things are never as simple as they could and should be

Hi y’all!
Well, I am back from Boracay and finally back at the office again. We arrived back in Sugod on Thursday afternoon after another epic travel experience that went something like this:
Original travel plans: 5 min boat ride to Caticlan, 2 hour boat ride to Lo’oc, 2 hour jeepney ride to San Agustin, 30 min tricycle to Sugod.
Reality: we left Boracay at 8am and got to Caticlan at 8.30 with plenty of time to catch the 9am boat. HAHAHA, we should have known better than to believe that things in the Philippines go according to plan because THEY DON’T: our boat had left at 8.20 because it was already full, and the next boat might or might not be the following day. (damn you Holy Week for messing with our travel plans!) So we sat around the boat terminal with Nattu, waiting for his plane to leave, until I decided to find the coast guard to see if there was any other possible way for me and Carolyn to get to Tablas. Thankfully there was another boat from Caticlan to Sante Fe, ages away from our end of the island, but on Tablas nonetheless. I raced off to find Carolyn, and we hauled all our bags over to the coast guard’s office, pleased with my resourcefulness. You can see where this is going, can’t you? We got back to the CG office, only to be met with the news that the Sante Fe boat had already left, and that thanks to Good Friday, there would be no boat until Saturday. Hot, bothered, and annoyed, we said our goodbyes to Nattu, and decided to head back to Boracay. We bought our 3 tickets to Boracay ( why buy one consolidated ticket when you can stand in 3 separate lines to buy 3 tickets??) and headed out to the boat. Just as we were signing the boat register, Nattu rang to say that Sante Fe boat hadn’t left and that they were waiting for us. At this point we were mightily confused. The Sante Fe boat that had left, hadn’t left? How did the Coast Guard of all people get this wrong? And how did Nattu, who had left for the airport, know all this? (Once they had found out about the new boat, they’d sent 3 guys to find us, and one guy had recognized Nattu, who had just randomly decided to jump off his tricycle and find an internet shop.) We hightailed it back to the Coast Guard, clambered onto the boat, and then sat around waiting for another hour while they did boat repairs (always confidence-inspriring) and loaded up the usual cargo: people, chickens, and a motorbike. We got to Sante Fe 2 hours later, only to find that the jeepney to Lo’oc had already left, so we arranged singles to take us. It’s a good thing that I am no longer afraid of riding on the back of motorcycles because we spent the next hour winding up and down mountain roads, some of which were less road and more stony path. The view was incredible: azure blue water stretching as far as the eye could see. I arrived in Lo’oc high on the amazingness of the motorcycle ride, but with a very sore bottom!
Of course, the jeepney from Lo’oc to San Agustin had already left and so we had to pay a stupid amount of money to get a tricycle there, and then another tricycle to Sugod. We eventually got home at 5pm. Whew!

ps: if you want to text me, you can, at +63 9285 948 067.