Lunch with the Gov

Today we got up early to go to Apo island for some snorkelling, but the weather didn't look too great so we changed our plan and went to Twin Lakes national park...a rather sketchy ride on the back of a motorcycle and then steep hike. The scenery was quite stunning up in the mountains of Negros. The road was treacherous and full of landslides. Apparently a few weeks ago they had buckets of rain and caused lots of the landslides making the road impassible. We got to the first lake which was gorgeous set amid misty mountains. We wanted to hike to the next lake, but the trail went along the first lake's shore and with all the rain the water levels were 15 feet higher than normal. It was quite funny to see the picnic cabanas completely submerged in water. They were having an inaugural lunch for a new tourist facility at the lake so there was apparently a bunch of big wigs up there. We were just chatting to a few people up there when I noticed one of the guys was wearing a boehringer ingelheim hat. BI is a huge biotech company that has facilities around the globe including connecticut and germany where I had visited when I worked for Sapidyne. The guy wearing the hat used to be the president of the site in the Philippines and in Indonesia, and has since retired to the PI. After chatting, Lucas, Sari, and I went to sit by the lake and eat mangos and let the little fish clean our feet. It started to pour, so we went under the cabana in the new tourist place. The guy, Michael, from BI and his wife invited us to ride back down the muddy road in their 4WD, which would be much safer than on the motorcycle and of course drier. We accepted and they took us to their AMAZING house. It had a gorgeous view of the ocean, immaculately landscaped yard full of flowers and fruit trees, a couple pools, huge outdoor dining area and more. They had security officers and maids and everything. It was quite incredible. They had us (in our sweaty, dirty, smelly clothes) sit down for coffee and fancy treats as we waited for the Mayor of sibuyan and the governor of the province of Negros to come for some food and coffee. So we got to eat and chat with the governor and the mayor. They were quite funny and liked to make jokes about how corrupt politicians are in the PI. After that they gave us a ride back into dumaguette.

We finished out the afternoon visiting the siliman university marine laboratory that has giant clam, grouper, and philippine crocodile breeding programs. We then watched Marley and Me in a theatre (aircon!) and finished out the night having a mango and mangosteen party.

Still have not found any sandals my size and my keens are starting to fall apart. Luckily they have cheap and hopefully good shoe repairmen here. I got my keens stitched back up for 30 cents today so hopefully they'll hold until I can find some sandals built for giant's feet.