TRAVIS POTTER:
12 Years on the Road, SURFER Finally Found Him

But at the same time you guys aren’t totally innocent. The movie projects, especially Second Thoughts, have drawn quite a bit of attention.
I’ve always felt that if I was going out there, because I enjoy it so much, then maybe I could inspire other people to go out and search. It just seems that, instead of staying at surf camps and sitting on the same break for a long time, you have such better memories, even if you don’t find anything, if you go out and have an adventure. The whole exploration thing can only last for so long. Eventually, by the time generation after generation of surfers pass through, everything’s going to be found. So it’s like, if you don’t do it now time is going to run out. That’s a rare viewpoint for somebody that puts such a premium on solitude. I’m happy to share the ideal, but still, at the same time, I’m not going to tell people where the waves are. More than anything, it’s sharing the whole concept of going and looking for yourself. I just want to inspire to people to go look, go out and do something fun. Get off the couch and go get lost. You know, stop working for the man and do your own thing.

When you’re out running around in the bush, you must run into similar characters on the same kind of mission, right? guys like Camel [Australian feral guru Geoff Goulden]?
Oh yeah. I stayed with this Aussie guy we called Camel on the beach a few years ago. He’s a legend, one of those gurus of the whole feral thing. He taught me all the little jungle tricks, like collecting water, what kinds of things you can survive on, collecting food, that sort of thing. Those guys are everywhere.

What about you, do you have boards buried around the Indonesian archipelago?
Not right now, but we used to stash them. We’d do a trip and didn’t want to lug our stuff around so we’d hide it in the jungle or bury it or tuck it behind logs and stuff. We had boards scattered all around on different islands. The only time we ever lost something was once when a fisherman stole a bunch of our water. The water was gone, but our tents and everything else was still there.

You’ve actually started to lay down some roots over here. Your wife is from Java isn’t she?
Yeah, I met her in this little beach town that we were hanging in for awhile. She was there with her friends for a birthday party. I had to stalk her for awhile. At first she didn’t want anything to do with me (laughs).

I can’t imagine her parents were all that ecstatic when a dirt bag surfer walked through their door for the first time?

In the equatorial heat of Indonesia, one wouldn't think of a wetsuit as a necessity, but tell that to Potter who spends months at a time pulling in over dry coral heads. They also come in handy when charging California secret spots in the middle of winter