7th October - Coron to Banana Island and back

Tuesday 7^th October

Stormy sky later in the day - no rain eventuated, more's the pity

am

HOT and very sunny.  Fiercely sunny!  When I am back in Tasmania, if anyone ever hears me complain about being a bit chilly – feel free to box my ears!

pm

We have had a very busy day, out on the water with The Crew – Rosie, Toby (Tobias) and Dodong.  Dodong is very shy but I winkled out from him that he has another name – Bernard.  Rosie told me that in fact Dodong just means… Boy… (I think I will call him Bernard from now on.)

Pete Toby Bernard Rosie

We went quite a long way, to Banana Island Bernard’s suggestion.  He has been driving a boat since he was a little tacker, and we took his advice. It was indeed a beautiful little island, with a very attractive-looking strip of aqua reef, only metres from our mooring.  After lunch, I asked if anyone was going of a swim.  Well...no.  Bernard told us that it costs 200 pesos to swim here – It is very expensive water, Mam. 

CaptainBernard

Co-ordinates

11 degrees 46.261N

120 degrees 7.731E

mooring buoys

small resort, v beautiful – 200 pesos

Banana Island

(Just across the way, on a nearby string of fabulous little islands, was a Four Seasons resort. I imagine the water there would be even more expensive…)

I happen to know that Philippine wages are extremely low.  $4.50 was not prohibitive for (bloated Australian plutocrat) me… I would have forked it out gladly, for a chance to swim in the glorious water.  But it is very probably more than Bernard earns in a day…So I tutted and said Goodness me no, much too expensive…and we went to Coral Gardens where only Toby and I swam, but it didn’t cost anything.

Rosie

We have only just got back, at 5.30, and I am totally knackered.  PATHETIC!!  Our guests were hardly difficult or intrusive, and in fact Toby and Bernard did all of the work, with supervision from Captain Pete.  All I had to do was make a potato salad and cut up some tomatoes and a cold chicken.  But…knackered…

Toby

Wednesday 8^th October

(So knackered I didn’t even have the energy to turn my modem on and put this into cyberspace…)