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The Great Chicken Escape
Up at 5:45 is not something I want to write about that often. We grabbed some breakfast from our hotel and then jumped in a tricycle to take us 7.5km to San Jose terminal. We feared we would have to take take a small Jeepney to Port Barton but luckily we had some oldish beaten up bus that looked like it could be a bit more comfortable. Two men came running at the tricycle within 20 seconds of each other speaking to the driver trying to get us on "their" bus, one leaving at 8am and the other at 9. We had read that apparently most don't leave until full so I didn't know if their times were just a bargaining tool.
Our bags were on the bus quicker than we were, launched up onto the top of the bus and strapped in by someone who was the Filipino equivalent of Spiderman. Hawkers poked their heads in the glass-less windows trying to sell sunglasses and other stuff. We watched another man put what I assume was 3 large sacks of rice on his head and climb to the top of the bus next to us, and he didn't even seem to struggle.
By surprise, the bus left on time and half full. The journey time was about 3 hours (not sure how long in distance), stopped at various random point along the way to pick up and drop off local passengers. It meandered its way around sharp corners, overlooking pleasant drops into the rainforests and sea we were passing.
Spiderman was sitting on top of the bus, but would occasionally lower himself down back inside the bus and then back out on top again. About halfway through the journey a guys box (Asian people love travelling to places with boxes taped or wrapped up in some way, they even use them as makeshift suitcases at airports) was shifted open by its contents, 1 full size chicken and a baby chick now trying to figure out how they could run past the bus conductor (I call him a conductor but he was just in jeans and a tshirt collecting fares) and make a run for it. Conductor soon had them back in the box though and tied up again.
Around about the same time we pulled over at the road, a man wearing some kind of uniform stepped on the bus and asked us to give over any mangos we may be carrying as they were not allowed to travel any further due to cross contamination or something like that. No persons gave up anything but I do wonder if some of the locals had a few in there bags hidden away!
With 22km left I thought the journey had been pretty smooth so far. The roads then changed into roads under construction, which then transformed into dirt tracks. Soon this old bus was off-roading. It was a bumpy journey until we made it to the port.
A hour later after some lunch our boat transfer arrived and we jumped on. We started heading towards islands and wondered which one would be "ours". Nothing seemed to get much closer! We started hitting some bigger waves and were given a sheet of tarpaulin to wrap ourselves and our bags in, to avoid being drenched. It was quite fun being thrown around a bit so I felt like we got our monies worth. A hour later we had arrived at Secret Paradise Island Resort.
SP is a island with 4 beaches, 3 next to each other and 1 you can reach by Kayak. Primarily it is a turtle sanctuary, as turtles arrive between December-April to lay their eggs. When they hatch, the turtles normally make a run straight into the water, wide open to predators on land and in the sea. So the sanctuary normally feed them within a large cage in the sea, to help them bulk out a bit before they are released and to give them more of a chance of survival. 116 recently hatched turtles were in the special area when we arrived. We watched on TV a few months back a program that said a turtle takes 30 years to become mature enough to become pregnant, and they will always go back to where they were born to lay the eggs.
There are only 8 lodges on the beach, so not really anymore than 18 guests and maybe 6-8 staff. There is limited power, only on between 17:00-07-00, the showers are heated by LPG and the Internet signal is a wireless signal coming 21km from Port Barton (impressive if there is any at all!).
We had a quick snorkel, swimming across some corals until it dropped several meters or more down into the open sea. Not sure exactly what fish we came across but it was like being in a giant fish tank!
Dinner in the evening was great, I had a whole squid, which was cooked in soy and came out on a sizzling plate. It seems that fish may be the way to go for good dining in Palawan.
We went for a walk across the two beaches around 10pm, a little early to see any turtles laying eggs. However we did see something else that we witnessed on a documentary back home, Hermit Crabs. These crabs don't have a shell of their own, but they find whatever they can fit into (sea shells etc) to protect them from the sun. Once they outgrow the shell they normally swap in a line out with other crabs from big to small, upgrading as they go. The beaches were littered with these crabs, as soon as you shined a torch on them they stopped running and hid in the shells they had made homes in.
Bowls of rice; 15
Turtles seen; 0 (let's hope this changes)
Hours travelled; 37
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