Where to begin?? The last entry was in Manila before heading to Naga to hang out at the CWC wakeboarding park for a couple of days. Currently I'm at an internet cafe in Tabaco City pausing in civilization for the night to buy some multivitamins, check the email, and sit down to poop. We head to Malapascua tomorrow where I'm doing my scuba certification so that should be a sweet 4 days! So what happened between now and then?
The first day at CWC we spent in what was essentially a huge aquatic playgound for adults. A giant floating iceberg, an obstacle course, and a water trampoline were among the highlights. The day was hot hot HOT and the water was about bathtub temperature. My little Canadian body still hasn't been able to stop bracing itself for cold BC lake water every time I jump in.
An afternoon of drinking led, unsurprisingly, to a night of heavy drinking and my first naked swim of the trip. I can't believe it took almost a week! We all somehow ended up climbing all over the jumps in the advanced wakeboarding lake and jumping off them with our arses hanging out. So I guess I can say with absolute honesty that I hit the professional-grade wakeboarding jumps at a world class park....naked!
The park itself was really cool. Its set up to house international competitions and there were some pros and semipros there flying this way and that while I struggled to stand on the damn thing, but on our day of boarding I did manage to get up. I had to spend some quality time in the beginner's pool where the cable pulls significantly gentler than on the advanced track, but by days end I could go straight down the track and stall and come back to the start. Pretty good for a virgin boarder if you ask me. Got my ass totally kicked by the big boy cable for a solid hour before I gave up and went back to the bunny hill. The website has lots of pictures so google!
A good test of how expensive the cost of living is in any given location is the cost of a bottle of Tanduay Rum. CWC charged a whopping P125 ($3) - Pretty steep!!
June 17th we left CWC to catch a ferry to Caramoan. We seem to be running on Filipino time already because we missed our 11am ferry and sat on the beach til 1pm waiting for the next one, drinking San Miguel beer (P26) and listening to a local guy play guitar under the palm trees (jealous yet?). When the boat came our guide Bertus told us "Make sure you tip the guys who carry you to the ferry." Umm...what??? He meant exactly that. A tiny little Filipino man proceeded to pick me up, seat me on his shoulder, and carry me through the waist-deep water to the ferry. I must've had at least 20lbs on him but its nothing compared to the guys in our group who all hover around 200lbs.
That night was a low key one, as we had to charge our batteries for our camping trip that began the following morning. I love the tiny places where you can get a coffee and a beef stew for breakfast for $1.50. We stocked up on Tanduay (P95) and headed out for an island hopping booze cruise. It was a crazy day of afternoon binge drinking. We ran into 3 Swedish guys setting up something odd on one of the beaches and it turned out there were carpenters for Survivor Sweden setting up challenges! We brought them with us to our campsite to liven up the party a bit (they had a cooler full of beer, after all).
I'm not really sure how it happened, but at some point somebody brought us dinner and it was one of the most amazing meals I have ever had. Rice, mangoes, delicious blue marlin, and prawns that were quite literally 6-8 inches long. I thought i was a small lobster. In the absence of proper cutlery I tore it apart like an animal with my bare hands. So. Friggin. Delicious.
That night, much later, and much calmer, the bioluminescence came out. if anyone has seen the move The Beach its the plankton that Leo and the french chick play in right before they bone. As you move your hand thru the water the plankton give off pulses of light to try to attract predators to eat the fish before it eats them. Makes for a very Avatar-like swimming experience, that is until a Filipino guide points out the 3 foot sea snake coming to investigate whose venom gives its victim about 8 hrs of excruciating pain before the sweet release of death. Everyone out of the pool!! That night I slept in a hammock on the beach. Sheer bliss.
The one downside: sunrise comes early and it comes BRIGHT. up at 6 am still drunk as hell. Our guide asked me if I wanted to go see the lagoon with only one fish. i foolishly agreed. This is called "hangover hyper". its the time between drunk and hung over when you can't believe how great you feel and everything sounds like an awesome idea. The only way to get to the lagoon is a climb over a vertical rock face made of jagged volcanic rock. Great thing to do hammered and wearing flip flops. The lagoon was a quicksand lake that a single fish lived in. Really random and totally not worth risking my life.
From there we headed by ferry to Catanduanes, about 2 hrs away. Needles to say I had a big ol' sleep. Sunday was the first, complete, uninterrupted, activity-free beach day of my trip. Up early for brekkie and made the 5 foot hike form my bungalow to the sand and plopped my butt down and didn't move until lunchtime, then repeat until dinner. A successful day if you ask me. I was treated to another amazing dinner. When we arrived, Bertus told us that the lady who owned the place would make our meals, that we had no say in what we were given, and that we would never be disappointed with the results. He wasn't kidding. They have amazing seafood here, and dinner that night was another great example. I reached for what looked like a lobster tail (the lobster heads turned out to be more jumbo prawns) only to be greeted with a pair of eyes on my "tail"! It was some never before seen flatheaded shellfish that was absolutely scrumptious, if only I knew what it was called. After dinner Tanduay (P62) led to a beach bonfire with some local guys. The people here are incredible. They are so welcoming and generous and they LOVE to party. I have still only seen a dozen or so white people here so far. When our group rides on top of the jeepneys (which we do at every opportunity_ kids shriek and wage and giggle at the sight of us. I was attacked by a group of adults on the beach one day who each insisted on a photo op with "Barbie". Its so odd to be in a place where the mere sight of a white face and especially a blonde head is a rare enough occurrence to warrant a picture.
Next morning (Monday), the group rolled its hungover asses on to another boat to take us to a village to do a little day trip to a waterfall. It was hotter than hell and I was sweating run thru my pores for the most grueling 2km walk up a slight incline I have ever been on. Jumping in that water felt great. An afternoon spent there and back to the boat for a solid 1 hr hammock nap, dinner, then a quiet and early night. The previous evenings festivities had left me with the beginnings of a cold and I needed to kick it before Malapascua and scuba.
Tuesday morning awoke with the cold I knew was coming. Between naps on the beach and taking all day to get thru 10 pgs of my book I managed to squeeze in yet another amazing meal, this time it was a full tuna (but a young and small one) more than likely caught in the very water in which we'd been swimming all day. They were about 18 inches long and delicious. All that amazing food almost made up for having to hover above a seat-less toilet to crap. Almost. Another lazy day. Another lazy night.
At the 2 week mark I'm starting to miss certain things from home. Some I can't get here, others just can't be stored or packed. They include:
- whole wheat bread
- white wine
- Strongbow
- real noninstant coffee
- cheese
- chocolate milk
- potatoes, pasta, and all other non-rice carbohydrates
That being said I am having a blast and eating like royalty! I need to improve my picture haul, as I have been severely lacking on that front, and mom: we definitely need a mini laptop for Greece!
Over and out for now, next update: SCUBA!
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