We took another ferry from Lombok to Sumbawa, and upon arrival immediately set off on the 6 hour drive to Eastern Sumbawa and Lakey Peak. Lakey Peak has drawn surfers from all over the world for decades, and yet (somewhat mysteriously) remains quite undeveloped. A handful of guesthouses and rickety warungs (restaurants) cluster around the Lakey Peak surf break, but other than that, the village of Hu’u is sparsely populated. There are no gas stations or grocery stores, and the only dependable wifi is at the “fancy” hotel Aman Gati, which boasts air conditioned rooms for about $60 a night. Compared to the guest house prices of about $5 a night, it’s a high class place. , thanks to Sky and his connections, we were lucky enough to stay at Sky’s friend’s villa, which is directly in front of another surf break called Periscopes. It’s about a half an hour walk on the beach from Lakey Peak and there is literally nothing around except for the locals, which include people, dogs, chickens, goats, and water buffalo.

In the town of Hu’u, cows rule the road. Followed by dogs and goats. Sometimes driving on the main “highway” was a bit of an obstacle course, especially at night. They weren’t afraid of moving vehicles, either; once we rounded a curve to see a dog ahead of us in the middle of the road, who looked at us for a moment before giving a big stretch and then laying down while we laughed and drove around.

We stayed at Lakey for about a week, mostly surfing and gorging ourselves on nasi goreng and other great indo food. One interesting thing about Indonesia, and Lakey in particular: the tides are more extreme than in Hawaii, and a surf spot can go from perfect to unsurfable in a matter of hours. Because of the tide cycle, in the morning we had to wait for the tide to come in enough to cover the reef before we could paddle out.

Still, we were able to surf almost every day we were there, except one day when the swell was too big. Photos don’t do it justice since the waves were so far out; in fact the waves didn’t even look big until we saw a surfer on them, to put it in perspective. Since none of us felt like charging, we resigned ourselves to watching triple overhead sets rolling through, and admiring the brave souls who were on them.