14 February 23:20
We have arrived somewhere warm where we can hear the ocean from our hotel room, but honestly, we have no idea what this place looks like. But I’m pretty sure it feels like a paradise! We can’t wait to see what Malapascua looks like in daylight.
Traveling from the small big town of Gothenburg is bad. It’s an embarrassment to say that we have an international airport. Which is why, Mikael and I for the third time together goes all the way down to Copenhagen, Denmark to flee Sweden.
Let’s say that our day started at 8am Swedish time. At home. Excited for what’s to come. Mikael’s mom will borrow the car while we are away so we drove to the Central Station to meet up with her. Transportation mode number 1.
Öresundståget, mode number 2, the train going between Gothenburg and Copenhagen took us to Lund where we had to switch due to delays or something. Arrived a bit late to the airport, but still with plenty of time to work some more. Too bad the project I’m working in doesn’t take a vacation just because I am.
Transportation mode number 3 was the first flight to Doha. 6 hours short. Managed to squeeze in some reading, a little nap, food and that’s it.
I’ve never been to Doha’s international airport before, but it was big! So big that we had to take the electric metro to our gate. Number 4.
Gender neutral changing sign in Qatar.
The layover was a total of 3 hours, perfect! We barely had time to sit down. From the gate was number 5, the bus to the actual flight which was some distance away.
The last flight from Doha to Cebu was 9 hours. And I am surprised to say this, but we seriously slept through almost the whole flight! How is that even possible? We woke up in perfect timing with breakfast/dinner and had a very pleasant flight. Except that Mikael dropped one of his earplugs during the first nap, but actually managed to get it back from the guy sitting behind us. And also, for some stupid reason, when we were descending, my nose spontaneously decided to start bursting out blood. Not super convenient and no tissues very close at hand, no stewardess’ who could help. Insane. We did managed to find some eventually, but by then there was blood, haha! I really hope this doesn’t affect our upcoming dives tomorrow.
Okay, number 6, that was the taxi that drove us all the way from Cebu to Port Maya, a small harbor up north from where the ferry to Malapascua leaves. When we received the confirmation from the hotel about the taxi/boat, they had written Bremm. I corrected them, yet was still not surprised when the name on the paper read Alexandra Been. I have to admit though, Been is a first!
Okay, so we had finally arrived in our destination country, woho! But still many hours away from checking in, tired like never before. Similarities with Bali: there are no countryside roads, they are all lined with buildings, small shops and eateries. The cities blend together. And the traffic. WOW! So much traffic. But we reached the harbor after 3,5 hours which was not so bad. The driver was driving like a boss, probably a little stressed out because he had the boat crew calling him asking him where he was. It turned out that they had waited for us for 2 hours. Not our fault though.
Number 7, we are finally getting close to our final destination! The commercial ferry stops going to Malapascua after 17:30 so we had to get a private one. Not sure if the normal ferries are of this size and type, but it was a fairly big boat, and from what I’ve seen, the most common type used over here. Like the dive boats in Indonesia, but bigger. The conditions were great, otherwise the coast guard wouldn’t have allowed the late night private ferry. Another family was on it, German, visiting family for a month. Imagine having family on Malapascua to visit?
The boat ride took approximately 30 min. It was warm, the breeze was perfect, the occasional ocean splatter. A little bumpy made worse by the pitch darkness. But that pitch black makes the stars really pop out! I can’t remember seeing such a starry night sky before. I even got some decent pictures with my phone. Mikael was too tired to get his real camera up on the balcony. But I hope it will be a sky clear of clouds other days too, because this was just wow!
Okay, next thing, the tide was low, so this “big” boat couldn’t get all the way onto the beach so an even smaller had to get us the final distance. Number 8. There are no cars on this island and the only way to get things to it is by boat. And small boats at that. I was mighty impressed when they tried to move the scooter from the bigger one to the much smaller one. Impressive!
Shortly thereafter comes the last piece of this super long puzzle, the walking, number 9. It was a full 20m from the boat to our hotel where we were greeted and shown to our room with sunset view from the enormous balcony.
To say that this was a long day might be an understatement. I’m not even sure how many days have passed since we dragged our luggage through a snowy Gothenburg. Door to door: 31,5 hours. Can’t say yet if it was worth it. But it feels like it! I think it’s around 30C right now, the waves are rolling in on the beach right beneath us, it’s humid and our AC works wonderfully well.
One thing though. NO INTERNET ACCES WHATSOEVER. We didn’t see where we could buy sim cards at the airport but thought it would be fine on the way or once we got to the hotel. 7 Eleven did not have sim cards. We didn’t yet ask the hotel manager if there are any for sale on this tiny 4,8sqkm island, but will do so tomorrow. And also, since we have the room furthest away from the lobby where the router is we assume, we don’t get any signal here. No one knows we are alive except my mom who at least knows we landed (when I briefly had WiFi for 5 minutes). That’s tomorrow’s problem. Otherwise, this will be an unconnected holiday with just focus on sharks and beautiful beaches.
HAPPY VALENTINES!
Valentine’s Day came and went this year again. My thesis partner was nice and told me to stay home and enjoy it with my boyfriend, so that’s what I did. We had breakfast in town, we bought a bag of red candies and he spent some time with his dad so I could do a little bit of work at home. When he came home he brought me roses. He is so sweet, I love roses, they smell soo good and they are pretty. The cats liked them too so they can’t be on the table unfortunately, but they are pretty high up on the shelf above the TV.
Bemm 