after existing in stark, plane cabins for nearly 24 hours. Thirty-degree heat smacks alongside scents of saltwater, diesel fuel and scaly fish, that unmistakeable tropical island trio. Engines of all sizes and purposes – cars, seaplanes, jets, boats – grumble impatiently for attention. Most tourists opt to …