Tony: hey guys, let's go to bantayan tomorrow!
guys (everybody else): bantayan...? (probably a few seconds of silence, some trying to figure out where bantayan is... and then...) yeah sure! (unanimously agreeing to it anyway, nevermind that tomorrow was just a couple of hours away and to get to bantayan involved a 3 hour drive and then an hour's worth of ferry ride) anyway, we left the next day around 9am (with me only having 2 hours worth of sleep since i did mock calls the night previous which ended around 6am).
as usual, thanks to jimmy's brilliant planning and varied connections, a v-hire picked us up at pipc 9am sharp. junpaul, aaron, rowie, tintin n., veni and tony and i loaded the van and sped off to hagnaya. the driver and his buddy (i think there has to be a buddy else the driver would be bored to death on the trip back without annoying passengers keeping him awake) estimated that we wouldn't make the 12noon ferry so they took their time and stopped for lunch. when we reached the wharf, the ferry was just leaving! damn! had we sped up a bit and had they not stopped for food (i'm so mean), we would have made it! scheiße! but as we did those things, and the ferry left without us, we had to wait for another one for 2 more hours... so we were at the pier, reading books (those who thought ahead to bring some), did picture-picture, joked around due to boredom, played i dunno what games those were, ate camote-Q hehe and found ways to entertain ourselves. we survived that bit.
finally, the ferry arrived 2:45pm. the boat ride was sooo nice coz it was already around 3 pm that the ferry left the wharf and for some reason, the sun was not scorching and the sea breeze quite refreshing, not the usual sticky, heavy summer sea breeze. we sat at the very back and sang songs we never got around finishing and nobody complained! no one even gave us funny looks or dagger looks... they did ignore us but hey we didn't really expect them to sing with us, so it was cool. so we sang unfinished songs all the way to the island and got there around 4:30pm. we rode the tricycle to budyong beach resort but--thank god!--it was fully booked so jimmy and i went to the one right across it, kota beach resort, which was not full but those which were not occupied were not so nice either. the one right next to budyong was just perfect, Yooneek beach resort. it looked new and had monkeys. i mean it, they have 2 monkeys chained to a contraption of sorts. the staff was really nice and accomodating, the price was very affordable, the food was great and reasonably priced too.
we finally settled there and went for a swim around 5pm already. the tide was out so we had to walk really far to get a respectable depth and sigh, it was perfect... the sun was about to set, the water was perfect, paul lit a cigarette for me and best of all, i was able to float for more than 5 minutes! really float! not like the usaul scene where i'd pretend to finally be able to do it but my feet would touching the sand, or my lower torso was struggling to maintain a relaxed state... REALLY FLOAT!!! it was beautiful... it was the most relaxing state i've been in, just floating on the water, the current was so gentle, i can hear my friends joking nearby, looking at the sky touch the sea, my attempt at romanticizing the experience probably sucks but the point being, the trip was unexpectedly beautiful...
it was by far the best weekend since, well, august 21, 2005... thanks guys! :-)
as for what happened last august 21, 2005, let's save that for some other boring afternoon when i'd have nothing to do but reminisce... ;-)
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