The new issue of Slide magazine is now on sale at many fine surf shops and bookstores, and, if you're especially keen and are a subscriber, it's en route to your mailbox. Within the pages of Issue 21 is my tale about Tonga, which I've excerpted (is that a word?) for you. Get your copy of Slide #21 today!
Our boat driver is drunk. Sateki’s glazed, red eyes focus on
nothing. He didn’t sleep last night and was in a messy quarrel with his wife
until dawn. Something about not drinking on Sundays. Today is Monday.
Still Sateki drinks. His forearms
are gray with faded tattoos. In the chest pocket of his dirty black shirt is a
small glass bottle of whiskey (“Jack Daniel’s! Don’ tell nobody.”). With a fat brown
hand gripping the wheel, he pounds us through the blue wind chop over two-meter
swells and a deep, dark sea outside a small island’s barrier reef. The drop-off
is sheer. The boat ride is loud and blustery and spine-jolting and we are
soaked in salt spray.
Low and green, this island looks deserted.
But, viewing the abundance of baitballs and splashes, an angler here would have
it made. Tonga is known for rich fisheries. And we’re really not far from the
Tonga Trench, which, at its deepest, drops to 35,702 feet — nearly seven miles.
“One time here I see tiger shark
longer than dis boat!” Sateki yells, slurring a bit but nodding slowly as he
sways. He wipes sweat from his face. “Come right up to da side and sit, waiting
for us to bring fish up on da line. Hoo-wee!”
“How big’s this boat?” I yell
back.
“Six, eight meter? I dunno!” He
laughs and picks his nose.
Armed with print-outs of Google
Earth grabs, I pinpoint our location. Amid the bounce, I almost lose a few
precious sheets of paper to the wind. But it’s a good wind. It’s offshore. We
need it. These swells are not clean.
Ryan Burch steadies and stands. His
eyes gape when he sees a gap in the reef.
“Ahoy!” he yells. “Is this the
spot?”
It’s one I’d marked with a red pen
arrow, the coffee cup stain two inches away. Tongan coffee is particularly
good, akin to French roast.
“Sateki, will you please steer us
into that channel?” I show the map to him. We’ve reached the end of the reef at
the end of the island. In the distance are several more, like stepping stones,
and nothing but soaring birds, spindrift, and bouncy blue water. Lifting and
lowering our little boat, the swells are from the southwest, the wind from the
east, and as Sateki motors us around the reef and into the pass, it becomes
joyously clear that Google Earth is indeed our best friend.
(To read the entirety of "Welcome to Meatland," grab a copy of Slide #21...you can see what else is inside the mag by clicking here: /peathead/2012/03/slide-magazine-21-is-hot-off-press.html)