Mentawai 2009 was a trip to remember. the waves were excellent, the diving was excellent, the boat was excellent, the members were excellent, and tokura-san’s birthday day was excellent. this past winter, kenji sahara came to hawaii and gave me this book he made. it brought back the memories as it was yesterday. thanks kenji for this awesome book and thanks for capturing all the great memories!
imagine waking up on your 60th birthday in the middle of the indian ocean right in front of a world class wave called Macaroni’s. surf it uncrowded for 2 hours, pull anchor and head to a dive spot in the middle of the sea to catch dinner. we catch 2 huge fish and head to HT’s in the evening where the waves, wind, and weather is perfect. you paddle out in your classic red vest, you take off on a perfect wave, and get the barrel of your life. Dove wetsuits owner Tokura-san was the lucky 60th year old birthday boy. it was one of the most perfect days in history. the champagne, the smiles, the laughter, and even the tears. i will never forget that day and i hope my 60th birthday is exactly like that.
i still remember my 25 second ride in the barrel at Riffles. that was by far the longest barrel in my life and by far the most memorable. out there has strong current and i don’t know how kenji swam and connected with this cool barrel shot.
i didn’t see anything in the deep blue water but decided to take a 60′ drop anyway. as i was down there, i seen this fish swim in from the dark blue and as soon as i shot it, i knew that we were going to have the best sashimi in indonesia that night. then right after this, i took another drop and in came a big GT. got 2 big fish in less than 30 minutes and the rest is history. i mean sashimi.
this is Tokura-san’s red vest. a red vest that will go down in the history books of surfing in japan. 13 people witnessed and experienced that special day. it wasn’t only a dream come true for him, it was a dream come true for all of us!
and the cool thing about this mentawai memory is i’m going again soon. counting down 22 days!!!!! yeah!!!!!
