general information

This spot -- just around the headland from Lance's Left -- has been renamed several times. It's also semi-commonly known as HTs or Hollowtrees, after a typically Mentawaian dead tree trunk that once stood way out on the reef. The trunk is gone now, but the wave hasn't changed a bit. Although the reef faces east, it benefits from the outer-reef refraction theory to draw in as much swell as most other spots in the area.

It's basically a squared off slab of lava-coral reef about 100 yards wide, with a rarely breaking cloudbreak outside that peaks waves up onto one of two distinct sections. Deeper and gnarlier of the two is The Office, well over in front of vicious exposed coral heads. A well-struck 6-foot wave at The Office is like flawless Backdoor  Pipeline; a badly chosen one is extremely sketchy, with the inevitable wipeout being quickly followed by a pounding way too close to the coral for comfort.

Safer, yet somewhat weirder, is The Cage, a wider-swinging walled-up peak that  tubes on takeoff, but occasionally pinches shut. Low-tide Cage sports three perky little coral heads on the inside that'll gladly take some skin if permitted.    Smaller days are a frolic -- tubes, airs, mad carves, whatever you can think up. Lance's undoubted allure is assisted by the Sumatran mainland's seabreeze,    which creates a very light offshore most afternoons.