30th January - Coastguard - Culion Island leper colony? - Coron (Philippines)

Friday 30^th January 2015

Another glorious sunset

Yes we are still in Coron but maybe today is the day we can start moving slowly away…

Schoolbus

Yesterday morning we had a visit from the local Coastguard.  Seven bright cheery young chaps clambered aboard, beaming with joy.  Three of them came into the cabin where they settled down and asked us many MANY questions. 

Coastguard formalities

They looked at every single one of our documents, plus our photos on the wall.  How old were we?  How many children?  Where is the document qualifying Pete to be Captain of 2XS?? 

Eventually they left, after giving us a document to sign saying that they had behaved with utmost propriety, had not asked for bribes, had not been in the least intimidating.  “We are here to help and protect you!” they said, a bit anxiously.  We re all for this and waved them on their way with appropriate gratitude.

Pete made the BEST loaf of bread ever!  I tried to capture its size and majesty by putting it next to my computer, for a bit of perspective, but maybe I didn’t do it justice.

Sourdough joy

We are hoping to get some fuel delivered early enough so we can go to nearby Culion, to visit the island with its historical leper colony.  Cheerful…maybe not!  But at least we will be moving and seeing something different and new…

I stayed up a bit last night and did some research on Culion.  I had found a whole lot of information last year, which I had transferred to my Navionics program (iPad.)  And then…I promptly forgot I had done just that!  

A nice way to go home from work every day

A few days ago Pete asked me to check out anchorages etc around Culion and I started, laboriously, to do just that until PING!  It all came flooding back…And it would seem that Culion is a steep island, with very deep anchorages.  We really don’t like anything above 10 metres, and in fact prefer 5m.  So it is a bit daunting to see 19m, or even 35, as the only alternatives.  So maybe we are not going to see the old leper colony after all.  Or at least, not from 2XS.