I spent a fair amount of time in Indonesia and grew to like the way they do it. You can do anything you want to do, if something happens, it's your deal. Unless of course someone does something to you with bad intent, then the law is swift and often carried out by a mob of villagers. It seemed to work out pretty well.

I strapped on a junky rented BC and regulator and went diving for $10, no papers to sign, liability wavers etc. Gave him $10 and swam out to the reef. Try that in the states. If something happened to me, they probably would have cremated me there and that would have been that.

I rented a kayak, and went down the Ayung river. The guy took my dough and said, "have a good holiday." No chance here.

I rented a surfboard and paddled out at double-overhead Balian rivermouth with nothing more than a wave and a smile.

There has to be a happy medium where people take more responsibility for their own actions, otherwise we start missing out. Getting on a boat can be potentially dangerous.

Talking about suing the PRO for running a race in high wind is shameful. Don't we have the ability to go in if we aren't comfortable in the conditions?

We tried to start a youth sailing program here and found it to be virtually impossible due to the requirements. I think that our overly-litigious society is one reason that the sport of sailing has a hard time gaining a foothold in the mainstream.

I get worried every time a cat gets wrecked in the surf here. One mention of suing the harbor and the whole works could be shut down.

The skipper should have had insurance though.

J