Going home

Back in Singapore again. Last stop on the trip. The flight over over from Palawan goes without any problems of any kind, and I can pick up my luggage at Changi as I am suppose to do. I have heard a lot of that it is always risky to fly over Manilla, and that they misplace your luggage all the time. So far, I have not had that experience, thanks for that.

I am staying in my usual hostel, River City in, at Hong Kong street. Since it is Thursday, it is the weekly CS meeting at Zsofi Tapas bar in Little India, and I went up there after a shower and some Vietnamese food on Circular road close to the hostel. Cheep and good food. I do not know anyone at the CS meeting, but I am pretty early and find the others from CS and join them at their table, and move a bit around during the night and talk to a bunch of nice people, mostly people living in Singapore, it is a nice meeting.

I do not have much planned for Singapore, shopping and just prepare for going home and back to work. I go around on the mrt, checking out some stores in shoppingmalls around, without shopping that much. Or, I get me a new Lifeproof cover for my phone, which was on my list of shopping. It is not cheaper than in Norway, so it is nothing to save. I also get me a haircut, that is cheaper than home. Since I have found some good sushi places in Singapore, I just have to have me some sushi lunches, and I manage to overeat on sushi on, terrible, but it is just so good (not the over eating part).

On Friday is Heidi inviting me to join her and some friends of her for a smal party in her home. We are about 10-12 people, having some beer and food, playing games and talks. It is really nice, and I enjoy it. I am leaving "early" around 2 AM, it would have been nice to stay longer. But since I am sleeping in a dorm, and will be woken up early the next day when the others in the room start to move around, I have to get some sleep. Thanks Heidi for one more good experience in Singapore :-)

Sunday in my last day in Singapore, I have a late plane out, 23:05. Or do I? Around 1500 I get a sms telling me that my flight is 10 hours delayed. So what do I do know? I am first thinking that I have to book me one more night at the hostel, but after some reading on the internet of my rights as a passenger, I find out that I should go out the the airport as I was suppose to, and leave it to Lufthansa to take care of me, as they should do. So I go out to Changi, and go straigth for the Lufthansa counter. Talk to some nice staff there, I they tell me that I can go to a waiting bus that will take me and others to a hotel, and then the bus will take ut back to the airport the next day. Excelent! The hotel is great, maybe the best room I have had for the hole trip. Next morning are we back at the airport, and we leave arould 12 hours to late. Lufthansa have booked me on to a new flight from Frankfurt over Oslo to Stavanger. And I am home 10 hours delayed. I guess when one first should be this much delayed, Lufthansa must be one of the best companies to be delayed on. Very good service!

The worst part of the trip was Oslo airport, where the security was going crazy on all passengers, checking us extreamly good. I had to empty my carry on, even if I have gone trough lots of securities with the same pack several times the last weeks. I was almost going out of patience with them, but after all they are doing an importing job to keep us safe, so I do think I manage to keep most of my frustration inside but not all of it. A part of the reason for my frustration was that I was very short of time, I had 1 hour to change planes. And in that 1 hour I had to pick up my check in luggage, go to costume, drop my check in luggage and pass security. It all vent well at all, and I got on time for my last flight.

Home sweet home! :-)

 

Posted with Blogsy

It's more fun in the Philippines!

Leaving El Nido

I am on my last day in the Philippines. Made my 6 hours trip in a van from El Nido to Puerto Princesa (PP) today. I have only one night in PP, and will fly out via Manilla to Singapore where I have my last vacation days. The driver we had down to PP today was in fact driving pretty carefully, which is good when you don't even have seat belts in the car. Had never been there, or had been removed. A thing that surprised me on the way down today, was that the white line on the side of the road here is hand painted! No machine! An important job, but it must be boring to paint the white line on the side of the road. Hope they make it a bit interesting some times, and paint the yellow line in the middle of the road as well. :-)
It's a saying to make people go to the Philippines, "is's more fun in the Philippines", and I think I will say yes to that, both for my stay in El Nido and also for the sail trip from Coron. This weeks in Palawan, Philippines have been good fun, and social, which is pretty important too when travel solo. I have had some good 16 days over here.

In El Nido have I just been diving, 5 days in a row and a total of 15 dives. The dives have been good, but the visibility have been bad on most of the dives. Down to 2 meter and at the best maybe 15, which is good. Even if the dives are good, I do not think that I will go to El Nido for the diving itself, it is not that good compare to other places. But, when one are in El Nido, it is most definitely a good activity and good fun. And El Nido is a nice little town to spend some vacation days, and I do believe it still is to consider as a remote place even for the Philippines and I like the place, more this year than last time.
The guides from Submarineer have been awesome, good diving and fun to be on the boat with them. When it comes to the divecompany, Submariner, I have only good things to say about them. I can for sure recommend to go diving with them if you go to El Nido. Good rental equipment, good divemasters and instructors and very good organised when it comes to logistic and everything that make the dives go smoothly for us divers. With 5 out of 7 days out diving it have only left 2 days for other stuff, and the other stuff have

been doing nothing, expect sitting at the Art cafe reading, writing on the blog while I have been eating and drinking. That is pretty good for a vacation day as well, as long as it isn't every day.
The days on the dive boat from Submariner have been really good, it have been nice people on the boat every day. Some of us have also been hanging out some of the evenings after the days dives, having some drinks and dinners together, it have been great and they have been very good company.

Between dives with Submariner

I picked up that it was a typhoon coming into Philippines when I was in El Nido, and that worried me a bit even if it was not supposed to hit Palawan. When I managed to get online, I found out that it was downgraded to tropical storm, that probably is bad enough for a Norwegian, and that it was not hitting close to El Nido or Palawan at all. Hope the people that got the storm, made it true it in a good way.
My tiny room at OurMeltingPot did the job, even if it was not more than a bed behind a door. I slept pretty good, even if it was noisy from the street before 23:00 and after 6.00, or it was some music that kept me a bit awake a few nights as well, and I was very surprised when I found out that it was coming from the church across the street, had not seen that coming.
Here in PP am I staying at the Blue lagon, stayed here 2 years ago too, it got a pool and it is 5 minutes from the airport, double win, and I do not plan to leave the hotel before I check out for Singapore.

Convenient seating for after food, just to lay back and relax.

Posted with Blogsy

Gone sailing!

The flight from Bali via Manilla to Coron went just as it is suppose too, not any problem at all with Cebu Pacific Air. I am stressing a bit on the airport in Manilla to get out money, since I am going to a place without ATMs again, and the 2 first atms I find doesn't work. It might be an atm in Coron, but it for sure isn't any in El Nido, so I like to bring along as much money at I think I will use the next 2 weeks, diving in El Nido not inkluded, since I can fix that with PayPal.

I stayed at an simple cheap accomodation in Coron town, at Patrick and Tess Guesthouse. I got a small room with fan, not any AC, cold water in the shower. Nothing fancy, but it is just fine for the 3 nights that I have in Coron. The house is at the end of a pavement strething out over water as many of the houses do in the Coron around the waterfront. Btw, it is a sweedish run guesthouse. I was not doing much the first day, long breakfast and long lunches and long dinners, reading and surfing the net. On day 2 in Coron was I doing 2 dives on some wrecks, good dive with penetration of the wrecks. We went pretty deep on both dives, and also went into deco on both dives. Have never done that, but it was not a problem really, since it all cleared on around 9 meter on the way back up, still, one is not diving into deco on purpose when one do not have the education for it. I had thew briefing for the sail trip at the Tao office straight after the diving, and the boat was back late, and so was I to the meeting. I meet a big group, 22 other sailers, a few more than expected. Talked to a few of them before we splitted up to meet again the next day.

My night before the trip turnes out to me a bit unpleasent, since I once again get sick before a boattrip, this time I most surely have a bad stomac, since I puke during the night. Still get some sleep, and manage to eat a small breakfast in the morning before I go with a tri-cycle to the Tao-Philippines sail boat. I am not feeling to good the first half day or so on the boat, and I find some spot with shaddow and just lay down being unsocial, just do not have the strenght for it. Not happy about it, since this first day is a get to know each other day, but is is the way it is. After a small lunch, I sit up, and get to talk to a sweedish couple, and Allan is making me drink some glasses of icetea, and that really helps, since I am pretty dehydrated since the water dosn't taste me any good. I skip all snorkeling and swimming this day, I do not have anything to do in the water. We are camping on a beatyfull island this first night, and we all get a small hut, or bed, with roof a bit over the ground, where we lay our matress under a mosqito net. Just great! I tell some of the peoples of the group that I are a bit sick, so I sort of give an exoplonation for why I am being so passive and quite, since it must look a bit strange that someone seams so unintristed to get to know the others on the boat. I am affraid that I do not make a good first impression. I hope I made up for it during the trip.

I have slowly being better during the first day, and on the morning of day two I feel a lot better, and I have had a good night sleep as well on my great outdoor bed. The rest of the trip I feel good, even if my tummy is not a 100%, but I can eat and drink as normal, and be normal social. The group is good, just a bunch of nice strangers traveling together and get to know each other on the way. Life on the boat is good, and very relaxing, some snorkeling or swims is breaking up the days on the boat. People are accepted as they are, some talk all the time, some talk less, read, listening to music and I got the feeling that everyone is just going with the flow and have a good time on their own terms, without making anyone unconfortable. I, well I must admit, are not one that talk a lot, but I get a good connection with some of the people, or some more than others, and I am also changing my first impression on some and find them to be really great and interesting people to talk to, and I have good days on the trip. Nice, fun and social.

The accomodation is good, but simple, since we basicly sleep outside, even if we have a roof over our head, it is on a thin matress under a mosquito net. On 2 of the island we also have to swim to/from the boat since the boat cant go into the beach beacause of corral reefs. I find it fun, I have never had to do that before. Our stuff and food and everything else that we need for the night is the crew transporting on kayaks. I belive I have some of my best sleeps on my trip on the islands, and since it isn't like a daily experience to sleep like this, it is good fun as an experience for some nights. Last time I sleept under some simulare condition was in the jungle on Borneo back in 2010, so it was about time. The crew was amazing, and they where very good organized in their work. It took them about 1 hour to get everything we needed for a night on the islands from the boat to the island, that meen our personal stuff, food, drinks, matresses, cooking eqipment and most likely more than that. And they where always in a good mood, making fun with each other and us, impressive.

 

Food, is always important. Last time I was on Palawan I could not figure out the food, and I did not find the Philippines food any good, or I got good food, just that is was more internatinal food. But the food on the boat, or on the islands in the evening has been amazing. We have been served crabs, calimari, grilled baby pig, fish, all fresh. The pigs have been killed the same day we have been eating it, some of the fish have been frozen, since it is hard to get fish close to the islands at the moment, because of overfishing most likely. It have all been amazing, and it have given me back my hope for the local cooking, and the chef on the boat was just amazingly good. When it comes to a different breakfast, I must mention a coconut (a hole one) with poridge, cooked bananas and some condensatet milk, and it was good. Not anything I will eat at home, but nevertheless.

After 4 nights and 5 days traveling from Coron to El Nido are we getting into El Nido around 17.30 on Tuesday in the Easter week. About 20 of us meet up for dinner later at the same night, and we are all pretty tired, and no of us want to hit the town for partying after dinner. Several are staying in El Nido for some nights, and I will most likly run into some of them the next days, but I do not have any appointments with anyone. See what happends.

My room for the week in El Nido is small, it is a single room in a hostel, but there is almost no floorspace around the bed. But I do not need much, I got AC and the toilet and showers are clean and working good. I do not have much planned out for my week, and I will most likely do some diving with Submariner. I have booked diving for tomorrow, and I told them that I will do 3-5 days of diving. See what happends. I tell you later. :-)

 

 

 

Posted with Blogsy