A Flip's Note: Philippines Day 5

Its kind of weird to think that my family had to move to the US just to be able to visit the places I always wanted to go to in the Philippines. Boracay being one of them. Boracay Island is one of the top tourist spots in the Philippines, although its takes a plane ride from either Angeles City, Manila, or Cebu, followed by a ferry ride to the island. Traveling to Boracay can be quite pleasant if all goes to plan. Unfortunately for us, our flight from Angeles City (Clark Air Force Base) to Caticlan was diverted to Kalibo, which is a 2 hour, butt-puckering ride, to the ferries in Caticlan.

The weather was bad in Caticlan and the plane had to be diverted to Kalibo because the runway was longer, which enabled the pilot to land us safer on a wet runway. The shuttles were notified and headed off to pick us up at the Kalibo Airport. The way to Caticlan was quite interesting. Going through windy roads through the mountains, narrowly missing pedestrians and on-coming traffic, somehow, we made it to our destination safe.

After arriving at Caticlan's ferry port, we were escorted to the loading point to the ferry, which is a fast craft boat to take us to Boracay. Unfortunately, the fast craft boats were way behind schedules so we were redirected to large banka boats. Imagine a big canoe with outriggers that chopped through the water, turning a 5 minute fast craft ride to a 15 minute open water adventure. we had to board the boat using a wooden plank about 10 feet long with a loose hand rail on one side and open on the other. As scary as that whole experience was, I think I was more concerned about my equipment falling into the water (cameras, laptop, etc…). I would have taken photos and videos of us boarding the boat, but I chose to concentrate on the task at hand instead.

We made it safe to our destination eventually, but the journey here is definitely an experience my dad, brother and I will talk about for years to come.

Here's some photos of the travel, and some quick snapshots I took when my big bro and I took a stroll on the beach. I got bored at the hotel so I photoshopped them.

Clark Airforce Base at dawn...