Days 9 and 10: Slow Day and off to Palawan

After the flood, things settled down. I was able to go to mass. It turns out the destruction from the rain was greater than expected. Even after the rains have stopped, a lot of towns are still underwater. One thing that has come out of this disaster is the generosity of people. You hear of people who go out of their way to help others. You hear of cops and military - where these are stereotyped as corrupt - staking their lives to help others. Lord, bless this land. Bless the people and the leaders.

Day 10 begins again with rain - heavy rain. We had to leave at 5am. And it was raining bad. The roads were starting to flood and we thought the flight was cancelled.

When we reached Makati, the rain stopped. All the way to the airport - the roads were drying up. We arrived at NAIA terminal 2 and am I really impressed with the airport. It is well lit, and clean.

The flight went without any problems - relatively smooth. We arrived in Puerto Princesa, Palawan and it was sunny and hot! What a sight to see the sun again. I don't recall seeing it  since I arrived in Manila.

The airport is very small and if they are expecting more visitors, someone needs to upgrade that airport pretty quick. The airport was different from what I recalled the last time I was here in the 1980's. But it was an improvement.

The tour operator was very efficient. The tour guide was very knowledgeable and he took us around.

We immediately went island hopping. The boat ride was smooth and we went to the Luli (not sure if I spelled it right) Island. It was called Luli from the Tagalog (Lulubog-lilitaw) because the island appears and disappears based on the tide. My party went snorkeling while I stayed at the beach.

We had lunch. Very simple but tasty food. Kangkong, fried hasa-hasa, crabs, pork chop and local bananas. After that we went to Cowrie island to see it. According to the guide, they just started to develop it. But I am impressed.

We went to check in at the Microtel Hotel and were quite tired. The hotel looks small on the internet but the rooms are quite large. The beds also were quite large and very comfortable. We all slept through the night!

 

We had dinner at Kinabuch. We were 6 people and had squid, fish, seafood soup, steak and the total came to about P1200 or about CA$30. Not bad considering the food was very good.

All in all, a satisfying day.