Now that you’ve read all about Karina’s trip to Indonesia in part 1 of her blog you might be thinking, how do I plan a trip like that for myself? Well keep reading!

Karina has shared all of her preparation and planning advice, from how to prepare for reef breaks, to flights and visa insights, to how many critters joined her in her hotel rooms! Pop the kettle on and have a read, this one is for the planners.

Note: all tips and advice given are from Karina’s experiences, always consult professionals and make the best choices for you and your situation.

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Pre-trip surf preparation

Reef research

Most breaks in Indo are reef breaks, which can be quite a change from our soft sandy beach breaks here in the UK. The good thing about reef breaks is you can often paddle out in a channel (rather than punching through breaking waves), which lets you surf bigger waves than you would normally. The downside of this is that if you wipeout, a big set comes, or you get stuck inside after a wave, then you will have a more ‘thrilling’ washing machine experience than you’re used to in the UK! 

If you’re new to surfing reefs or a bit out of practice, there’s lots of great Youtube content with tips and tricks - 15 Reef Break Tips - Watch This Before Your Trip!

Practice Your Pop Up 

Make yourself a pop-up practice calendar and do 10 pop ups a day, even if you’re already a shredder! Trust me, this will pay dividends (just ask Zara! Her first wave off the plane was an absolute bomb!).

Breathhold Training

Breathhold training will help you keep calm in the washing machine (where even the best surfers will spend time, sorry!). Check out free apps like Freedive Apnea or keep an eye out for more BGSC breathwork events.

 

Zara’s (from the BGSC community too) absolutely sending it, fresh off the plane! Smashed it!

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The surf

Surf with local guides

I recommend having your first sessions in any new spot with a local surf guide (and ask to try different spots each session if suitable). 

When you’re with the guide, make an effort to remember exactly where you are sitting in the lineup (pick 2 markers to line up with in each direction) as often this is the ‘golden spot’ on the reef that balances priority, current, wave faces staying open, etc. In lulls, ask your guide about what the conditions are like on other days (e.g. does the current ever run in a different direction, what tide levels does the spot work on, etc.). This will help set you up to have successful independent surf sessions.

We also found that establishing a good relationship with a local guide initially meant that other locals were very friendly to us and called us into waves, even when we later went out without a guide. 

Navigating the line up

This is my advice for Indo but they apply wherever you surf. Etiquette is important for safety and enjoyment so the more you know the better.

1. Never paddle out directly behind anyone. You never know who will ditch their board or have a turtleroll/duckdive go badly. Similarly, always check no one is behind you if you need to let go of your board (and if they are, paddle sideways before letting go). 

2. If someone is surfing towards you, there isn’t much time and it is unclear if they have seen you or are capable of going around you, then ditch your board and swim deep! Lloyd unfortunately learned this the hard way on Bali, when he duck dived (putting one leg up for balance/drive) and the surfer managed to run over the back of his knee.. 16 stitches later (3 layers of stitches!) he was land-bound for 3.5 weeks while he recovered..

3. Get comfortable in busy lineups and make sure you are familiar with the etiquette of lineups. Especially in Indo busy lineups are part of the challenge, particularly at surf spots with a specific take-off spot. Its not uncommon to be out there for hours and only get a handful of waves. Researching ‘surf etiquette’ / ‘surfing in crowded lineups‘ online yields lots of useful advice. *Note that our pictures are a bit deceiving, we definitely didn’t have the place to ourselves!

4. Smile and say hello to other surfers when you join the lineup. This helps create a good vibe (particularly when your concentration face looks as serious as mine!). In some spots (especially in Indonesia), locals might police/control the lineup; if a surfer is too ‘greedy’ or shows bad etiquette then locals may deliberately start blocking or dropping in on them.

Wave Size

In general, the waves are bigger and more powerful in Indonesia. 3-4ft on surfline in Indonesia will typically be bigger and more powerful than a 3-4ft UK forecast! 

Be careful on days where there is a building swell (e.g. a forecast that is 2-3ft in the morning and 6-8ft by the afternoon); the forecast won’t predict exactly when the new swell will arrive, and often there are some early big waves before the rest of the swell. On one such day I was enjoying some shoulder high peeling waves when all of a sudden a set of 6 monster waves rolled through and cleared the entire lineup (we were all caught inside)! Those of us that didn’t fancy sticking around for the big swell then promptly paddled in without any drama, but I wouldn’t have wanted to surf a building swell at a surf spot with hazards or a tricky exit point.

Boards

If travelling to remote areas, I recommend taking two boards in a ‘coffin’ bag. You don’t want a ding or snapped board to keep you from surfing!

On our trip Lloyd snapped his new 3-week-old board when caught by a wave lip on a day that was forecast as 3-4ft but was well overhead on the sets. He was able to get a local ding repair person to put the board back together (which took a week), but the board wasn’t the same after that.

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For the planners

Travel insurance

Make sure you have a suitable policy. Remember that some single and annual travel insurance policies have an individual trip length limit of about 30 days, so for long trips you will need the ‘backpacker’ style policies.

Visas - In Advance vs On Arrival

If planning to go for a couple of months or more, definitely apply for your visa in advance. We applied for a 60 day tourist visa online in advance of our trip, and then when it was 2 weeks from expiry we applied for another 60 day extension online. In theory we could have done this extension again (for a total of 3 x 60 days), before then having to leave Indonesia for a ‘visa run’. 

You can also buy a standard 30 day visa on arrival in Indonesia, however there is more faff as you have to apply for extensions more frequently and they would have run out sooner (3 x 30 day maximum). 

Medical Kit & Vaccinations

If travelling to remote areas, buy a proper remote travel medical kit that includes antibiotics. We purchased one from Nomad. The kit included a 3 day course of antibiotics for unresolved traveler's diarrhea, which let’s just say came in very handy. 

Check out what vaccination injections are recommended well before you go. If you don’t know exactly where you will end up, then best to ‘play it safe’ and look at what is needed across the region. 

The NHS doesn’t offer a travel advice service so if not sure where to start, first download your vaccination history from the NHS. Book a consultation with a private travel health provider to narrow down the list of injections you need (they will confirm which ones you will get free from the NHS and which you will have to pay privately for). Then book an appointment with your GP practice accordingly. 

For some vaccinations, there are standard injections or ‘rapid’ injections (which can be given much closer together, but are more expensive), so organising these with enough time before your trip for the standard injections will save money. We used Nomad and had excellent service (online booking, excellent availability, all vaccines, easy scheduling), but it was pricey.

Luggage and Laundry

If you’re buying new luggage for your trip, we would recommend a wheely suitcase that has detachable backpack straps. The combination of a surfboard bag over your shoulder and a wheely bag behind you works really well when going through airports, ferry terminals, etc, and saves overloading your back (particularly when it’s very hot!). And having the option for backpack straps over occasional rough terrain (e.g. when moving accommodation locally) is ideal. A bag that is at least ‘water resistant’ is a good idea, however for electronics and clean clothes a few light dry bags will soon earn their keep!

Getting your laundry done in Indonesia is such a treat! Comes back clean and folded for a couple of pounds, delightful! However in remote areas I would avoid sending to the local laundry any clothing you are super precious about, as sometimes they are scrubbed by hand (so the clothes get worn more quickly) and in my experience white t-shirts will come back a slightly different colour. Taking one large plastic bag/canvas bag with you to use to drop off your laundry is a good idea.

Accommodation

We found all of our accommodation through Google Maps or Booking.com and stayed in hotels for most of the trip; £30-70 total per night including breakfast. 

There were cheaper options available (particularly homestays), but we needed a desk and good internet (for my partner Lloyd to work remotely), and air conditioning (because we’re old and British). The standard was very good, with only the occasional mouldy corner or unexpected visitor (100 x geckos, 1 x mouse, 1 x snake!). 

Flexible Itinerary

It seemed like everyone we met who was travelling for more than one month had a story about an ailment or two that had put a temporary spanner into their plans, and we certainly had a few of these! So keep in mind that not everything will go to plan, you’ll likely need some downtime at some point; consider it part of the experience. 

lf your goal is to maximise surfing, a long range surf forecast and a flexible itinerary are your friends! For our trip, we kept an eye on various 14+ day swell forecasts (Surfline, Surf-forecast, Windguru, Windy), and made plans one week ahead of time. This allowed us to follow good conditions (and find shelter from massive swells!).

This strategy does have drawbacks - for example, sometimes the best accommodation is already booked out, and you might have to move between places in their pockets of availability. We generally found that there were a couple of places per location with Free Cancellation up to 1-7 days before the booking, so definitely worth finding these and pencilling in a booking (if you know you’d like to be in a particular location for a while, then I recommend entering separate consecutive 1 week bookings, to make it easier to adjust and still have free cancellation valid). 

Also keep an eye out for newly opened accommodation - sometimes they will have much cheaper prices for a period while they train staff/build ratings - we had one of our favourite (and most luxurious!) stays like this.

Internal Flights with Boards

Most of the small internal Indonesian flights are operated by Wings airline, which have a 6’5 (200cm) board length limit quoted. In our experience, we were able to fly with Wings with a 7’2 surfboard (220cm) wrapped in foam inside a daybag, and a double coffin 7’0 travel bag, however it could be route dependent. The maximum board length I heard of other travellers flying using Wings was a 7’10 (240cm).

Flying with surfboards on Wings is also pricey; they charge £50 per surfboard per flight on top of the baggage weight cost. 

One thing to keep in mind is that usually small propeller planes with limited luggage space are used. If there are lots of tourists with surfboards on the same flight, there might not be enough room for all the boards. In that case, the extra surfboards will be sent on the next available flight — which could take a few days. Any additional taxi or courier costs won't be covered by the airline. 

Scooters and Safety

Surfing in Indonesia will often involve riding a scooter with a surfboard rack, sometimes on rough terrain. This can be tricky/intimidating if you don’t spend a lot of time on two wheels, so ask someone (like a fellow traveller) for a ‘lesson’ on a quiet road to get the hang of the basics first. This is probably the riskiest activity you will do in Indonesia, and unless you have a valid motorbike license and an international permit then your travel insurance will NOT cover you in the event of an accident. 

If you rent a scooter, ask for a helmet, and if they tell you that you don’t need one, then insist that you would like one; we were always able to get helmets. Lloyd and I rented one scooter with two helmets and rode tandem (which was ok for short distances).

Additional Surf Kit Recommendations

• Reef boots

• 2 surfboards (preferably with the same fin box type)

• Ding kit

• Wax comb

• Multiple fin keys

• Leash, spare leash & leash strings

• Surf sun protection (hat, long sleeve surfsuit, leggings, zinc)

• Mosquito spray

• At least 1 set of modest clothing (for travelling through remote villages, etc)

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If you're part of the BGSC community and would like to share one of your surf stories too, drop us a message on our contact form. We'd love to hear from you!