Virgin surf breaks, deserted beaches, metaphysical discovery, rock stars, man-eating sharks—this is the voyage of the indies trader.

Illustration by Darcy Muenchrath

At the precise point where the sea and the sky collide, your self-importance evaporates. An overwhelming sense of insignificance swallows you whole. I know. I’m staring out at it right now, and
feeling just about as insignificant as it gets.

I’m standing solo atop the wheelhouse of a 75-foot boat, straddling the Tropic of Cancer. Starboard lies a massive chain of crooked islands and keys I can no longer see. In the water below me is a blue hole, a sinkhole in this shallow sea that’s as wide as the boat and more than 200 feet deep. I’m a man on the edge of an abyss. I’m reticent, contemplative.

OK, I’ll be honest: I’m scared. Even though I’ve been riding waves for more than 20 years, I still get a little freaked in deep water. But my current predicament is not a situation in which to reveal even an ounce of vulnerability or fear—not with a Tasmanian and an Aussie egging me on. “Well Timmy Boy, we’re gonna sit here in the middle of God-knows-where until ya jump,” barks the captain, the aforementioned Tasmanian.

I pace like a pissed off New Yorker waiting for a late train. I know I have to jump, but I don’t want to. Then again, I don’t want to climb back down and have these guys think I’m soft. So I do it. I jump.

Such is life aboard The Indies Trader, Quiksilver’s vessel of self- and surf-discovery that has been circumnavigating the globe since its launch in 1999. Over the past five years, the boat has traveled more than 100,000 nautical miles and found more than 100 new world-class surf breaks.

The project is aptly titled “The Crossing,” because its goal is to push limits and glide over the boundaries of surf, science, nations.
By day, the former salvage boat is a craft of exploration. On this vessel, surfing is all about discovery, both in a raw Captain Cook sense as well as a feely Dr. Phil kind of way. From its decks, pro surfers such as Tom Carroll, Kelly Slater and Jack Johnson have scored epic waves in previously uncharted waters. But, the Crossing’s other key mission is environmental research. Scientists on board constantly monitor the troubled underworld of coral reefs.

Even in the most remote areas, humanity’s greed is being felt in the sea, where reefs are dying—some quickly, some slowly. Reports from the Indies Trader are e-mailed daily to Reef Check, a United Nations-sponsored program, where the data is loaded into an international watchdog bank.

By night, the ship is a think tank and exclusive pub, where Neil Young and The Clash are in heavy rotation on the I-Pod. Tall tales waft through the galley like smoke, maintaining the seafaring tradition of exploits and exaggerations. The blackboard in the galley keeps track of who caught the boat’s biggest fish. It’s funny, depressing and not shocking to see that Jack Johnson and Kelly Slater are numbers one and two on the fish list (c’mon now, is there anything these two can’t do?).

On this voyage, the crew, which constantly changes, includes the Tasmanian Captain Ollie, Ben the Australian chef, a marine biology student from California named Dan and two Indonesian mates. And me? I’m a lucky journalist from the Jersey Shore,
hoping to catch virgin tropical surf, dive some and, most of all, relax. I’m a bit high strung; growing up in the Garden State and doing business in Manhattan can do that to a soul. But, I’ve come to find, if I just get out of my own way, things fall into place.

There’s just one problem. Since I joined the boat three days ago, Mother Nature has been giving us no love: The sea is flat. While flat water doesn’t make for good surfing, it’s perfect for underwater exploration, and so we decide to make a reef check with our scientist, Dan. In other words, we go diving.

The reef is a Colorform cartoon come to life. Sea fans billow with each surge of the current. Large sponges fill the few spaces where coral is lacking. Fish are bountiful: Skipjacks, tang and surgeonfish seem as curious about us as we are about them.
Later, I swim to a small beach to do what I’ve wanted to do since 7th grade when I read Robinson Crusoe: wash up on a deserted island. The island is tiny, maybe 100 yards long and 40 yards wide. I roll around in the pink sand, digging my hands in and rubbing it all over my body. My elation turns momentarily sour when I spot a piece of plastic trash lying at the high-tide mark. I crumple it up and stuff it in my pockets. I decided that I wasn’t going to let this inescapable trace of the outside world kill my buzz—for now. Alone, I lay in the sand and let the surf wash all over me.

The next day, there’s still no surf. So Captain Ollie aims our boat for the next best medicine
to cure a Jersey boy’s fear of the deep: the blue hole.

“Go up top and jump in Timmy,” orders Ollie. And that’s how I end up atop of the
wheelhouse, talking myself into jumping 25 feet into the depths below.

I hit the water hard, momentarily disoriented by the impact and overcome with relief as I float to the surface. Ollie smiles and throws me a mask, snorkel and flippers. “Now, enjoy yourself,” he says. “That’s also an order,” he adds, with a laugh.
The sand has formed a hard, crisp, clean edge around the hole, and fish are everywhere. I force myself to the edge of it and float over the middle and stare. There’s no light shining in or out, just the abyss. For two minutes, which feel like two weeks, I float and meditate on the nothingness. I realize how short a human lifespan is within the context of the universe. The unknown beckons my subconscious to come forward. A psychic wall in me breaks down and I breach a new dimension. Whoa. Wait. Is this a residual effect of my summer following the Grateful Dead in 1985? I have to remind myself to breathe. Scary? Just a little.
Ben pulls on my flipper, snapping me out of my trance, and signals that we should go up. As we surface, I hear Ollie saying, rather urgently, “Now boys, it would behoove you to get your asses to the boat quickly, but not in a panicky manner. Be fluid.”
Ben’s eyes grow wide. He tells me to stay close to him as we make our way to the boat. I look up, and see all the boys on the rail of the boat signaling us to move faster. The boat is within reach, but I’m almost out of energy. I can’t get my foot on the ladder, and I keep falling back in the water.

“Dude, seriously get up the ladder,” Ben says. Finally, I get my footing and clamber up over the railing of the boat.
“Look starboard, Timmy Boy,” says Ollie.

My gaze follows his, and I see two dorsal fins slithering away from the boat, but, strangely, I feel no fear.

The next day, the Indies Trader drops me off in port, where I begin my return trip to the megalopolis. As I stare down at the ocean from the window of an island hopper, I can’t help but feel I’ve left part of me deep inside that blue hole. Metaphysical transformations and a newfound sense of self-confidence were not on the log when I asked permission to board the Indies Trader. I was just looking for relaxation and some good surf.

Then I realize that the water below me is now running through my veins.

To learn more about the mission of Quiksilver’s The Crossing and to read daily log entries from the captain, go to http://thecrossing.quiksilver.com .