Our original flight time was 4:00 PM so we were scheduled for the 1:00 PM boat shuttle the airport. We had to take out shoes off to get onto the speedboat as it could not reach as far up the beach as the pontoon had been able to do. The boat ride over was smooth and we had another half hour van ride to the airport. We shared the van with four folks who were Polish and were currently living in Vienna. It was nice talking with them and I got to use my German at the end, Auf Wiedersehen! Perhaps we will look them up when we live in Vienna in May of 2026. We were expecting a quick one hour flight to Manila but that was not to happen. We got into the airport and as we were checking in the agent said the flight was delayed by 40 minutes. We headed into the big seating area where all the folks were seated on hard metal benches. As more and more people filtered in the temperature got hotter and hotter and we were more and more uncomfortable. Luckily Leslie found a cafe that would let you sit in their airconditioned upstairs if you made a purchase. So we both bought a cold drink and chilled out in relative comfort. Then when we should have been boarding, the nearly unintelligible announcement might have said that our plane was due to arrive at 4:55. We could not be sure of what it was saying so Leslie went back out to the Philippine Airways counter to get the information straight from the source. She was told that the flight was due to arrive at 5 PM and they would do their best to turn it around quickly because at 5:30 the entire airport closes. That was the first time we had ever gotten that kind of information. True to their word the plane was unloaded and the new passengers made it on to the plane. All without any sense of urgency. The door closed at 5:28 and we immediately started taxiing down the runway and soon we were in the sky! We landed in Manila and were trying to find out which turnstile our luggage would be coming out of. So I asked the agent who told us that only one of our two bags made it onto the plane. We had to fill out paperwork and hopefully the bag will arrive tomorrow at out hotel. We were given 2000 Philippine pesos for our trouble the equivalent of $34 USD
A smaller species of lizard is outside the main lobby
Hi folks, any goodies in here?
A fantastic sunny day
Our island level of luggage
Rome and his big hearty smile
Aqua overload
Garbage scow, at first I thought this was going to be our shuttle to the main island
Very calm seas
Very calm giant monitor lizard
A bronze turtle
Bronze front the metal, not from the sunshine
He was giant tortoise sized
Captain, start your engines
There is a tiny two person canoe out there
Entering the mouth of the river
Mountains off in the distance
The island we stayed at id just a dot labeled Club Paradise, the old name of the resort
We were optimistic that our plane had already arrived at the airport
But no, this one is broken
The new one arrived with just a half hour to spare
Would the passengers please be seated so we can close the door and take off
