Siargao had on offer pretty much everything we were looking for. What a relief it was to arrive and see that all the high expectations I had didn’t come crashing down - not at all. Even the weather got better and the constant rain stopped. We had been so tired (tournament tiredness they call it in Finnish - long time on the road can do that) but now we could build a little nest for the next ten days and relax.
By relaxing I of course mean doing all the possible activities on offer: kitesurfing, surfing, yoga, island hopping...you name it. Our first priority was to sign up for a kitesurfing course! We had done a snowkiting course last winter but now wanted to try the sport on water. Other stuff we’d do when we’d have time.
Siargao is an island a bit east of Mindanao. It’s principally known for its world famous surf at Cloud 9. There is a lot around the island but most of the action is packed near Cloud 9 and the tiny town of General Luna (GL). Between GL and Cloud 9 there’s a wide paved road, parallel to the coast, along which most hostels, surf camps, restaurants, shops and resorts are located. The coastline has beautiful white beaches but the swimming is not fantastic: there’s a lot of sharp rocks and soft coral when heading out deeper. Also “deeper” means walking out towards the open sea for at least two hundred meters :D it’s very shallow. For beginner surfing this is also not optimal: there are no safe beach breaks around. But for learning kiting this flat, not deep part of the coastline was optimal. And yes, the water was crystal clear! Amazing.
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| Beach! |
Cloud 9 has an iconic boardwalk which takes you to a high wooden platform with fantastic views to the waves and the island. Near the Cloud 9 break there is a break called the Jacking Horse which is also kind if suitable for beginners. Kind of. It’s not a beach break and there’s a ridiculously strong current pulling you the wrong way constantly which means you’re out of power immediately. The first time we went there, we were done in an hour. And only got a few waves :) Good exercise though.
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| Cloud 9 Boardwalk |
We arrived and found our nice Tiki bar and bungalows. It’s a small, few huts containing place between GL and Cloud 9 with a Swedish owner. Our native cottage was very spacious, nicely decorated and had a great porch with two hammocks and a perfect place for hangboarding.
First things first: we went out to rent bicycles! There’s no better way to go around than cycling and we found some very dysfunctional but cute bicycles for rent. They even had baskets in the front.
Next up was to go and visit the Seabreeze kite club to sign up. We met Joanna and Maurice who welcomed us to start straight away. We settled for the next day though ;)
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| Tiki bar and bungalows |
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| Nice room! |
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| Swedish owner's cute kiddo |
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| Monkeys, both of them |
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| Hangboarding |
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| Seabreeze beach and the upcoming storm |
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| Surfer and sunset |
The restaurant selection in GL/Cloud 9 was fantastic. Everything was of course a bit more expensive but very delicious. We immediately found a small place called Kitya’s where we tried pretty much everything on the menu. Kermit surf camp had yoghurt for breakfast, great pizzas for Chris and some nice chocobanana shakes for dessert. Buddha’s surf camp had the best chicken curry and some excellent salads.
These surf camps also offered yoga lessons in which I took part multiple times, either in the morning or in the late afternoon. Chris joined me a few times too and he did really well for a beginner! Maybe the nicest setting for a lesson was the boardwalk of Cloud 9 where a special yoga sesh was held. In the mornings the air was way hotter than in the afternoon. It was like natural hot yoga, jeez, I was sweating bullets.
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| Special yoga on the boardwalk |
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| Random visit again, this time with diving gloves |
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| The most fun when taking selfies |
Kitesurfing started off fantastic! We had a great windy day on which we began with kite set up, then flying the kite a bit and after lunch we were already using the kite for body dragging in the water. We would’ve started with the water start on the board too but the wind suddenly died. We decided to leave it for the next day. Wow, it was a lot of fun. How exciting!
But a problem arouse. The wind never really came back. First few days we weren’t worried: we’d still have a lot of time and it was just the nearby typhoon that was sucking the wind out. When it was gone, the wind would be back. So we thought.
After three days of waiting we had one day that had barely enough wind. The thing is that for beginners the light wind is very tricky: the kite is hard to control and it needs more power to do anything. We went anyway and I’m glad we did! After flying the kite a bit more we put on the board and tried the water start! I expected it to be a lot harder but quickly we got the gist of it: Chris was riding like a pro and even I managed to ride a bit. Cool!
It didn’t take long though and the wind gave up again. After lunch I had barely started trying out the board retrieval exercise when the wind just completely died. The weather forecast didn’t look promising either: the wind would start blowing again the day we were leaving :’(
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| Kite still up in the air |
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| Chris getting ready |
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| Storm stole all the wind :( |
So on those non windy days we had to come up with other things to do. Luckily my fears did not come true and the days had very little rain so we could also enjoy things like island hopping and discovering the Siargao island.
On 24.12. we decided to do the classic island hopping trip to the three islands: Naked Island, Dako and Gilligan Island. Naked Island was just a little patch of sand in the middle of the intensely turquoise water! Not an island one would like to get stranded on.
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| Naked Island and the dark clouds around |
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| Two girls in Christmas spirits |
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| There's not much there, hey? |
Next place was Dako which was a bit bigger and had some snorkelling and surfing too. Dako was beautiful. We spent some time walking around, then tried to snorkel but it was way too choppy for that and afterwards we had great lunch: a whole grilled fish, rice and some veggies. Yam.
On the last small but beautiful Gilligan Island we encountered some pretty crazy guy. He started pestering us straightaway when we hopped on the shore. “Give me 20 pesos per person, entrance fee!!”, he demanded. We said that we want a receipt, otherwise we won’t pay anything. We walked away and soon he came back with a piece of paper that basically said “Receipt, 40 pesos”, handwritten. We laughed and said no. That’s when he got really aggressive, grabbed Chris by the arm and started shouting that we should leave the island and that we are out of our minds (what? I think he was…) We told him to take a chill pill but he was mad. And so we left, without paying. We rather not stay somewhere with someone like that.
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| Dako island and sunshine! |
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| What are these!!? |
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| Something edible? Look at those eyes! |
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| Supercute chicas brought me sea shells. So we made a fortress. |
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| These gals knew how to pose |
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| DELICIOUS lunch |
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| Gilligan island - our last stop |
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| New board shorts |
On the Christmas eve we had a quick hangboard session and then Chris had booked us a massage in one of the resorts! Excellent massage it was too and the resort also had a all-you-can-eat sushibuffet for Christmas dinner. I was excited!!! Such a great idea from Chris to take us there.
Unfortunately the buffet was a catastrophe: they had way too little food, way too many guests and the staff was completely overwhelmed. One really had to fight to get a bite of sushi, the plates were empty in no time and the waiters would bring just one small plate at a time. I all the time thought that soon they’ll bring a bigger batch but no...then the sushi just stopped coming and that was it. I’m glad we got some and weren’t left hungry in the end but I have to say it wasn’t too enjoyable :D
We did another trip around the beautiful island of Siargao, first visiting the Magpupunko rock pools where we took a dip in the sea and almost got carried away by the crazy current. We viewed the coast on the way, went all the way North and back. There was one special moment that really stayed with me. We were driving by a dense palm tree forest with a completely mossy green forest floor, the sun was trying get through but it could barely make it down from the canopy. Suddenly in the green lush forest we could see a group of horses herding. I don’t quite know why but somehow horses in a palm tree forest seemed to me so out of place...like putting camels in a Finnish forest somewhere. I know it’s not unusual or anything but we had hardly seen any horses in the Philippines. Maybe that’s why.
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| Rock pools |
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| Current was strong, I tell you. |
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| Beaches |
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| More beaches |
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| Aaand more |
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| more and more... |
One morning we had a great hangboarding session at Cloud 9! We woke up super early, took our breakfast stuff with us and drove to see the sunrise at the boardwalk. We put up the hangboard, did some training and the enjoyed the great brekkie while watching the massive waves roll in. Unfortunately no pro surfers showed up to perform their skills but it was still a fantastic way to start the day.
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| Boardwalk sunrise |
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| So incredibly pretty |
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| Nice waves too |
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| And perfect hanging |
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| Breakfast time! |
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| MMmmmango...yam |
After a week we moved to Pesangan surfcamp because Tiki’s was fully booked for our last days. It was a super nice place too and the best part was the kitchen! Well, it was quite dirty and the rats were not uncommon visitors but we could make our own breakfast eggs and shakes and coffees.
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| Pesangan |
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| Post card business |
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| We've had many creatures at our hostel rooms but this was the first hermit crab |
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| It really really wanted to go in, so we opened the door. Later that day Mr. Hermit decided to leave us and go back to wilderness. |
While waiting for the wind we did a small trip to Sugba lagoon: a beautiful lagoon hidden in the mangrove forests and small islands. Sugba has a big stilt hut built on water and rock and one can rent stand up paddle boards for checking out the surroundings. We did that and some snorkelling too (although it wasn’t extremely interesting). I won’t describe the place too much, let the pics speak for themselves.
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| Mangrove forests close to Sugba |
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| That water... |
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| Sugba!! |
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| SUP |
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| Swim |
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| Snorkel...or just enjoy the water |
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