Coron Town

Day 266 – Proud Aussies

This morning we were down at the Australian Embassy at 10am exercising our right to vote in the forthcoming Federal Election. We passed through security at the entrance to the building, had our identification checked at a second post, were buzzed up to the 23rd floor where our bags were scanned and then taken off us (except for our passports) and then were walked up to the 24th floor. The first thing we heard when we entered reception on the 24th floor were three Aussie blokes in their 70’s or 80’s speaking broad ocka – weird to hear after so long! We filled in a form with our address so the lady knew where to send our votes and which papers to give us, but no one bothered to check our ID for the voting bit! There was a huge gold coat of arms in the lift area that I asked politely if I could photograph – of course the answer was no! So we had to settle for this one outside:

But even then they were about to called security on us!!

We hurried back to Makati Apartelle, said goodbye to Dharma (below) and then back to the airport for our flight to Coron Town.

We landed in on the island of Busuanga in a tropical downpour and rolled our eyes at each other before scurrying across the tarmac to the terminal building. Before we knew it we were shuttled into Coron Town, checked into Sea Dive Resort and organising a dive for the morning.

All that was left to do now was have a beer in the restaurant downstairs and enjoy the view:

Watching as another storm rolls through. We’re still hoping for sunshine at some stage in the Philippines, although we can’t complain too much – it is rainy season!

Day 267 – Scuba Review

Although we are both Advanced Divers it had been about 2.5 years for me and at least 18 months since Matt had been diving, so we did a “Scuba Review” day today which was aimed at getting us back in touch with our Scuba Zen.

After passing a written exam and practicing our Dive Table calculations, we headed out to CYC Beach with Borge our very smiley instructor to practice some of the safety signals and manoeuvres like recovering our regulators, mask emptying and buoyancy, etc all at about 6 metres. Demonstrating that we haven’t lost the touch and with plenty of air left we got to spend a bit of time exploring the nearby reef and saw lots of clown fish families playing in soft pink coral, a Juvenile Sweet Lips (fish) which was black with huge white spots, a Barracuda school swimming by and two Lion Fish stuck together. It was so disappointed not to have the dive camera with us this trip – no photos sorry!

Given neither of us had any troubles with skills, Borge took us on a second dive at Seven Islands Marine Park just to get some more buoyancy practice in, ready for “Wreck Diving”. Near Coron in the bays and inlets around the islands, several WWII Japanese warships thought they were safely hiding, but were subsequently bombed and sunk by the US on 24 September 1944 via a daring long range air attack. Some of the planes sent to bomb these ships even ran out of fuel on the way back! Anyways, these ships now make the area well known for wreck diving, something we’ve never tried before.

(Photo courtesy of Google images.)

The highlight of the Seven Islands dive was a Hawksbill Turtle resting on a huge coral table, but we also saw lots of fluoro coral, a giant clam, one tiny black and white nudibranch and lots of fish including Batfish, Titan Triggerfish, Snapper, Groupers, Emperor and Damsel fish.

Hawksbill Turtle (courtesy of Google images).

At the end of the day Borge said he thought we would have no worries getting in and around the wrecks, which made me feel a lot more confident as I wasn’t sure about wanting to go inside a sunken ship!

Sunset from our room on the third floor of Sea Dive.

And from the restaurant again…

Day 268 – First wreck didn’t wreck us!

Enthused that we hadn’t “lost the touch”, we signed up for some wreck diving today. There was a big group headed out on the boat, although the first part of the journey out was rather quiet for us - between the Filipino, French, German and Japanese all speaking to each other in their native tongue, we were the only native English speakers!

Our dive launch – was more of a dive raft!

First stop was the Irako, a Japanese refrigeration container ship about 200 metres long. Not only was this our first wreck dive, but probably one of our deepest also (inside 40 metres, deck 28 metres). So needless to say we kept a close eye on each and the Dive Master, although visibility wasn’t too bad.

The Irako! (Courtesy of Google images.)

We saw stuff like this! (Courtesy of Google images.)

And back in the day… (Courtesy of Google images.)

We didn’t get to spend too much time inside as there was a bit of mucking around at the start of the dive with one of the other members of our group of four. He said his ears were playing up, but we suspect he freaked out a little bit and started back up the mooring line without signalling to the Dive Master – a pretty big no-no. That then meant that we had to wait while the DM went to look for him and waiting at 30 metres you obviously go through more air.

It was a little freaky following the mooring line down into nothingness and then this huge thing appearing! We entered the wreck though an opening on the deck, swam along a corridor for a bit and then into a larger space with lots of pipes and valves. We exited through a damage hole and back up onto the deck for a poke around before heading back to the mooring line. A nice intro for our first wreck.

(Courtesy of Google images.)

We saw lots of Lionfish like this guy! (Courtesy of Google images.)

After a long stop and some lunch, our second dive of the day was the Olympia Maru. The Olympia was a 120 metre freighter which ended up lying on it’s side and has lots of nice big spaces to explore. This time we descended to the stern and entered through a cargo hold. We swam through a large area to the boiler room where we could see the two huge boilers, tipped to the side. Then we slipped through a smallish gap at the side of the boilers and swam through a series of smaller cavities and then over and under a series of beams. We exited at the bow and then swam back over the deck to the mooring line. All over the deck huge lotus shaped corals had formed and we saw lots of Lion Fish too. The same guy freaked out again, but this time bothered to signal. Later on deck he was telling his friends that entering the ship reminded him of the tunnels in Vietnam (as a tourist, not in the war…), where he also freaked out, and so he didn’t want to go in. I think this guy might need to admit he’s a claustrophobe and give up trying to wreck dive.

Matt watching me struggle. The worst thing about diving (and surfing)? Wetsuits. Hate em!

The last dive of the day was back at Seven Islands. Visibility wasn’t as good today and we didn’t see anymore turtles, but we did see another black and white nudibranch and some more interesting neon coral we hadn’t noticed the first time round. There was one particular coral that lit up its tips when you swam past – must be a defence!

The nudi was kind of like this! (Courtesy of Google images.)

Two of the seven islands that surround the dive site, making it a ‘marine park’ which the locals are doing their best to try and protect. I still brought back a “fluro light bulb fish” and a “coke bottle fish” with me to the boat though!

Day 269 - Sunset kayaking

This morning we did some internet catching up and general lazing about in recovery from two days diving. You don’t move about much diving, but the long days out on the water and I guess the pressure you place your body under really takes it out of you. Life is tough!

We did make up for our lazy morning in the afternoon though by hiring a double kayak and paddling out to Coron Island to visit Cayangan Lake to swim some laps! We probably should have done it in the morning, instead of an hour and ten minutes paddling into a headwind on the way there and then almost another hour back (with not a breath of wind –damn!) and then arriving back in the dark, but we had a nice day! We saw a sea snake swimming past and paddling into the sunset was very romantic! (Well for us ; P )

We kayaked over to Coron Island and then had to get out, pay an entrance fee of P200 ($5) each to the locals and then take a short hike up and over a hill to the aqua blue lake.

Crystal clear!

The sun setting on us as we paddled!

Day 270 – This day proudly brought to you by Google Images.

Today we were back into diving. The first wreck today was the Kogyo Maru and probably my favourite of the wreck dives we did.

(Courtesy of Google images.)

Once we were down to 30-odd metres we entered into a large cargo hold that housed a tipped over bulldozer – you could still see the steering wheel and the treads were also very clear even with the poor visibility. There were also hundreds of cement bags all in a stack, frozen! It was much easier to picture this ship’s position (on its side) and scale, something I was having trouble imagining on the other dives. We swam into a second cargo hold that housed building supplies and hundreds of bundles of rolled cyclone wire which had formed a cool honeycomb type effect now that it is covered in silt and debris. On the sides on the ship, essentially the top of the wreck we swam through what I call a “fish city” where huge schools of small fish swim together in all directions amongst the swaying coral and plant life all looking very busy. If you wave an arm at them they all dart off course in the same direction! There were also the hugest lotus/lettuce shaped corals I have ever seen and a cute purple and yellow nudibranch that Matt found with a huge yellow branch stuck to his backside. We also did a swim though the empty engine room. Like most of the interesting stuff off these ships, the engine was recovered years ago.

The steering wheel of the bulldozer. (Courtesy of Google images.)

The nudi Matt found looked like this guy, but with a much bigger yellow branch. (Courtesy of Google images.)

After a rest and some lunch, we moved on to the Tangat Wreck, so called as they don’t know the name of the ship, it just sank near Tangat Island. This wreck was largely open and empty, but with huge ladders everywhere and lots of other broken and bent bits to form interesting shapes as we swam through the inside. We saw lots of Lion Fish and a Panther fish and a new coral that was small and purple and shaped like a tall mushroom. You could clearly see the big bomb hole on this one.

When we swan over the deck we could see all the masts poking up. (Courtesy of Google images.)

(Courtesy of Erin van der Peet images.)

(Courtesy of Google images.)

Panther fish. (Courtesy of Google images.)

Our last dive of the day was Barracuda Lake. There wasn’t much to see there, not even a Barracuda, but the interesting thing about this lake was that it was a Thermocline. This meant that there was a layer of freshwater at 28 degrees on the top and then saltwater at 38 degrees at the bottom (usually hot water would rise to the surface). Descending we could clearly see where the fresh and salt water layers meet (at about 15 metres) and the temperature difference was huge! Like falling into a hot spring with all your clothes on! The rock formations around the edges of the lake were quite interesting and it was weird swimming up and down through the layers of hot and cold. The bottom of the lake was like quicksand if you put your hand in it. Not much life though, just some yabbies and a big black and white spotty fish.

We had one beer on the boat on the trip back to Coron which was enough to zap the last bit of energy from me and we were sleeping as soon as we finished dinner.

Baler

Day 261 – No surf

We were up around 5am (earlier than we had made it to bed the night before (!)) to get a cab across town to the bus depot. We were aiming for the last of the day’s buses to Baler which left at a respectable “sometime between 7 and 7:30” (that’s actually what the timetable says!). We then battled Manila traffic for a while before we hit the expressway. Off the end of the expressway we pulled into Cabanatuan and sat at the terminal there for nearly two hours (so I’m not sure why we used the expressway in the first place). Eventually we headed east into the mountains and after four more hours and another lengthy stop we finally made it to Baler.

Rather informative signage on the loos at one of our many stops.

The tricycle from the bus station deposited us at the most expensive hotel on Sabang Beach, cheap by Japanese standards, but we headed up to the road to Bay’s Inn, a cheaper option that was reputed to have a bit more of a social scene. After checking into our room we headed out the front to check out the surf, as you can imagine after 8 hours on the bus we were keen to see something pretty special. Instead we saw what may as well have been a lake, flat as a tack. But it was too late in the day to surf anyway so we went for a walk one way up the beach where all the little kids showed off their English skills by shouting “What’s your name?” at us over and over. Most of them became overwhelmed when Erin not only answered them, but asked them the same question back in return, we did get a few answers at least. Most just grinned widely and scattered away! Finally we consoled ourselves with a few beers and dinner looking out over the ocean hoping for better luck tomorrow.

The other consolation prize so far as Erin was concerned: Lizzie, the brown lab pup.

Day 262 – Still no surf

When we rolled out of bed in the morning I headed straight out front to check on the swell, perfect 6 inch sets rolling in, great. So we had some lunch and then blogged while a tropical downpour rolled through.

Beautifully clean, but tiny, surf rolling in the midst of a tropical downpour.

When the storm cleared an Australian and some Japanese appeared on the beach with jet-skis. We got the story from them later, apparently they were all working on the same construction project in Singapore and headed to Baler for a long weekend of surf and travelled all night to get there. Upon discovering there was no surf they decided to make the most of it and do some jet-ski-surfing instead.

One of the Japanese guys trying to tow Brett the Australian onto one of the tiny waves while the locals look on amused. I was impressed he could even get going on the surfboard behind the jet-ski, he didn’t manage to get onto any waves though.

It didn’t bother Lizzie that there were no waves, she got plenty of attention instead.

We had some company that night in the form of the Japanese/Australian Singaporeans, but the next day they gave up and drove another eight hours to the west coast to try and at least get one day’s surfing in before they had to fly back to Singapore.

Day 263 – Jogging, not surfing

In the morning we went for a jog up the beach, first one way past all the fishing boats and children asking our name, and then the other way up the more deserted part of the beach. Right as we reached the farthest point it started to rain, but it hardly mattered seen as we were so drenched in sweat anyway.

Late in the afternoon a group of Filipinos showed up to show us that there was in fact enough surf to catch a wave. They were all complete beginners on massive foam boards, but if their instructors gave them a push at the right moment they could actually catch the largest of the tiny waves.

Day 264 – Let’s just call it a lake.

We seriously toyed with the idea of leaving today, but seen as the Filipino beginners had managed to have a surf lesson the afternoon before we decided to give it a crack.

We had to wait all day for the tiny swell to build sufficiently so we went for another walk up the beach to take some photos and get asked our names another couple of hundred times. It was also interesting to see the local fishing technique which seemed to involve using a boat to drop a net well offshore then having about half a dozen people on the shore spend the next hour or so hauling it back onto the beach.

Me in front of the Bay’s Inn. The beach in the background in Charlies Point, where the surfing scene in Apocalypse Now was shot. Legend has it that the film crew left behind a few surfboards and by the time some intrepid Aussies showed up a few years later many of the locals could already surf!

The little harbour at the north end of Sabang Beach.

Erin and Jason waiting for a ‘wave’ (those of you with keen memories and nothing better to do with your time but to read our blog will recall that our kayaking instructor in Colombia was also named Jason (or Yeison anyway)).

Halfway there…

… or not.

Looking better.

Back to the beach for some more practice.

In fairness this was Erin’s first crack at surfing. I had a brief go and didn’t do much better, bit out of practice it would seem, if we ever find some surf it could be interesting.

Day 265 – Surf: Fail

Still no surf this morning so we gave up and decided to head for Palawan. At least the last bus from Baler back to Manila was not quite as early as the one there. So we got on the bus scheduled to leave “around 9”, which actually left at about 8:30 and were back in Manila about 4pm.

So as you can imagine there is not much to report for today. When we finally got into Manila, we checked into our hotel, hit the ‘Green Belt’ for a meal and then went home to bed. Some days just aren’t that exciting! The most exciting part was watching Erin try and finish the ice cream sundae she had ordered for dessert, which was actually supposed to serve 4 (but the menu and attached pictures gave no indication of this!)

Manila

Our flight was largely uneventful, except for the first few minutes after take off where the cabin began to fill with steam, a product of the overzealous air-conditioning crossing with the humid air filled cabin. Quite funny for us, who have seen it before, but not so for a few others who weren’t sure what was happening. They usually make an announcement when they know it will happen, but said nothing!

We chatted briefly with the tall English guy seated next to us in the exit row (as we were the tallest three on the flight!) and then made our way by cab to the ‘burbs’ of Manila to our hostel.

To our surprise our cab driver was friendly, didn’t try to rip us off and made decent time out to our not-so-easy to find hostel (and the hostel knows it, giving us 12 step directions to give to the cabby!)

To our second surprise at 11pm on a Tuesday evening, we were greeted very enthusiastically by another backpacker and then our host who had been waiting for us hoping we would go out with them! We had to wait for three others to arrive, who turned out to be the guy next to us and the two people in front of us on the flight – the only “white-ies” ! And then we were off!

Day 260 – Keeping strange hours

I’ve started a new day, as it was probably at least midnight by the time we had arrived at Quattro, our host Aldrich's bar of choice. All systems were go with a live band and lots of Filipino males to make me feel special. The biggest beer we have ever seen arrived shortly after, as did dinner and we ended up chatting and drinking until 6am (which was 7am Japan time!)

The sun was up again by the time we got home so we had a morning nap and headed out about 1pm to find water and 7-Eleven for slurpies! After our morning walk through the suburbs, we had decided that the only things Manila had in common with Japan were the heat, the crowds and better public transport than Melbourne – apart from that we were in culture shock!

Our palatial Red Carabao Hostel was set up in the 7 storey family home of Aldrich, who had been educated in California and convinced his parents to let him open it as his ‘business project’. He’s doing well, rated second on Hostelworld which is where we found him!

In the afternoon we decided to educate ourselves about the Philippines, it’s islands, where we shouldn't go due to travel warnings and what we wanted to do. We hit the local mall for some sustenance in the form of pizza, and took home some delicious looking fresh vegies and salmon burgers from the supermarket – fresh vegies were individually placed on a pedestal and cost about $10 each in Japan so we were craving them! More planning followed and we decided to head to Sabang Beach in Baler (Northern Luzon) for me to get my first surf lesson!

Our ride to the mall – a tricycle! Essentially a dirt bike with a covered side car welded on, very common transport in Manila and very scary! But at least you can’t see what’s coming.

Our street – one of the cleaner ones! Manila would have to be the most “full on” city we’ve been too. Sprawling, disorganised, noisy, grotty, crowded and intimidating with the amount of stares, smile-nods and winks I get!!

Osaka

Day 258 – Parents avert your eyes

We spent almost the whole of today planning and about 3 hours in the post office trying to post home everything we didn’t need anymore. It is quite liberating to have such a light pack again!

We did have some Japanese fun later in the afternoon though. We had found ourselves in the middle of the “Love Hotel” district, so we went to check them out. We had found a funny website talking about the types that use a love hotel and suggesting that finding an ‘unusual’ room was part of the fun. The website guy had found all kinds of rooms including one with dodgem cars, underwater scene i.e. completely surrounded by fish tanks, subway train car, Winnie the Pooh and even Hello Kitty S&M!

The whole thing is anonymous so when you go in there is usually a reception room with a snap shot of each room on a board. The ones that are free are lit up and the ones that are taken are blacked out. More than half the rooms in every hotel were blacked out at 4pm on a Monday afternoon! We didn’t find anything interesting in the end, just normal looking hotel rooms, boring.

Had cool waterfalls outside but boring standard rooms inside.

The Puppy Hotel. This is wrong – puppies can be scarred for life too!

Most of the other hotels had even more than this blanked out!

Ha ha!

Just some diamante studded cars we passed on the way.

Some outfits for rent! Hopefully disinfected and dry cleaned…

Instead we headed to our last sushi train dinner and then drinks at a place called “Planet 3rd”, a really cool little bar, in the bottom of our building ; )

Matt enjoying his last sushi train.

Osaka at dusk.

Day 259 – Sayonara Japan! Tanoshikatta ne! (It was fun!)

Packing today was easy with half a pack! We looked at some last minute stuff for the Philippines (I don’t think we have ever been more under-prepared turning up to a country!) and decided to kill our last few hours in Japan finding funny mistranslated and sometimes just plain gibberish t-shirts. We found a few good ones, but given Japanese sizes are small, extra small and extra extra small, nothing that didn’t look like my little sister’s. Matt was fitting into a “medium” for the first time in his life and settled on a “short muzzles” t-shirt with bulldogs on the front, but didn’t end up liking any of the gibberish ones enough to actually wear [Matt - I really liked one, but it was just too wrong, I think I could have been arrested for wearing it in Australia].

Our last meal was going to be gyoza, not exactly Japanese, and not very filling so we called that breakfast and hopped into some all-you-can-eat sushi we found right at the last minute before we got on the plane for our 5 hour flight to Manila.

One the of the many monstrous and futuristic buildings around Osaka.

Love it! Spotted this guy with fans in his shirt waiting for our train to the airport. Only in Japan!