The Indonesian archipelago continues to offer up slices of surfing heaven for those willing to get off the beaten track. But don’t worry, a few days at this resort in Lombok is anything but a hardship.
TIM LARCOMBE reports.

tasting a slice of heaven where the extraordinary is our daily bread

On the southeast corner of Lombok island, just a short plane ride eastwards from Bali, there is a spot that offers all of this… and more. Perhaps the greatest thing about the ecoresort they call Heaven on the Planet or HotPlanet is its isolation. While not that difficult to get to – the resort will pick you up at Mataram airport for the two-hour car ride across the island – it is in a surprisingly uncrowded corner of the universe.

Nearby there are no busy tourist towns, no ports, no buzzing bemos or taxis, no hawkers and no plane loads of surfers from all points of the globe descending on what is one of the most fun waves in Indonesia. A few kampongs dot the rolling countryside and small sandy bays stretch in either deserted direction from the clifftop resort. At night the sound of a squillion bugs and the crash of surf are just about the only sounds you’ll hear and the kerosene lamps of fisherman out on the bay the only lights below. Above, a clear night sky delivers a spray of stars. On the eastern tip of Ekas Bay – about the size of Sydney Harbour – Heaven on the Planet sits on top of a headland overlooking the home break, Inside Ekas.

What you get is a classic peak with a fast right breaking in toward the reef and a long walling left that slides into the channel. At its best a great shortboard/longboard setup and at size, challenging enough for the experienced campaigner. At high tide it’s a long paddle back to the beach but that’s about the toughest thing you’ll have to endure here. Everything about the place is a pleasure.

The scenery is so spectacular – and all green at the end of the wet season – with a wall of hills in the distance and cliffs behind, and one of Indonesia’s highest mountains, Rinjani, like a reclining goddess to the north. It’s kind of weird surfing surrounded on all sides by land – like on a lake. Inside Ekas is about a kilometre within the bay and the swell arrives as if from straight up out of the ocean depths.

Sometimes there isn’t much warning but a line of whitewater across a shallow slab of reef at the mouth of the bay signals the oncoming sets. A couple of minutes later the waves will be upon you. In the dying light of the early evening, with the soft sandstone cliffs behind fading in the encroaching darkness, we continued to surf, lit by a newly risen full moon.

Insides is a very safe place to surf but its sister break Outsides, just around the headland at the mouth of the harbour, has a lot more water moving around and tricky lurching peaks that keep you guessing. The left at Insides is regular and fairly predictable. But it is a long wave and, even on a larger day, the end section offers something for the novice. While the Longbreak crew was there, several German and Dutch hopefuls were having the time of their lives.

A short walk around the corner in the next bay, there is also a sand bottom learner’s wave for the absolute beginners. Occasionally, surfers will travel from Kuta (Lombok) to the village of Awang on the other side of the bay and grab an outrigger to the break. The mood changes with the arrival of these interlopers. But it’s way too easy to get possessive of the place, especially when there are six guys you just had breakfast with crowding out the lineup!

Honestly, I had what was easily equal to any best hour of surf in my life on the righthander when the others were going left. Wave after fast hollow wave broke across the shallow reef as I paddled straight back out and into another one, grabbing head high perfection every five minutes. Try doing that for three straight hours!

Give us our daily bread

Ray, from Bundaberg in Queensland and a good mate of one of the owners, Greg Wolff, had been staying at HotPlanet helping out for six weeks and was due to head home. Most days he surfed Insides with Greg, or on his own, throwing his six foot Mitchell Rae fish around like a man possessed. At 44, Ray had reached that point in his life when he had the freedom to do what he wanted and a great understanding of what made him happy.

“I’ve wanted to come here since I was 14,” he says. But there were no regrets now, as we sat with half an eye on the short horizon, just the two of us, again… It was a laugh. Ray going left, me going right. I think surfers can get a bit smug about life sometimes. I mean, the places we go, the things we do and see. You can be sitting in this amazingly beautiful place on the edge of the world and hear yourself complaining when the change in tide brings a 20 minute lull! We live in the incredible, in the spectacular. Extraordinary is our daily bread.

Ray recalled surfing the Superbank at Snapper on the Gold Coast for three hours to get five waves. Now he found himself switching between a longboard for the photos and the fish for fun every hour or so, a relentless machine consuming wave after wave in the pursuit of extreme joyousness.

The place reminds me a lot of Uluwatu in the old days – circa 1983 when I made my first trip to Bali and the trek down to the warungs perched high on the Bukit cliffs, a naïve 21-year-old Sydney boy amazed that such places could exist on earth. It reminds me of Ulus because of the climb down the hillside to the beach and sitting out in the lineup with high cliffs at your back and climbing back to the top exhausted.

The climb up the rugged stairs to the hilltop bungalows at HotPlanet is not for the weak of knee and a great pack drill for those who like their workouts of a more military style. Getting back up after a few hours in the surf was enough for this lounge lizard but a member of the Longbreak crew, made a habit of running the gruelling ascent five times a day.

Cooling breezes and bugs galore

HotPlanet’s isolation presents some challenges for the luxury traveller. If your partner can’t live without starched white sheets laundered to within an inch of their life, room service and shopping malls, you are best to leave them behind. But there is enough here for the non-surfer to just relax and enjoy the beautiful environment and simple lifestyle. Great for those who want to detox from the rigours of the urban treadmill.

Showering under cold water open to the night sky after a big day in the surf is a pleasure you won’t get at the Bali Hilton. It was simple, but also charming. HotPlanet is a bug and bird lovers paradise, alive with all manner of wasps and beetles, butterflies and birds, frogs and lizards, including geckos and their larger noisier cousin the Tokek, which makes a hell of a racket as its abdomen visibly swells and lets out a resounding ‘ekoor’.

Breezes keep the exceptionally comfortable bungalows cool at night and a good cover of shade from larger trees keep the place well shaded during the day. One of the things I really liked was the water cooler in each room – no horrid piles of discarded plastic bottles here. The solid wooden beds are a good size for two and mozzie nets protect you from the risk of bites.

Waking, rolling over to views across the bay from the bungalow’s verandah was a massive pleasure. And wake early to get misty views of Rinjani at sunrise. The mood at HotPlanet is one of polished simplicity. The restaurant – open to panoramic views on three sides – delivers a classic array of quality Indonesian- European dishes from an extensive menu; a substantial achievement for such a remote location. The chef, Saad, takes a great deal of pride in his product. He controls the kitchen with a sure hand, supported by a band of young local women.

There is a surprising variety of fresh veggies, salad and fruit along with whole fish, good size prawns and squid. Tom Yum, Gaddo Gaddo, fish curry, and homemade spring rolls were among the favourites, and for desert, pisang goring (deep fried banana) with vanilla ice cream. And of course banana pancakes for breakfast with a watermelon or papaya and lime juice. In the front of house, Ram watches over the orders and the receipts with his calculator at his side. And the core management team is completed by Man, who controls all things to do with water activities, including the large outrigger the resort uses to get visitors to Outsides, on the aquaculture tour or to Awang across the bay The question I posed at the beginning remains: What does paradise mean to you? Whatever your answer, there’s one thing that’s true for everyone – it ain’t real until you tell your mates. Happy searching.

Two worlds collide

The deep straits dividing Bali and Lombok are only about 30 kilometres wide but a world of difference exists between the two islands. The people of Bali are mostly Hindu, while those of Lombok largely Muslim. Ethnically the people of Lombok belong, in the vast majority, to the Sasak tribe. They have their own language and customs but are, like the Balinese, an essentially agrarian population, living life by the seasons, mixing mainstream religion with animism.

The straits separating the two islands are also significant for another important ecological reason. The passage signals the boundary between the Asian and Australian continents. This boundary is known as the Wallace Line after the 19th century naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace, a contemporary of Charles Darwin, who postulated that this was where the two continents collide. Bird, plant and animal species are noticeably different on either side of this divide, as they evolved in total isolation from each other and were unable to cross the deep waters separating the two landmasses. Some flying mammals, like bats, have crossed the line but other migrations are limited to rafting rats and shrews, and macaque monkeys. Even most birds refuse to make the journey.

Transit lounge luxury

If Heaven on the Planet is your ideal ecoresort, all natural simplicity on the edge of nowhere, Karma Resort in Bali’s Jimbaran Bay is the ideal respite from the rigours of off-the-road surf adventure… or for the intransit Bali/Denpassar stopover en route to or from Lombok (depending on your flight schedules and connections).

Set up by 80s pop group manager extraordinaire John Spence (Culture Club and Eurythmics among others), Karma is the height of opulence Bali-style. Each villa comes complete with its own plunge pool, separate lounge/kitchen area, and three spacious double rooms with gorgeous en suites. The attention to detail and quality is outstanding but the resort seems to retain a relaxed and welcoming atmosphere. The poolside restaurant is excellent and the three of us indulged our way through several courses washed down with Bintangs for just over US$40 a head.

And if the surf is cranking, Karma is just a short outrigger ride to the world-class (when it works!) Airport Rights, and of course its equally stunning sisters on the other side of the runway, Airport Lefts and Kuta Reef. Jimbaran Point also has a substantial wave when the rest of the Bukit is maxing out, so don’t miss this if you are fortunate enough to lob in town when the Southern Ocean’s huge winter groundswells make the long journey north.

By year’s end you’ll also find a Karma resort on the cliff top near Bali’s Uluwatu temple, while others will be found at Koh Samui, Seychelles and Margaret River in Western Australia’s south. Hey, why not buy a villa. They are for sale as well.