As we mentioned in the last chapter the early to mid 1980's was the golden period for Lakey surfing. Uncrowded perfect surf and a soul surfing brotherhood . We knew it was only a matter of time before things changed , a matter of time before some surfers just had to tell the world , heck we told the world a few years before but no one had listened and so we just continued to score unbelievable surf year in and out.
The bay at lakey was now changed forever, surfing had made a home at lakey, as it does where ever great surf spots are. Surfers had changed everything. They came and stayed longer now and there was more every year. Some had set up with local families and other locals had also realised that there was an income to be made catering to the needs of the surfers and they too started to frequent the bay to befriend the surfers and see just what these strange tourists were on about? Things cruised along for a few more years and wave after uncrowded wave was ridden in this little corner of surfing paradise.
Then it happened !, just as we knew it would one day....an article appeared in a major new surfing magazine about a "New Discovery" the greatest cache of surfspots outside of Bali they called it ? And we all thought it was gonna get crazy ... Surf Camps were the new thing in Surfing now and they were popping up all over the surfing world so news that a Surf Camp was being built and that people would pay a $200 per night to stay there wasn't the best news for the guys that had been enjoying Lakey without crowds.
And soon Lakey was a busy little spot. The Surf Camp had been built at the wave we know as Periscopes and that had 12 regular guests staying from March until September. Local business people had also jumped on the Surf Camp train and put up some simple accomodation to cater for the tourists that were sure to come. And come they did . Before too long and by 1990 there were 3 surf camps operating there. 1 at Periscopes and 2 in the bay at Lakey. By May 1994 there was 5 Small Hotels and some warungs and Restaurants on the Beach. And in may there was 100 people /surfers at lakeys.
From about this time around 1990 there started to appear quite a few very young local kids who were just mad on surfing. They lived at the beach and would ride anything that floated in an attempt to mimic the older surfers. Honestly a floating log was a real surfboard to these kids or a piece of wood from an old section of wall or just about anything that floated would be ridden and they would spend hours just following the surfers around and watching their every move in the hope that they could just have one ride on a real surfboard.
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