Location: El Nido, Palawan, Philippines

Max: At 6am, we ninja snuck out of our room to catch the sunrise (Sav even brought her blanket) on the roof. El Nido was surprisingly quiet this early in the morning and it was good to get a bit of peace. We’ve been listening to techno bangers and soap opera backtracks at 4 am for almost two weeks now! The pool on top of Frendz overlooks the ocean, so we sat by it for the morning and watched the sun slowly creep over the four islands within view. The cliffs on our own island towered straight up in front of us, as the sunlight brightened the greenery all over the tops and brought the rocky details into relief. It all felt pretty majestic.

As the sun reached us, the streets began to fill with tourists and scooters and we decided to join in the chaos. I was on the hunt for flip flops, which wasn’t too hard as El Nido caters so strongly to tourists. Pretty much every building sells flip flops, as well as a plethora of beach attire. I walked barefoot for a few blocks before finding a cheap pair to do the trick. This city is a stark contrast to our other stops in the Philippines so far, where everything is so bare bones and there really is no use for silly touristy things. We decided to take advantage of the early morning and walk the length of the beach right near our hostel while it was less busy. We arrived just as the tours for the day were leaving and long lines of people were walking into waist high water towards their boats. Most of them were fully dressed! As we passed them, we were approached almost a dozen times by locals selling dry bags and necklaces, but traffic slowed as we moved further down. For two kilometres and around a bend the sand is soft and white, and the ocean is brilliant blue and warm. The photos I’ve been seeing turned out to be real!

Finally, in a shallow bay that seemed to be used for boat repair, we had a section of the beach pretty much to ourselves. Or so I thought. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a huge herd of little blue crabs rushed by us. Like a hundred crabs. I had never seen anything like it and immediately started to freak out. As I got closer, all the crabs disappeared in the sand, burrowing and throwing perfect little balls in every direction as they got deeper. Sav started explaining everything that was happening around us because she biologies and I do not. It was pretty magical exploring the beach in closer detail, poking hermit crabs and herding minnows around. Eventually we strolled our way back to the hostel to rent a scooter, as we had some other beaches to check out and a sunset to catch later on.

Sav: We rented the scooter kind of on a whim, agreeing that it would be a better way to explore things at a more convenient pace. We hopped on (to my total delight it was pink) and scooted off down the only main road. We stopped at the very first beach we found, Corang-Corang, wading out to our knees in what felt like actual hot water. As beautiful as it was, we saw one further down that looked better. When we reached it, it turned out to be quite rocky and a bit dirty so nope! Not this one! I laughed a little at the idea that we were basically shopping around for a beach to spend the afternoon at.

What a way to spend the day.

We eventually stumbled upon Vanilla Beach, which although quite touristy, ended up being the one. The sand was finer, the water was bluer and the bars along the backside were many. In the distance a few bright green islands jutted up straight out of the ocean, some of which were connected to our own via zip lines passing overhead. We stayed for hours, alternating between hopping in and out of the water and laying on beanbags in the sunshine. The wind was a pretty strong so we ended up completely covered in sand most of the day, which did little to diminish our relaxation.

Eventually we walked around the corner of the beach, finding an even more gorgeous view of about 20 mini islands as the sun went down. We stayed there in the sand for over an hour, feeling sleepy from the days sun. Torches were lit in lines behind us, fairy lights strung up in palm trees blinked on, and the sky turned pink and purple.

We eventually made our way home to grab the Taco dinner special at the rooftop bar, still feeling sleepy. We are both excited to wash off all the sand and head up to bed early- since it sounds like we have a huge day tomorrow based on the tour we booked. Tune in for whatever’s that’s gonna be! I don’t even really know exactly…

Sav