Siargao

Day 279 – Crash and burn

The kind lady owner of Mondsee Land Resort who was heading back to Cebu as well gave us a ride to the ferry (at 6am!), helped us buy tickets, waited to make sure we got  on board and then arranged a transfer to the airport for us at the other end.  The plane left at around the boarding time again so it’s great that she had done all that for us so we had plenty of time to spare.

Once we had made it to Siargao Island (pronounced “Shar-gow”, one of the most famous surfing destinations in the Philippines), we were shuffled into one of the waiting minivans to “Cloud 9” where all the backpacker resorts are.  On the way we chatted to Jetjet, a local surfing champion (Winner 2009 of the Billabong comp held here each year, we were told at least 4 times)!  He also offered lessons when the waves were small, so I let his marketing work on me and we agreed to meet up later in the afternoon.

My first lesson on actual waves (unlike the puddle at Baler) was tougher than I thought it would be!  I got nowhere near standing up and couldn’t even get my feet in the right position.  I had decided that my arms were too short for my legs, but agreed to give it another go in the morning.  I spent part of that night trying to work out some standing up techniques as the technique I was shown by Jetjet didn’t even work on land!  Matt had a surf too, but described his experience as “largely crash and burn” so it was unsuccessful day all round!

  
The view from our room.

Day 280 – Surf, eat, nap, eat, surf, eat, sleep!

Up bright and sparky at 5.30am for my next lesson, I was determined to give my new technique of getting to one knee first a go, instead of the Twister move Jetjet wanted me to do.  I saw a lot of the other girls using it and it was marginally more successful as I stood up briefly once or twice.  I thought Jetjet would be happy, but instead he cracked it!  He said I would never be a good surfer if I did it like that!!  He insisted I go back to his technique and keep trying.  My mind was saying that he obviously knows something about surfing but then he’s 5 and a half feet and ripped, easy to say when you’re not 5’9” and frustratingly unfit!  Matt was much more successful this morning and looked really good in the clean breaking aqua waves.  I would even go so far as to say he looked cool… which is unusual for him!

Between the morning and afternoon sessions we had something to eat and a nap and then it was time to ask the all knowing Google, YouTube…oh and Matt for some help.  I showed Matt the three step move I was told to do by Jetjet and he showed me the one fluid motion I was eventually aiming for.  Turns out that skipping the steps and heading straight for the end product was the only way for me to get up!  That afternoon, there was much less wave eating and a few more successful wave rides, just briefly.  

The relaxation hut at our accommodation Ocean 101.

Matt enjoying said hut.

 

Day 281 – Pain in the …face?

This morning I woke up in agony.  I had been fighting a slight sinus infection after diving so many days in a row, but it wasn’t bothering me or my balance – until now!  The pain in my cheeks and teeth and the attached headache was so bad there would be no surfing this morning.  I sent Matt off to deliver the message to Jetjet on his way to the waves and went back to bed.

Matt on the other hand was feeling more comfortable on bigger waves and swapped to a board more like the one he has at home.  After breakfast, more reading and napping for both of us, Matt went back for the afternoon set.  I went out a bit later to take some photos, but he was already coming back in complaining the waves were crappy this afternoon.

 
A pier has been built out over the reef so it is easier to get in and out of the water and also provides for a viewing platform for when comps are on.

However, the boardwalk needed a little repairing.  Only a day after we arrived they began these repairs, but that left us balancing on planks of wood spanning up to a 3 or 4 metre gap with surf board under arm instead!

Day 282 – Crowd 9

The day off and early night must have worked for me as this morning (and with a little push from Jetjet) I was catching and getting up much more consistently, even if unstylishly.  After Matt’s sleep in he came down to take some pictures of my efforts:

Up but not stylishly!

 

As I was still feeling unwell, we hired a bike and drove into Dapa, the bigger town about 30km away, to get some drugs for my sinuses and a haircut for Matt.  The best we could get were some decongestants, but that teamed up with some painkillers seemed to be enough to get me back on a surf board.

As we still had a bit of extra time on the way back from Dapa, we decided to head back a different way to the way we came.  Actually, more like Matt’s eyes lit up at the fork in the road just outside Dapa, (the way we came vs. dirt) and I couldn’t say no.  He assured me that the dirt road went back to Cloud 9 and that it followed the coast the long way.  I learn this lesson time and time again, but that’s what I get for being married to an explorer.

So we ended up in Pilar, on the other side of the island and at a dead end with no choice but to reverse the route back to the fork in the road.  We also made it there at about the time we were supposed to have the bike back to the guy we borrowed it from and so as if the dirt roads weren’t scary enough, I had to keep telling Matt to slow down all the way back (mostly by pinching him when I could see the speedo tick over 60!).  The guy didn’t seem too fussed about us being late (Filipino time must still exist in small towns, just not airlines) and we even had time for a short nap before the afternoon session of surfing, which had been getting later with the tides.  The waves here are all reef breaks and at low tide there is only about a foot of water under the waves – not good for learning! 

This afternoon was great for both of us and I was especially happy that I could get up now and ride for a decent amount of time… I just needed to work on my direction a bit as I ran into a few people!  Cloud 9 had turned into a bit more like “Crowd 9” with the amount of people out today and it was getting frustrating now that I had graduated to the big kid’s wave and was actually catching waves to have the local heroes cut in front leaving me with no choice but to bail.  The instructors were frustrated as well and would yell out to them to get out the way if it was a wave they thought would be good for us and they seemed to respect that.  Matt on the other hand didn’t have anyone to yell at them for him and was quite frustrated with one particular guy that seemed to be on every wave he went for. 

That night we chatted again with the little group of seven we had seemed to have formed in the restaurant attached to the resort.  The other five had decided to do the “Island Hopping” tour organised by the hotel in the morning.  We initially weren’t keen, especially now I was getting somewhere with the surfing, but agreed very late in the evening that a morning off surfing would be good, especially for my aching muscles.

 

Day 283 – Island Hopping

We were up just after 6, ready for our 7am departure on the island hopping tour.  The main aim of the day was a change of scenery and some sun, as well as some snorkelling at one of the islands.  The 7am departure was more like 8.30 or 9 by the time the boat man arrived, we waited for our take-away lunch to be cooked and scavenged some snorkels (given they weren’t provided by the tour!).

Playing games while waiting for the boatman.

Our first destination was Guyam Island.  About 100m across, the highlights were the crystal clear aqua water and a huge dead sea snake on the beach.  Matt and Manu, our new Indian Swedish friend did a lap of the island with the snorkels but only saw some fish.  After a bit of time swimming, we signalled the boatman and were off to Naked Island.

Guyam Island

Naked Island is just that.  A sandbar in the middle of nowhere with no trees!  The book suggested is may also be a nudist island if you so wished as it would only be the boatman watching you.  Yeah sure!

Last but not least was Daku, a much bigger island that was actually inhabited.  The beach here was quite nice even though the sand was coarse and we spent the afternoon in one of the beach shelters eating lunch, reading, chatting, and listening to the French girl Natalie’s songs on the ukulele, including her favourite (and Matt’s absolute least favourite) Poker Face acoustic style.  A very pleasant day with some excellent tan lines to match.

Natalie and her ukulele gathering some local interest (the old lady watching over her right shoulder, who earlier was picking up shells off the beach to try and sell to us).

The view from our beach hut.

Matt trying to capture the reflection in my sunnies without getting himself in the shot!

The beach huts.

A local inhabitant.

We made it back to Cloud 9 in time for the afternoon session.  Matt opted to hit the bar while I opted to take advantage of the last hour of daylight.  I shouldn’t have bothered as after a day in the sun I was way too exhausted and so didn’t go very well!

Day 284 - Get up, stand up

This morning’s session was much quieter than it gets in the afternoon, well and truly worth getting up early for.  Again I was catching almost everything, but still needed to work on my direction a bit more.  I was getting the hang of how to use weight to steer though.  Baby steps!  Matt had a good morning too, although the board he had borrowed was missing the middle fin so may have done better if they bothered to fix it like they said they would.

The instructors sang this a lot as they stood in a line almost neck high helping us catch waves.

After two hours in the water, it was back to 101 Ocean Resort to continue with our daily routine – eat, nap, eat, read and then back to the surf.  My instructor Jetjet had asked me to pay up to today this morning as there was a big cock fight that afternoon that his cock “Red Chicken” was entered into.  Glad to see my hard earned bucks are going to good use!  He invited us to come, but I politely declined.

I headed down to the pier at 5pm for the afternoon session, but Jetjet was nowhere to be found.  Normally he spots me before I spot him and comes in from the surf.  I asked around his mates and everyone said he was still at the cockfight!  Should have known!  So turns out I was stood up. 

I watched Matt for a hour or so from the viewing platform.  A 12 year old local girl MayMay sparked up a conversation with me and as well as her life story, she told me all about the surf spots in the area, knew all the pleasantries in about 6 languages (I guess from quizzing foreigners!) and the only thing she wanted in life was her own surf board.  She had pointed out her 17 year old brother to me carving it up in the surf.  Turns out he is sponsored and has at least seven boards, was given a mobile phone and is treated to all kinds of things not many kids around here get.  He had been loaning her a board and teaching her to the point where she came 4th in last year’s junior’s competition.  She had admired one of my bracelets from Peru earlier on in discussions and so I took it off and gave it to her for good luck in this year’s competition, about two weeks away.  Then she said she can’t go in it this year as she had a fight with her brother and he won’t lend her the board!  Poor little thing!  She was only down at the pier because her mum wanted her to sell Biko to the tourists.  Given we had been chatting for about 2 hours and I had answered all of her questions she gave me some (I had no money as I was supposed to be surfing!).  It is basically sweet sticky rice mixed with coconut – tasty! 

Eating biko was all the signal needed for a bunch (at least 10!) of other Filipino tourists standing on the platform to come up to me and start asking questions, firstly about whether I like their food and their country (yes and yes!) and then about all kinds of other things ending in photographs and hugs with all of them and the ladies not being able to get over the fact I was twice their height!  I had to jog back to 101 to catch the second quarter of the footy playing by satellite.  Go dogs!

Day 285 – Watch out Rip Curl Pro

This morning’s session was my best yet.  The waves were clean, I was catching everything, even turning into the right hand break!  Everything was finally clicking.  I graduated to catching my own waves where Jetjet would just tell me which waves to paddle for and not push me into them.  It was a nice feeling after feeling so pathetic on the first day.  Am still not sure how I will go once it’s back to the freezing cold waters of Victoria, but it’s a least worth trying now.  I had hoped that Matt would come down with the camera again, but he slept in… so no evidence.  Damn!

Jetjet was having a good day too.  I asked him first thing “Is Red Chicken still alive??” as there was no point saying “Where were you yesterday?”  Given I knew where he was!  He jumped up and down and told me enthusiastically “Yes!  Red Chicken is the Champion!”  He apologised for not meeting me at the pier.  Because Red Chicken kept winning, he had to stay around for the next fight.  He told me he also won 1,000 pesos ($25AUD), but at 500 pesos an hour from me, failed to see the logic in my cheeky suggestion that he should just teach more to make the same money.  I think he was more after the glory, given the local Mayor was there and shook his hand!

A happy Jetjet.

Given my mammoth morning session of about 2 and a half hours (it’s tiring stuff!), and Matt’s lack of enthusiasm for fighting for the one wave, we spent the rest of the day being lazy.  We chatted with a couple of Aussies, one who was a diver there exploring the area looking to set up a dive resort and shop.  He didn’t seem impressed that the local fisherman still get away with illegal dynamite fishing (understandably for a diver!) and was having meetings with the Mayor (at the cockfight actually…) to try and get something done about it.  He said the Mayor was a reasonable guy and seems to understand what further tourism will do for this mostly untouched island.  A shame for future surfers and divers looking to get off the track a bit.

We had a few beers at the bar across the road, but I was determined to get in one more 6am session in the morning before we left in the morning and so I bailed early. Matt says I didn’t miss much, although Jetjet showed up looking to shout a round!

Day 286 – Amazing Race

Although not as good as the morning before (my paddle muscles were DEAD) I managed to get an hour in before the bus arrived to take us back to the airport and onto Cebu.  Once in Cebu we hit the mall with a few others from the flight to kill time, get lunch and passport photos made for our Vietnam visas.

Siargao Airport.  We laughed at the fire crew who, at the appropriate moment right before a plane comes in, stop playing cards, don oversized jackets and helmets, pile onto the fire truck and drive out onto the tarmac only to have the plane land without bursting into flames so they can go back to their cards.  Matt and I thought they must be pretty disappointed all the time!

Bored with the mall we decided to head back to the airport early.  A lucky decision.  We were there about 4pm for our 6.20pm flight to Manila and told that the flight was delayed at least three hours.  This would have us missing our connection from Manila to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam at 11.20pm.  After working out whether it was better to change the HCMC flight, which we couldn’t or have us miss the connection (leaving us stuck in Manila two days til the next flight, an unpleasant thought) we decided to demand a refund and find another flight.  While Matt did the demanding, I ran around to all the other agencies, Amazing Race style, trying to work out the best and cheapest method to get to Manila asap given we were now going to be out-of-pocket.

I got us the last two tickets on an 8.10pm flight with Philippines Air (tricky given there were others running around doing this too) although when asking the lady if the flight was definitely going to be on time and definitely going to arrive in Manila at 9.30pm (giving us about 20 minutes to check in to the next flight) she ended up doing us one better and getting us on the already closed, boarded and about to taxi 5.15pm flight!  So we had plenty of time to make the connection to Vietnam and were on our way.  On assessment at Manila airport we wouldn’t have made the short connection time anyway as the domestic and international terminal are miles apart and the shuttles frustratingly infrequent.