It seems that everyone is putting their
hand up for involvement in the Hollywood movie – ‘The Beach’. While it was
filmed on the gorgeous Phi Phi islands of Thailand, El Nido is purported to
have been the location for the writing of the book. We went to Phi Phi Don last
year and it was a beach that had max-ed out its tourist industry with
dozens of boat operators jostling for your custom to drive you to Phi Phi Ley
to sit in a ‘secluded’ beach with hundreds of other people. The real drawcard to
those islands are the stunning limestone rock formations that rise up out of
the water and often enclose golden sandy beachlets that look picture perfect.
El Nido has those same limestone formations and is absolutely stunning, without
the horrible hectic tourist element. The town has a rough grid street pattern
dominated by small shack-like single story shop fronts, the end of the streets
at the east of the town has rock wall structures rising to the heavens
bounding the town in. Low shrubbery clings to the sharp flat rock faces and
gives the town a really enclosed and almost secretive feeling. One morning when
it was raining a low band of cloud hovered over the rock peaks and eerily
swirled revealing glimpses of the rockscape behind. Bars, restaurants and dive
operations line the beachfront and you can stroll along going for a leisurely
bar crawl, moving north along the beach to get the best sunset view as the
evening rolls in.
We are here in the southwest monsoon which
is also the wet season period. Every day, mostly in the afternoon or at night,
a ripping breeze pummels the cove and gusts of 40kts send boat owners securing
their washing and tying down anything loose.
Next comes the rain, not usually too much but the strong wind drives it
into your face and sends you running for cover. So it is the low season for
tourism, which suits us just fine. While the daily storm and rain periods are
inconvenient, it means that the town is not so busy with tourists.
 |
| Limestone rockfaces enclose El Nido town |
I made the tricycle trip to the market on
Wednesday (the good day apparently). The deafening sound of pigs and goats being
led off to the slaughter place (open area behind the market) was my greeting.
Bright colours of fresh bananas, avocados, mangoes and oranges filled my eyes.
The sight of fruit was exciting as it was not something cherished on Peninsula
Malaysia and I made a beeline for the mandarins and oranges. Still the animals
were screeching, and pigs can make a good scream if you just look at them funny.
At least you know the meat you are buying is fresh, the sound of pigs was a
stark contrast to Malaysia, where pork is forbidden. I picked up loads of
potatoes, bananas, watermelon, tomato and some replacement ginger for the next
batch of ginger beer (more about that later).
As we dropped anchor in the bay, who did we
spot but our old friends ‘Shanghaied’, Aussies who we had met in Saumlaki on the
Indonesia Rally. While we had stayed with the rally for the 3 month period
travelling west through Indonesia, they had left at Banda Neira and sailed
north to Ambon and onto Raja Ampat, before spending the next 8 months exploring
the Philippines. We invited them over to EJII along with some new friends on
‘Free Spirit’ to indulge in some boat brewed hooch - ginger beer. I made up the
wort batch in Kota Kinabalu, and it had made the rough passage from Borneo and
up the coast of Palawan before its taste testing in El Nido, explosion free
which was an excellent outcome! To the surprise of the tasting participants “it
was actually ok”, and a few more bottles were opened and shared around. Abe had
predicted the brew to be somewhere between downright awful and slightly
tolerable, but he was happy to throw down a few glasses!
 |
| Boat brew success! Thanks to my tasting team, Shanghaied, Free Spirit and EJII |
Another gastronomical (and social)
experience was when Hugh and Abe went ashore at Balalo Bay, a tiny fishing
village just 40km south of El Nido with no mobile phone reception and one house
with electricity (petrol generator). We were hunting for a spot to anchor and
dozens of children came running out on the pier, jostling each other and
jumping up and down whooping and hollering while waving. They sure were excited
to have visitors. With ideas of a fish curry for dinner, the boys went ashore,
to be mobbed by all these children. Falling back to our old faithful ‘cross
cultural-win’ with children, the high five, Hugh and Abe made themselves very
popular with the kids. Hugh is 1.98m tall so when he puts his hands up at his
shoulders, they are high off the ground. Filipinos are not a tall race, but the
enthusiasm by some kids to high-five Hugh led to much jumping and super-human
strength! Such fun kids.
Eventually Hugh and Abe were able to ask where they
could buy fish, and like the pied piper leading the children, they made their
way through the village with dozens of kids all pushing to be closest to them,
to the man with the fish. Some negotiating done, three small fish were
purchased and it was two thumbs up for fish curry for dinner. Abe passed on
some exercise books and pens as gifts for the kids, hopefully they will find
them useful, and they made their way back to the boat. It was such a contrast to see this remote
village, cut off from other parts of Palawan as there was no serious road
access. It was so close to other places that were tourist hot spots, El Nido
even has an airport, yet they lived a completely different life. We wondered
whether mobile coverage would extend to this location and how long this village
would remain in its isolation.
 |
| Enthusiastic High-Fiving! |
After 6 days at El Nido we decided to move
on. We had had a fun time eating ashore, enjoying the edible delights of Adobo
(meat stew with potatoes) and diving the beautiful waters. This sure was a nice
place to visit and I hope that it does not become as over populated as Phi Phi
Don, because that place was real tourism overload! A teary goodbye to Abe-l
Seaman Abe (we're not above a cheap pun on this boat), as he left to fly out from Puerto Princessa and we continued our
whistle stop tour of the Philippines.
27/6/2014
27/6/2014
0 comments:
Post a Comment