Paradise Pulau Asu - Hinako Islands

Tiny island Asu is a gem, a hidden paradise, where the Indian Ocean hits Sumatra.
Arriving there by night, getting awesome food served, had an early, deep sleep and woke up, when the sun rose up at my window.
Fell in love immediately with that unbelievably beautiful island, white sand beach, crystal clear turquoise blue water, surrounded by huge palm trees, growing all over the island. 🥰
There are only around 50 people living on that island, since around 100 people left their destroyed housings on the island after 2005's earthquake. Interestingly 2004's tsunami didn't hit the island hard, as it's surrounded by deep waters, but the big earthquake, half a year later, traumatized lot of people there. As it's still visible at several points, this earthquake lifted up the whole island for around 3 meters and changed the shape of the island's shoreline massively.
At Ina Silvi Cottage, aka Mama Silvi's, I had great times, even if there was a lot of rain, my last days there.
As her husband, who passed away around half a year ago, was sort of the island's chief, now Mama Silvi is running all the important businesses here. Her daughter and some of the workers' wives are running kitchen and hospitality services, one of her sons is running the all islands connecting ferryboat I've arrived with, her son-in-law is the doctor for all of Hinako Islands and Mama Silvi is the managing center of all.
She is an amazing, fascinating, strong and smart person, caring about the whole island's community, worrying about any issue happening on the island and giving support to anybody who needs it.
Having nice talks with her was one of my best experiences here, asides from visiting the tiny village with all the welcoming, friendly people living there. But exploring the reefs with my snorkel (thank God for my new prescription goggles from Günthers Tauchertreff in Vienna! 😊), and walking around on the small paths all over the island, watching the huge waves hitting island's wide reefs was great, too!
And finally, visiting one of the two surf camps, close to the surfspot, meeting some crazy addicted surfers from all ages from all over the world, watching them riding the incredible >3-meters-waves, was so amazing to see! 😍
Due to a lot of rain during my last days there, I had an additional night, as the ferryboat wasn't able to be loaded and didn't go, for two days.
Amazing to experience island's life up- and downsides, struggles and highlights.
Finally I left the island during a beautiful sunrise, with my heart full of joy.
Hopefully I'm able to improve my surfskills, so I can come back again, one day, to ride these huge waves and visit Mama Silvi again!Baca selengkapnya