It’s true that you always want what you can’t have, and with international travel locked down in some capacity for nearly 4 months now, we’d sure as hell love to jump on an airplane to score surf in some tropical destination. Anywhere with warm water and electric blue tubes will do. Because how nice would it be to pack a bag and travel to some far-off island chain, like journalist and longtime surf adventurer Michael Kew did pre-COVID while in search of writing inspiration?
“Surfwise, none of these islands are ‘the stuff of dreams,’” Kew tells us, in an email along with this batch of photos from Oceania (below), where he’s spent a good chunk of the last 18 or so years exploring. “True surf destinations they are not, but they exemplify the spirit of exotic pure exploration that in the past decade or so has largely and sadly gone missing.”
Kew recently wrote a book, called Rainbownesia, which details in great length his travels throughout these islands. No stranger to solo exploring, Kew writes in detailed prose about his experiences searching out surf in the fringes of the South Pacific and Oceania.
“None of the book’s destinations host what might be the normal definition of a perfect setup,” Kew continues. “There are no Cloudbreaks, Restaurants, or Teahupo’os in here. Most reefs are ill-formed, or a pass is too narrow, or it’s just too shallow. And, if an island does feature a perfect setup, more often than not, it’s on the ‘wrong’ side. Fickle is an understatement in these parts. But…you never know till you go, right?”
While few of us can “go” anywhere at the moment, we are beginning to see a crack of light at the end of the travel tunnel. Bali just announced the re-opening of its borders in September, and hopefully other countries will follow suit. In the meantime, scroll through the below gallery of Kew’s Oceania surf hunt, and insert yourself there.
All photos and captions by Michael Kew
“Standing on cool white sand at this island’s most surf-friendly shoreline, I sipped coffee and watched small clean waves riff off this notch in the razor-sharp barrier reef,” says Kew. “Ambience in spades, swell in short supply — typical of Micronesia.”
“Few boats call at this island, which is why I was shocked to see a sloop moored inside of what looked to be a clean, hollow righthander inside the cove’s west reef,” Kew recalls. “The morning’s shifty weather had calmed July’s normal tradewinds on this day, allowing a particularly rare window of surf.”
“Because this atoll’s sole pass was so small and shallow, I was certain it would be flooded by any swell larger than chest-high,” says Kew. “Fishermen later confirmed this, noting the difficulty — and often impossibility — of going ocean-fishing on these sort of days.”
“This shallow pass was mostly closed out, but a piece of reef against the motu did allow for some long, sectiony rights,” says Kew. “I watched it for an hour this day before abandoning my quest — being Sunday, hiring a fisherman as transport out was impossible. Surely this spot still remains unsurfed.”
“A year before visiting Niue I’d watched a short video from a local tour operator,” says Kew. “In a few magical seconds of footage, shot from inside this cave, a small perfect right could be seen. The wave looked rideable and the cave enticed me, but as it turned out, Niue’s geologic reality would harshly foil my foolish surf fantasy.”
“This day, I was startled by an oddly angled late season winter groundswell on the wrong side of the Pacific,“ says Kew. “But surfing was futile. Despite an abundance of speedboats, I could not arrange timely lagoon transport, as this swell was more fleeting than most.”
“After several days of unsurfable conditions, on my final morning here this raw and rare left-hander finally came to life.”
“Not a lot of setups in this zone,” says Kew. “This wave was an exception, however flawed, in a nation of unsurfable reefs.”
“After an all night steam north from Samoa, I awoke to notice my ferry was idling offshore this tiny atoll,” says Kew. “Along the shallow reef boomed large swell — long clean left hand barrels with no safe entry or exit, perhaps a primitive kin of One Palm Point.”