Saturday March 29

My body never seems to stop adjusting on this trip. It’s been three weeks, and I’m still getting used to being away from my desk and out in the sun. It started out with that horrible heat rash. It seemed to take forever to go away and it kept moving around my body as new areas had to learn all over again how to sweat about three gallons an hour. That has finally come to an end, at least. Then my feet had to get used to my sandals and I went through a period of blisters and the constant applying of bandages. That led to all the blisters getting infected and I had to deal with that. Then came the nik nik bites, which also became infected, which in turn led to my trip to the hospital. In the meantime, I had to adjust to the physical exercise of cycling and the sore butt and sore muscles and sore joints. The hike to the Underground River really stiffened up my leg muscles and had me hobbling around like a grandfather for several days. All through this, different parts of my body were getting exposed to the sun. I was pretty consistent in applying sunblock while cycling and I didn’t have to deal with too much sunburn, but there was a little bit here and there.

You’d think that after all of that, I’d finally be adjusted to my new temporary life on Palawan, but I’m definitely not. For one thing, despite all my hours on the bike, I haven’t really been exposed to the sun that much. I’ve been wearing shorts and a t-shirt the entire time, so only my face, legs, forearms, and hands have gotten much sun. On these island hopping tours, the rest of my body has suddenly been exposed to the sun, and my whole body is now a bizarre patchwork of different colors ranging from a dark brown to a savage burnt red. I decided that applying 50 spf sunblock to my whole body wasn’t really helping much. It meant that my skin never really got exposed to the sun, which meant in turn that I could never get adjusted. I could go out for ten days in a row with sunblock on, and then on the eleventh day if I didn’t put on sunblock, I’d get a sunburn anyway. With such strong sunblock, there is no chance of gradually tanning. In the future, I guess a less strong sunblock is the answer. With this thought in mind, I didn’t apply much sunblock on Tour C and then I applied even less on Tour B, which means that after three weeks in the hot sun of the Philippines, I’m just now dealing with a fairly uncomfortable sunburn on my chest, stomach, and back.

I also found that when I woke up this morning, I was stumbling around like a grandfather again. My calf muscles were fine. This time it was the muscles of my upper thigh that there tight and sore. I’m thinking back over the last couple of days, and there are two possible reasons for the sore thighs.

The first is that two days ago, I went on a cliff climbing tour. I wasn’t that interested in climbing cliffs per se, but I wanted to get a nice overhead view of El Nido. I was sitting in the Art Café and I asked one of the girls about it. Two people overheard me, and they were also interested so I suddenly had a group.

The owner of the Art Café was there at the time, and she took an interest in our understanding what the cliff climbing was all about. I had assumed that “cliff climbing” was just a description and that it would be more like hiking. She wanted us to understand, though, that it really was cliff climbing. You really do climb up the cliffs hand over hand without ropes. It wasn’t until she got out a video of this climb that I really believed her and understood what this tour was all about. Even so, I wasn’t prepared for what we had to do.

My climbing partners were a couple from the United States. They were probably younger than me by a few years, and yet I had the distinct impression that they were much older. She was from the Philippines originally and was somewhat short and plump. She didn’t look to be in very good shape. Her husband was a typically tall American. He was quite muscular and had a big athletic build. The two of them were something of a surprise. He had always been something of an athlete and played hockey, football, and anything else you could name. He even had dreams of playing professionally. He met his future wife at an NHL hockey game and was so surprised to meet a woman who knew about the 1972 Sabres that he married her. I believe she was born in the Philippines, but she seemed to be out of touch with her home country. I say that because she made a big deal about her hotel here in El Nido not having hot water. I gathered that she and her husband were staying in one of the nicer places. Even so, it seems odd to worry about hot water here. I remember laughing at myself in Puerto Princesa when I put my hand in the stream of water from the shower waiting for it to warm up. I did that just out of habit. I never really expect to find hot water anywhere here.

The cliff climbing tour was supposed to be about three hours long – one hour up, one hour at the top, and one hour down. You could leave at either eight in the morning or three in the afternoon. The owner of the Art Café looked at the three of us and suggested a 2:30 start to give us a bit more time.

We met our guide outside the Art Café. He seemed a very nice fellow and he spoke much better English than any of our boatmen (none of whom I’ve been able to understand yet). He also seemed to think of myself as a real guide. He was informed about the area and took it upon himself to look out for our interests and safety.

He took us through some alleys and lanes in the real part of El Nido away from the tourist beach front. I’d been so busy island hopping that I hadn’t even explored that part of El Nido yet and I looked around with interest. It was just as crowded as the tourist areas and a lot smellier!

Very quickly, we hit the base of the cliffs and the seriousness of what we were about to do was impressed on us. Our guide ran us through a quick course in cliff climbing. His most important piece of advice, and one that I took very much to heart, was to always make sure that we had firm grips with both of our hands before moving any of our feet. The idea was to be clinging to the cliffs like a spider with all four limbs and then only move one limb at a time, making sure that our three other limbs were firmly in place. The usefulness of this advice quickly became apparent as almost from the very beginning we were having to climb straight up as if we were climbing up a ladder. The difference here was that this ladder was made of deadly sharp stone edges. The limestone was shaped in knife edges and even the smallest mistake could lead to trouble. There was the usual risk of falling. Most of the sections were not that high, but a fall could still have broken legs, arms, backs, and your neck. Some were quite high, and a fall from those sections would certainly kill you. The more consistent danger, though, came from those sharp edges. Even a small slip could result in cutting your leg or arm or hand wide open. You really couldn’t let your concentration go for even a second.

Overall, I didn’t have much trouble with the climb. I’ve always been happy scrambling over rocks and boulders and climbing up cliffs and trees. I simply tackled it and started spidering my way up. My companions, though, had quite a bit more trouble. The woman was not in good shape and she was not confident on the rocks. Our guide had to work with her and literally tell her exactly where to place each foot and hand. He often had to grab her feet and move them to the next spot on the rocks. This was quite a slow process and I quickly moved on ahead and then periodically waited for them to catch up. The woman’s husband was much better, but he stayed alongside his wife and so I was out there on my own most of the time. The route we followed wasn’t that clear so I couldn’t go that far ahead on my own. I had to stop from time to time and look back at our guide and have him point in a general direction. The problem was that we often weren’t following any kind of trail, but simply a direction up the rocks. At many points, I could have gone in different directions and I had to wait until they caught up before I could move on again.

I was honestly surprised that the woman stuck with it and made it all the way to the top. Myself, I don’t know if I would even have allowed her to make the attempt. I’m not sure that it’s wise for anyone to make the attempt. Even reaching the top doesn’t mean that the danger is over. The top was actually the most dangerous part. There was literally no flat place to sit. You could only stand carefully on these sharp edges. However, being on the very top, there was nothing above you to hold onto with your hands. It was quite precarious especially as there was a sudden drop of hundreds of feet all around you, and now you were trying to take pictures and pose for pictures. I’m not that affected by heights, and I was comfortable up there scrambling around. However, I did have one crazy feeling that I couldn’t shake. It wasn’t like being on a solid mountain with the edge nearby. There was nothing solid up there. You were standing on all these sharp ridges, and they felt a bit fragile, as if the weight of my body could suddenly cause one to snap and send it and me plummeting down. To take the pictures I wanted, I had to brace my feet against the very last ridge, and I kept imagining that after sixty million years, this was the moment that this ridge was going to choose to let go and crash to the bottom.

The views from the top were certainly worth the effort of the climb. That view of El Nido was the view I’d seen on the Internet that made me want to come here. I was glad to see it for myself.

Coming down was, of course, far more difficult and treacherous than going up. It’s very hard to judge distances when you are going down, and I could never tell if my foot was going to reach that particular spot or not. The danger was that you’d start to descend and you’d be hanging from your arms, but your foot wouldn’t reach the next rock. Then what do you do? You might be too extended to be able to pull yourself back up. Other times, I thought that certain footholds were far out of reach, yet when I reached for them, I found that they were easy to get to. There was something about looking down that made it hard to judge. There were also times when I was going down facing away from the cliff, not leaning into it. Then I found myself slipping and sliding and much more at risk of cutting my hands or arms. The problem was compounded by my daypack, which often got in the way and would push me out and away from the cliff when I wanted nothing more than to stay close and hug it. I’m sure there are lots of rock climbing techniques to make this easier, but I didn’t know any of them and coming down was quite difficult. It was even more difficult for my climbing partners and it took us a long time to reach the bottom. It was something of a relief for all of us to finally be on solid ground again and not have to judge every single footstep. It was not physically draining so much as psychologically. My brain felt fatigued at the end from having to concentrate so hard going up and down.

That’s not say that it wasn’t a physical challenge. My t-shirt was soaked through from sweat and my legs were a bit wobbly at the end. This morning, my thighs were quite tight and sore. It could have been from the climb or it could have been from my latest little adventure: Tour B.

 

My first day in El Nido, I went on the Sunset Tour. Then I went on Tour A. The very next day, I went on Tour C. After that, I just hung out in the morning, and went on the Cliff Climbing Tour. Yesterday, I decided it was time to check out the final island hopping tour: Tour B.

It was a more complicated morning for me because I had to change bungalows. The previous afternoon, I’d gone walking up and down the beach looking for my new home. I don’t think it actually mattered in the end, but I was particularly interested in having a separate cottage. Many of the places on the beach are actual two-storey buildings and they have rooms lined up beside each other. I think any of them would have been comfortable as well, but I had my eye out for a cottage. I picked out one that at least from the outside looked good. It had a nice balcony with a table and two chairs. There were a number of palm trees ranged across the front giving it some shade and cover. There was even a hammock swinging between two trees. I didn’t have much hope it would be available, but I asked and was pleased to find out that the present tenants were leaving the next day. I could drop off my bags and bike in the morning, then go on the island hopping tour, and take up residence when I got back. I was a bit worried because they wouldn’t let me write down my name or leave a deposit. We had just a verbal arrangement. I foresaw a hundred different ways my cottage could disappear and then I’d have to find someplace else at the last minute, but there was nothing else I could do but hope for the best.

I went to bed quite early as has become my habit here and I was awake early and had plenty of time to sit on the balcony and drink coffee and then pack. I rolled my bicycle along the beach and was pleased to find that they remembered me, and even though the people hadn’t left the cottage yet, they were going to, and the place was mine for that night at least.

I had thought my bags could be placed inside the cottage, but they couldn’t be. So at the last minute, I had to open them all up again and rummage through them to reorganize. I didn’t want to bring too much with me on the island hopping tour, but I thought it would be best to bring everything of value including my NEO and all of my exposed film. The Ortlieb bags ended up being a huge problem once again. By the time I was done, I was drenched in sweat and covered in sand and grease. Plus I had a huge heavy bag to take on my island hopping tour.

I left my stuff behind and walked along the beach to the Art Café. I rented some fins again and then I went up for breakfast. I looked on the board and saw that there were seven people signed up for Tour B including me. There was “Stefan and party”, two women, and then myself. I was still impressed with how the Art Café organized things. It’s impossible to be completely smooth in this kind of setting, but they come as close as one could reasonably expect. They write down the date and the tour on a big white board and then write down the name of everyone who signs up for it. Those who sign up leave a deposit of 200 pesos and get a “voucher” for this which includes their name and all the information about the tour. At this point, things do break down a little bit, because it’s hard to know what to do once you have signed up for a tour. One assumes that you gather at the Art Café, but where? Do you check in with anyone? Do you go to the restaurant upstairs? Do you just hang out on the beach? The real process is that you don’t need to check in. You simply gather outside the Art Café and wait. Eventually, a woman will come out with a clipboard and announce that this or that tour is loading. You follow her and you go to a boat and get on. At the end of the tour, you don’t go to the restaurant or the reservation desk, but pay at the counter of the downstairs store. This is the confusing part that could be a bit better organized. Or at least it could be explained. I figured all this out by just hanging out and watching. At the end of my first tour, I simply followed the crowd. I guess what happens is that in any one tour, there is usually one person who has already done a tour and knows the system. So this knowledge is passed on and everyone simply follows them. On my first tour, I noticed that people walked back to the Art Café and then dipped their feet and sandals into a big bowl of fresh water to remove sand. Then they returned their flippers and masks, In the meantime, the boatmen have delivered a list of the drinks that people have had during the day. The women at the counter of the store have this list and just wait for people to show up and settle their bill. The first day, it was quite confusing because a group of young Americans got there before we did, and they had some immensely complex way of dividing up the bill amongst themselves. It went on so long that I wanted to jump in and pay for all of them. It would have saved us all a lot of time as they quibbled and talked about fifty pesos and forty pesos and who had paid for this and that and who owed who what for last night’s dinner and how that affected what they owed for the tour. After what felt like an eternity, they moved away from the counter and the rest of us could get in there. At that point, you hand over your voucher which shows them how much you paid as a deposit. They add up the total cost of the tour, rentals, and drinks, subtract the deposit and present you with a bill and you are free to go. After Tour A, I hung out for a while and kept an eye out for the boatmen to give them a tip. I felt they had done a good job and had worked hard. They did more than was expected of them. After both Tour C and Tour B, I didn’t tip them. These boatmen seemed to do the minimum and even less than the minimum. I figured their salary was all they deserved.

Stefan and party turned out to be a fellow from Germany, his German girlfriend and his friend’s girlfriend. His friend was also supposed to come, but he decided to do something else at the last minute. My overwhelming impression of these three Germans was of a mass of wobbly flesh. They weren’t hugely fat, but considering their young age, there was far too much of all of them. I never did learn much about the two women (other than that they could stand to lose thirty or forty pounds each), but in a brief chat with Stefan I learned that he was a PR consultant in Munich. They had just come from Coron, where Stefan had done some wreck diving. He made me feel better and worse about my decision not to go to Busuanga. On the one hand, he said that you could snorkel at only one of the wrecks. To see all of the others, you had to dive. On the other hand, he said that this one lake that he visited was the most beautiful place he had ever seen – even more beautiful than the islands here around El Nido.

Tour B was pleasant enough, but not as nice as Tour A or even Tour C. We stopped first at a snorkeling area. No one could stay in the water for long, though, because there were far too many jellyfish. Everyone got stung by the little ones and we all quickly climbed back into the boat. We also visited Snake Island, so named because there is a long underwater sand dune that twists and turns like a snake. I walked out to the end of the dune in water up to my thighs, and just as I turned around, I heard someone calling out to me to wait. I turned and saw a small local boat with three teenage girls, an older woman, and a baby. Apparently, the older woman had paddled them all the way out there just for the purpose of meeting me. The three girls piled out of the boat and crowded around me and told me how handsome I was. I got the impression that the woman was their mother and that she had hopes that the foreigner she saw in the distance was of a marriageable age and would whisk one of her lovely daughters off to a new life somewhere. I tried to let them down easy and told them how old I was. Then they asked for chocolate.

We stopped at a couple of caves, a couple of beaches, and at a snorkeling spot or two. It was a nice day and I enjoyed it, but it didn’t have the dramatic quality of Tour A or the remote and wild quality of Tour C. I ended the tour, as I’ve ended all of my tours, with a large Hawaiian pizza and a beer and an early night. I say that my sore thighs might have come from this tour because at the one really nice snorkeling spot, I strapped my fins onto my feet and swam a fairly long distance. I was deliberately moving my legs quite strongly and not using my arms and body at all. I could feel that I was using leg muscles I didn’t normally use and perhaps my sore thighs came from that exertion and not from the cliff climbing. The smart money is still on the cliff climbing, though.

 

After a quick dinner, I walked down the beach to my new home. I hadn’t seen the inside of my new cottage at all and I was a little disappointed when I opened the door. The place had appealed to me because of its setting, but inside it was fairly rundown and on the small side. The bathroom was particularly old and grungy. It was also not sealed in any way and there were openings to the outside world everywhere. There were obviously lots of creatures and creepy crawlies living in the rafters and elsewhere. The sink became peppered with little mouse droppings, which rinsed away with splashes from my shower and left little brown stains behind. Overall, it isn’t anything I can’t live with. It’s certainly far nicer than most places I’ve stayed in overseas, but I can’t help but have higher expectations when I’m paying 900 pesos or $25 a night in a place like the Philippines. That’s about $750 a month, which is a fortune here. They do provide hot water, though, and I enjoyed a cup of coffee last night and a few more this morning. I also got the entertainment of listening in on some drama in the cottages next door. Apparently, someone stole 10,000 pesos from each of the rooms while they were out island-hopping yesterday. They reported it to the police and a very unsympathetic policeman came by this morning to investigate. I can see both sides of the story, but the policeman seemed to be working from the classic police strategy of blaming the victim. He had little to no sympathy and he essentially put the victims on trial. I suppose he had to cast some doubt on their story, but he went too far and ended up upsetting everyone and making them angry. To the victims, it was pretty straightforward. They knew the money was there when they left in the morning. When they came back from their island hopping, the money was gone.

Even I doubt their story, however. It’s very easy to miscount your money. You think money has been stolen when in fact you spent it. It’s also easy to misplace things. I thought someone had stolen my Cateye cycle computer in Port Barton. I searched every single bag I had and every single pocket twice just to make sure. But in fact, it was there all along and I had just misplaced it. The timing of missing money is also very difficult to ascertain. Even if you conclude that the money definitely has been stolen, it isn’t so easy to figure out when it was stolen. At least, it isn’t easy to prove. It could have been stolen at a different cottage, even in a different city altogether. It’s also impossible to determine or prove who could have stolen it. It could easily have been a fellow traveler – something I know happens very frequently. It could have been the housekeeping staff. It could have been a random thief.

In this case, their story is made more credible in that money was taken from two separate rooms from two groups of unrelated travelers. The policeman showed them how useless the padlocks were. He opened them in two seconds using a fork. It’s pretty clear that security is not at the forefront of the minds of the people who run this place. My own experience illustrates this. I was a little taken aback when I came back to find that my bags were in the room, and the padlock was on the door, but the key was still in the padlock! A potential thief wouldn’t even have needed a fork. Perhaps I was lucky that I had that impulse to bring everything with me including my NEO and film. I always bring my money and passport and ID with me wherever I go – even island hopping and cliff climbing. But I don’t always bring all my cameras and other gear. Yesterday, I did and perhaps I avoided problems that way. I’m surprised also that no one has come over to question me. There have been all kinds of police here, but no one has come over to question me yet. You’d think I would be a suspect. I actually took my daypack into my cottage and quietly counted my money to make sure it was all there and so that I knew how much I had in case I was questioned.

I think the policeman was correct to be suspicious of our victims. One of the victims said that they had 28,000 pesos and when they got back from island hopping they only had 18,000. The explanation is that the thief didn’t want to raise suspicion and hoped they would leave El Nido without noticing. Still, that seems like a pretty thoughtful thief for this place. It seems to me that they’d have to have a lot of self-control not to take all 28,000. This victim also has some weird attitudes about it all. He’s saying that it is the fault of the management of this place because they didn’t warn him that it wasn’t safe to leave money in the cottage. I agree that the management should have better locks and that they shouldn’t have left the key in my padlock, but it isn’t their responsibility to warn us not to leave valuables in the room. Many places have this warning on posters on the room’s wall and at reception, but they aren’t really intended to protect guests. They are there just to protect the hotel from liability. This fellow is taking things a bit too far and is saying that he will now refuse to pay his bill. He will stay here six nights and at the end he won’t pay, and that way he will get back some of his money. That logic is definitely faulty.

I had a nice surprise earlier in the morning. I was sitting here drinking coffee and I saw Yvonne next door. She is staying with a group of people in the cottage right beside mine. We chatted for a bit and I got caught up on her story. The last time I’d seen her was in the jeepney from Port Barton and then waiting for the bus in Roxas. She took the bus to Taytay and stayed there only one night. She didn’t like the place at all, and I think that was largely because she stayed at Pem’s. She said her room was really small and uncomfortable. There was nothing to do and she left very quickly and took a van or a jeepney to El Nido. She was here for a little bit, and then she took a boat to Coron on Busuanga. She didn’t recommend going there, though she did have some adventures. The adventure came mainly from getting there and then trying to get away. This appears to happen to a lot of people. She was then traveling with a group of people and they all decided to take this cheaper local ferry for 850 pesos as opposed to the tourist boat for 2,000. They ended up facing delays of up to twenty hours as the boat was going to leave, then not leaving, then leaving, then not leaving. It was a big cargo boat and they had to sleep on these strange leather sheets hung between timbers shaped like an X. They didn’t get back to El Nido until one in the morning. She plans to stay here until Tuesday. Then she will take the boat to Sabang and stay there until she has to go to Puerto to catch her flight on Sunday. Today she had plans with this group of people to rent motorbikes and go to a waterfall. I didn’t leave the front porch of my cottage until close to 11:30, and I still ran into her and her new friends getting organized with the motorbikes. I guess they spent a long time over breakfast and were just now getting the motorbike business straightened out. It could be just two travelers sharing costs, but it looks like Yvonne hooked up with this good-looking black guy. It looked like they were sharing a room here, and he was driving the motorbike with her as a passenger. I thought it was funny that they were going to a waterfall, the same destination that Yvonne and I had in Port Barton.

I went back to the Art Café for breakfast and had spaghetti carbonara. I also asked them to reserve a room for me at the Casa Rosa in Taytay, where I plan on going tomorrow. They do that by just sending a text message and waiting for a text message in reply. My plans have somewhat come into focus for my return to Puerto Princesa. The idea is to ride to Taytay along a small coastal road rather than down the “national highway.” This could be a terrible disaster, but I feel it’s the best way to go. The road could be terrible and steep, but I’ll never find out if I don’t try it.

From Taytay, I plan to ride along the main road until I get to the road to San Vicente. I plan to ride there and spend the night. It appears that there is some kind of accommodation there. From San Vicente, I can ride to Port Barton along the coast and then cut inland on the same road I took last time, or I can reverse my path and simply head back out to the main road and continue to Roxas. From Roxas, it is an “easy” two days to Puerto Princesa. That’s a total of five days of cycling with one extra day to spend somewhere – probably San Vicente.

After my spaghetti carbonara, I went out for a walk around El Nido. I just wanted to wander around some of the streets, take some pictures, and perhaps walk a bit north of El Nido to see if I can find the intersection with the road that will take me along the coast. I was successful in my stroll and picture taking, but I wasn’t so successful when it came to figuring out where that road was. I spoke to a couple of local people who spoke very good English, but our discussion illustrated more than anything the gap of understanding that can exist between cultures. What I planned to do was so foreign to them, that they simply couldn’t process my question or answer it. They talked a lot about roads and places, but no matter what I did, I couldn’t get anyone to focus on the simple question of where that intersection was. I even had my map to help illustrate my question, but no one could help me in any way.

I took some pictures of the local jeepneys, which pleased me, and then I stopped off at a store to pick up my usual six liters of water and two bottles of cold beer. The water was for tomorrow, and the beer was for my front porch.

When I got back to my cottage, I was glad to hear from the woman there that my laundry was done and waiting on my front porch. Only one shirt wasn’t dry yet, and it was hanging from a rope. This woman asked me if I’d heard the stories about the thefts from the two other rooms. She was very upset about them, and she said that it is the first time in her life that anyone has accused her of stealing. She even had to go to the police station to answer questions. She seems like a very sweet woman, and I felt sorry for her situation. I wonder if the people making all the accusations understand what an impact such things can have.

I drank my cold beer on the front porch, and then I hauled up the bike for a bit of cleaning and tuning. The cleaning was successful, but I can’t say the same for the tuning. I worked on the rear derailleur briefly, but I didn’t manage to fix anything. I have a vague idea of what is wrong with it, but I can’t see how to fix it. I paid the woman for my two nights at the cottage and for my laundry, which meant I was free to go in the morning if I so chose.

 

The closer the date for my return to Taipei gets, the more surreal and unpleasant it seems. It feels like I’ve left that place, and going back there feels like a major step backwards. I know I’ve only been gone for something like three weeks, but I can’t imagine walking back into Rooftop and then back into work and clocking in. I remember quite clearly what Rooftop looks like and I can picture arriving there perfectly, yet it is like remembering something from a distant past that has nothing to do with me anymore. I could easily not return at all, and I don’t think it would make the slightest difference. There are practical details of course. What little money I have is in a bank in Taiwan, and Rooftop is full of possessions. There is also a job and an income to think of. However, these are just details and have no emotional resonance for me at all. What emotions do resonate are largely negative at this point – just necessary evils like work to make the money we all need to survive. I don’t mind the thought of working. I don’t even mind the thought of that particular work. But being totally controlled by a company, I do mind. At this point, it feels like whether I take up the mantle of that job again feels like a 50-50 shot.

I left my front porch at around 5:30. The sun was setting and I was hoping to run into Ed and his wife before I left El Nido. I was very lucky in that I found them walking along the beach just as I got close to the Bayview, where they were staying. They were heading back to their room and Ed invited me up onto their balcony for a chat. He made me a cup of coffee from the fixings on a table there, and we chatted about life and philosophy and fatherhood and dreams and Schopenhauer. It was quite the full plate for a sunset in El Nido, but we devoured it with ease. This is bread and butter for Ed, and for me as well at times.

I had plans for an early dinner and then an early night, but after my longish chat with Ed, that seemed less and less likely. I guessed it was okay, though. I’d slept a long time each night in El Nido and felt that I’d stored up a good amount of extra sleep.

I enjoyed talking with Ed as always, though I have to say that talks with him do tend to get very serious very fast. One comes to the meaning of life and the very core of your own life very quickly. These days, the core of my life doesn’t stand up to much scrutiny, so I quickly got into trouble. Ed came off better largely because he seems to take things in stride and has more of a zest for life. He had his new son on his lap most of the time that we talked and he said that having this new baby has been wonderful for him. It was in fact his second son. His first son is already thirty years old. He said that he had his first son when he was in his early twenties. Now, he feels more like a grandfather than a father, and yet it is working out just fine. That might be because he is in the Philippines and his wife comes with a whole extended family that help take care of the baby. Still, I have to admire someone that can so easily take on those kinds of responsibilities – someone who can take on life so easily. I can very easily get into a contemplative mood, and someone like Ed brings that out in me. After talking to him, I felt somewhat inspired, but also challenged, as if my next moves should be purposeful and strong ones. I guess I’m also in the mood for some changes. In particular, I had this feeling that I wanted to live a life that included things rather than excluded them, a life that took all the things in my life and joined them and made them work together as opposed to the way things are now with all the different elements seeming to be in opposition – a life of exclusion, not one of inclusion – a purposeless life, not a purposeful one.

 

Down off that elevated plane, there were also my immediate plans to think of – specifically of which way to cycle. I still wanted to ride down a different road, but after some more research it was starting to look like the route along the small road down the coast might be more challenging than I was prepared for. From Taytay to El Nido down the main road was difficult enough for me. I think I was getting in better and better shape with every passing day, but I still wasn’t up to a really difficult day, and from El Nido to Taytay down the coast was looking more and more like a really difficult day. I got hold of a better map and it showed that just to get to the opposite coast would mean 20 kilometers of cycling on a very difficult road – up a high mountain road and on very rocky surfaces. Only then would I turn south to move closer to Taytay, and the road looked very windy and difficult from there. Till that point in my trip, I had found that a difference of 20 kilometers was a very big difference. I seemed to have around 60 to 70 kilometers of hard cycling in me. Adding twenty to that might not have been possible.

In the end, I chose not to take the coast road, and I think the decision was a wise one. Cycling on the main road a second time did not feel like a repetition at all. There was much still to see and take in, especially since I was seeing it in reverse. I saw the portion near El Nido in the early morning light and it felt fresh and beautiful. The first time, it was late in the day and I was very tired. This second time, I could appreciate it more.

The second half of the route was not that interesting, but it was very difficult and it made me glad I hadn’t taken on the extra challenge of the coast road. If I’d had a tent and more time, I would have taken the coast road. Then I could have slept on the beach when I was tired and not be forced to go all the way to Taytay.

I went to the Art Cafe for dinner again. Looking back, I see that I ate all of my meals there while I was in El Nido. That’s fine with me. I’m still utterly astonished (knock on wood) that I haven’t been sick at all on this trip. I have been able to eat two or three meals a day just like a regular person and not worry about it. It’s really a wonderful thing. I usually have so much trouble, which is why I lost so much weight while I was in Cambodia last year. I’m sure I’ve lost weight on this trip as well, but not nearly as much. I’ve certainly gotten in far better shape. I can actually see my leg muscles again – muscles which in Taipei were getting lost in desk jockey fat.

I had a pizza for dinner and I ordered a second pizza to take on the road for breakfast and lunch the next day. It was quite dark when I walked back to my cottage, and I ran into Yvonne and this English fellow that she met. I asked them about their motorbike trip and they said that the roads were really tough and that the waterfall was quite a tiny thing compared to the one that Yvonne and I hiked to in Port Barton.

I slept well, and I was up at five the next morning to shower, shave, pack, have a cup of coffee, and leave town. I had mixed feelings about leaving. I’d spent five and a half days in El Nido and done five different tours including three all-day island hopping tours, which should have been enough for anyone. That’s why I was comfortable leaving. However, I hadn’t had many days where I could just sit on my balcony and drink coffee and relax. I’d only had the one day that was an “off” day where I just hung out and did nothing. Those days seem like more real days to me than the ones where I “do” something. I might have changed my mind and stayed longer, but my second cottage really wasn’t that great. I had the big police drama next door which ended up souring the mood of the place a bit. Plus, there were some powerful smells wafting around. I couldn’t decide where they were coming from, but they made sitting on my front porch decidedly unpleasant at times. Finally, my second cottage was a bit dark and gloomy. I thought it had a perfect location, but it was actually a bit too covered in trees and didn’t have nearly as clear a view of the water as my first cottage did. I hadn’t been that pleased with the layout of my first cottage, but I found when I sat on the front porch it was quite nice. I just had to rearrange the furniture a bit to make it just right. Moving in the middle of my stay in El Nido also soured things just that little bit.

So despite my mixed feelings, I rode my bike out of town. Well, I sort of rode it. That poor beast is still not dealing with the rigors of this place that well. Somehow, the rear derailleur is barely working at all. I’d reached a point where I could at least range somewhat between first and sixth or maybe even seventh gear. Now I couldn’t even do that. The gear shifter simply spun around and seemed not connected to a cable at all. The rear derailleur simply wouldn’t shift. I had to stop by the side of the road again and again to fiddle with it and make adjustments. I tried switching into the second set of gears by changing to the second chain ring on the front, but that was a disaster. Just as before, doing that meant that the whole derailleur would just jam and get pulled right up into the frame. Whatever is wrong, it’s wrong by a long way. After many bouts of fiddling and adjusting, I got the derailleur to shift between second and third reasonably well. It would occasionally go into first by an application of extreme force. As for the higher gears, I would just spin the grip shifter around and then wait to see what happened. Sometimes the chain would pop onto one of the smaller rings, sometimes not. It was just a surprise. When it didn’t shift at all, I just wouldn’t pedal and would let the bike coast. Sometimes on the very steep uphill sections when the bike wouldn’t shift into first gear at all, I’d stop the bike, get off, and physically move the chain. It was a slow process, but I still made progress along the road.

I was quite glad to have left as early as I did. It allowed me a lot of pleasurable kilometers before the sun came out strong and started to roast me. Even so, I was quite tired and hot and bruised and sore by the time I reached the 40-kilometer mark. The last 23 kilometers were very hard. It made me wonder very much if a better bicycle would make a difference. By better, I mean one more suited to touring with drop handlebars. The thing is that my legs were fine. They had lots of kilometers left in them. It was my butt and my arms and hands that were causing me all the problems. The pain in my butt was so bad that I found it hard to breathe. The ride to Roxas tomorrow ought to be quite interesting. I’m going to make an effort to get up even earlier and be on the road by 5. It will still be dark, but I can make progress with a flashlight.

I was quite glad to reach the roundabout that meant there were only two or three kilometers to go to get to Casa Rosa in Taytay. I had asked people at the Art Cafe to make a reservation for me, but they never got a reply to their text message. I found out when I arrived here, that they don’t have any kind of cell phone signal at the moment. It’s been down for a few days and they figure it will stay down for another week. That disappointed me, because I was hoping they could make another reservation for me at the Coco Loco resort near Roxas. They can’t, though, and I’ll just have to take my chances that they have a cottage available – that’s if I decide to go there.

I had planned out my days so that I would have one day in Puerto Princesa to relax and pack my bike before my flight. I started thinking though, that I didn’t really need that day. I’d already gone back to Puerto Princesa once to change money and after the quiet and calm of Sabang, Port Barton, and Roxas, it was distinctly unpleasant – crowded, noisy, busy, and hot. I started to think that it would be okay to simply ride my bike to Puerto on Saturday, pack the bike on Saturday night, and then fly out on Sunday. That would give me an extra day to spend somewhere pleasant – perhaps somewhere with a nice front porch where I can sit and look at the ocean – something I wanted to do more of in El Nido. One such place is the Coco Loco resort near Roxas. Today has quite a different mood from yesterday. For some reason, time is suddenly hanging a bit heavy on my hands, and so some time at one of these resorts doesn’t seem ideal. They aren’t the kind of places one would normally go to by yourself. But it could work out nicely, and I would be able to get in a bit more swimming and that sort of thing. I don’t know if Coco Loco offers more than just bungalows and a beach. Perhaps they have little day-trips as well that can fill out one of my days nicely.

The people at Casa Rosa did not have my reservation, but it didn’t matter. There were no other guests, and I took cottage four again. I thought about taking one of the nicer cottages, but I like the view from cottage 4. I had a beer and lunch and then who should show up but the Frenchman Allen. I met Allen in Port Barton at the same place where Yvonne was staying. I met him again in El Nido.

I rested in my cottage for an hour or two in the afternoon. It felt far too hot to go outside, and besides, I had had plenty of time to explore Taytay the last time I was here. I had one errand and that was to get some water and perhaps a notebook. I need the water for tomorrow’s cycling, and I need the notebook because the NEO’s memory is just about filled up. I was looking forward to the errand because I planned to go to the store that I found the last time I was here: It looked like nothing on the outside, but on the inside it was a huge grocery store with everything you can imagine for sale. It offered one-stop shopping with convenient cash registers for paying. Unfortunately, when I got down there I found that it was closed. That happens to me a lot. The places I want to go always seem to be closed on the day that I want to go there.

I found water and some Tang envelopes at another store so all ended well. I was glad to find the Tang because drinking six liters of water in a day can get very monotonous. One’s throat even starts to get sore and rebel a little at the endless flow of water. Adding a bit of grape or lemon flavor will make it go down easier.

 

Tags: Art Caf, bike, El Nido, Palawan Bike Trip, Port Barton