It was a three-day weekend. We left for Puerto Galera on Saturday. It took us two hours to get to Batangas Port and another two hours to Puerto Galera by boat. I haven’t gone on a boat for a very long time. The smell of seawater was very refreshing. While we were waiting to board the ferry, there was a group of children who tied their small rafts to the boat and climbed onto the window. At first I was very confused and thought they might work for the port or the ferry. Then I realize that they were begging for money, food and cigarettes. Those kids were organized and experienced. It’s impressive for them to have a great sense of balance on the rim of the boat.
We stayed at Dolphin Bay Beachfront Resort. It is a secluded resort on a mountain. The entire building extends along the hillside all the way until it reaches the beach, which is a lot of stair climbing if you stayed on the ground floor, which we did. The resort also comes with pools and a jacuzzi. Unfortunately I forgot to pack my swimsuits, so I had to jump into the pool with my regular clothes. I have never done that before, although, to be honest, it felt weirdly comforting, because my clothes just floated and slushed around my arms and waist as I went up and down in the water, which made me feel like a jellyfish. We took two tricycles to go to the downtown area and we had dinner at this Italian place with some fantastic Filipino style lasagna.
The next day we went snorkeling. We took a boat to the coral reef area. We held on tight to the rim of the boat and jumped into the water while the boat was still going forward. I saw so many fish and urchins. When the boat finally stopped, we got to swim and snorkel freely near the vicinity of the reef. I took off my life jacket and dived into the water. The process was as liberating as it could get with fish swarming beneath me and the water clear as emerald. At that point I still didn’t have my swimsuits, so I had been a jellyfish in the pool previously and then I was a jellyfish in the sea. I hope my weird metaphor makes sense. Ironically I was actually stung by an actual jellyfish on my knee when I was in the water.
Later that day, we went kayaking. We headed back to Taguig on Monday. It was so hard to say goodbye to this beautiful island.
A Summer in the Philippines 