The Boat 

Flo had organised for a boat to take us out to surf near the islands off La Luna, and we were to meet up with them at 7am. We had organised for the surf shop at Cloud 9 to deliver a couple of boards to Ocean 101 at 6:30am. Perfectly organised, with some time to spare just in case, right? As if that was ever going to happen, this is the Philippines.  In classic Philippines island style, at 6:45 as we were on the way over to Flo and Richard’s place, the lady from the surf shop met us at the front reception and asked us to come down to the surf shop to select our boards. This did not leave us with a lot of time to go to meet up with the boat. Byron, Christine and I made our way down to the Cloud 9 surf shop, we selected a couple of reasonable 9’2” boards, I carried them down to Ocean 101 while Byron and Christine brought the bikes around. We met up with Flo and Richard who then took us out to meet the boat. 

The Surf 

The boat took us to point half way between Jacking horse, one of the surf breaks at Cloud 9, and one of the small islands that you can see in the distance. We were not able to surf at the islands, where the waves looked like they had been produced by a machine, in that they were perfectly formed and perfectly spaced, as only one boat at a time was permitted in the area and ours was not the earliest boat by a long shot. So effectively both of the islands were full and we were left with the bit in the middle. There were however some huge clean waves rolling through. Now the night before we had been chatting with Richard who had assured us that although the waves would be larger out near the islands, the water would be deeper over the reef, his words were something along the lines of, “it is way over my head, so there is very little chance that you will come close to the reef” now with that reassuring speech rolling through my head, I paddled onto one of these large beautiful beasts and sailed down over the top of the reef, looking down I was amazed at the bright vibrant corral and fish that due to the crystal clear water looked like they were only just underneath my board. I came to a stall as the wave lost momentum and dropped down beside my board expecting to be swallowed by the warm ocean water, only to be met with the hard floor of the reef about 1 foot below the surface, and the next two walls of white wash barrelling down on me. I am pretty sure that I heard Richard yell something about the tide going out further than expected as I paddled for my life to get back out past the breakers and into the deeper water. I can assure you that I made sure to get off the waves a lot earlier after that experience. We did end up catching some nice waves, well Scotty and I did, Byron and Christine opted to stay in the boat and watch us get hammered on the reef. Once we decided that we had pushed our luck as far as we could, we piled back into the boat and went out to take a look at the islands and the perfect waves that we were not permitted to surf. 

The Breakfast Afterwards

We arrived back on the shore at about 9, Flo decided she wanted to paddle out for a few more waves. Christine and I decided that we would join her. We surfed a few more waves and then headed back to Siargao Residency to cook up some breakfast. 

Fresh Coconuts

After breakfast we made our way over the the wet markets to collect some more supplies for the next couple of days. While we were there we decided to take a look to see if we could find the famous banana cue that Christine remembered from her childhood, we also wanted to see if we could find a fresh coconut. We had been on the island for 3 days now, we were surrounded by fresh coconuts but we hadn’t found anyone serving them. We didn’t find the banana cue, we did however discover a small cafe where they were serving fresh coconuts. The couple running the place, Ben and Himaya, were around the same age as Christine and I, and they had children who were around Paige and Byron’s age. We chatted with these guys while we watched an enormous storm roll in and sipped our fresh coconut We then returned to Siargao Residency for a siesta.

Harana Surf Resort 

In the evening we checked out a hidden labyrinth of shops, restaurants and accomodation that mum had found just up the road from Siargao Residency. A big part of it was called the Harana Surf Resort, and would become a regular hangout over the next couple of weeks. While we where there mum introduced us to fire crackers, these were hot chillies wrapped in pastry and deep-fried. On the first night the staff took the seeds out, on subsequent nights, when they realised that we could handle the heat, they left them in. 

After dinner in the evening Byron, Christine and I rode down to a town that was not far from Siargao Residency, we parked the bikes and went exploring. There were all sorts of interesting things taking place with shops, restaurants and other little business all offering various goods and services, this was a great way to wrap up a fun day.