70 Islands - Journey to the Mentawai

This book has 40 photos chosen between thousands, taken in four years of adventures in the Indic Ocean searching for waves, places and new territory.

The pinnacle is the Mentawai archipelago (Indonesia): 70 idyllic islands to explore, surf, enjoy the beautiful landscapes, dream...

It is not only the salt of the Indian Ocean that gets under your skin. Sharing the daily lives of its people, learning about their various cultures and ethnicities, witnessing the rich biodiversity of this unique site, exploring some of the most remote corners is unforgettable and a truly enriching experience.

It was no accident that the British naturalist Alfred Russell Wallace chose this country to develop his studies that allowed him to anticipate the theory of evolution, theory later presented by his colleague and countryman Charles Darwin.

The Toba catastrophe theory (lake where I passed several times), which argues that this megavolcano in Sumatra caused the "bottleneck" (population extinction of all hominids except the current man), compels us to see that this corner of the world it is a truly special place.

These photographs are a celebration of life in an place that we should respect in all aspects, without forgetting our environmental obligations, including combating deforestation, preserving species like the red orangutan and maybe our own preservation.

João Bracourt *

* He is a Portuguese photographer specialized in surf, interested in portrait, landscape and marine ecosystems. João Bracourt is known for his numerous trips to Indonesia and photographs published in the magazine Surf Portugal. His work has also been shown in Surf Europe mag and in the U.S. site Surf Surfline. He likes beer.