Understand, Bali and Fiji/Cloudbreak are different type waves (have surfed both).
The waves in Bali are cleaner, tend to line up perfectly, and easier to ride ‘shorter.’
Cloudbreak is thicker, has more water moving off the reef being out in the open ocean, more wind and chop, and incoming sets on the bigger days tend to shift around, so a tad more board is a good thing on those days.
Byrning Spears are popular with many Indo vet’s, because they work…faster then hell and hold a line way deep. And
hundreds of quality and reasonably priced new and used boards to be had in Bali from shapers around the world, as many surfers don’t want to pay to ship their boards home again and end up just selling them to the shops. So if your board requirements are ‘average’, consider saving
the board costs to ship, p/u a couple there, sell 'em (if still in one
piece) for half price of what you paid when leaving.
Fiji, however, does not have the board selection, so if going there, bring whatever you want to ride.
One thing to factor, lot of surfers strongly prefer PU boards in Indo/Fiji vs. epoxy boards, and I’m one of them, as PU penetrates the ledge a bit faster which can be critical. PU step-ups in Bali are usually glassed 6/6,6, which helps reduce the too frequent breakage, and helps that ledge penetration as well.
Ok still hard to decide. Have think about it a while.
im really unsure of what rails to go for. My 6’3 has 50/50 i think. People say go low rails and down rails for waves like that but with the tides changing so much waves can change from fat to hollow within an hour or less. Same for rocker.Especially if under 4ft Also dont like outside rail bogging on in the tube.
But if ill be using a step up it should be big enough to be heaving all through high tide.
I think i will go for a coil. around 6’5 maybe a 6’8 byrne when i get to bali too.
Will be getting fcs plugs for a gopro on the back,behind deck pad. two fcs plugs with a pipe to clamp onto. With channels the fcs plugs might not sit right.
AB makes sweet boards and channells look lethal…I used to ride them years ago…these days I enjoy these in quality reef waves…sent plenty to fiji and Indo, got a few heading to Noknaduis real soon actually… http://www.moresurfboards.com/quadfather.html