Words by Jan Michellardi
Dusk at Pipisik Beach Resort © Photo by Paelo Pedrajas
It began with a desire.
It always begins with a desire—to move, to be elsewhere. It was a Saturday, it was early and four of us were in a car, windows down, blasting music made for vagabonds. Going where? To some place we don’t know.
See, the beauty of traveling is in the spontaneity, in that sudden impulse to go, to jump, to swim, to climb, to see, to experience. Four of us wanted to get away from the humdrum of city life for a day or two so the four of us did. Nevermind that we don’t know where were going or we might not have enough money, nevermind that. We could always sleep in cars by the roadside; we can always eat cheap. The supermoon was scheduled to make an appearance that night and we wanted to see it. So we went without excuses.
South, we decided to go south, to the beach. Batangas is an easy target for weekend trips so we drove there, to the small town of Laiya where most beaches were. The drive was smooth except for a dragging float parade that pushed us back nearly an hour. Three hours and three mix tapes later, we arrived and the search began—where to stay?
With our limited budgets, it was funny that we agreed to go there where resort accommodations were quite expensive. We checked each and every joint, not quite finding what we needed. Hungry, we were running low on energy, driving in circles, going back and forth the same paved road.
But just as we’re about to give up, we found it. Read the rest of this entry »
