ZAMBALES ISLAND HOPPING

Last year in celebration of the new year's, we went to Katungkulan Beach in Ternate and to Tagaytay after. For this year's first travel, we went to the beautiful province of Zambales. We've been planning to go to Masasa Beach in Batangas before we finally ended up choosing Nagsasa. Actually, it was all just planning. Never really intended to go, but we wanted to push it so we went. And boy, it was a very beautiful island. Islands, I mean. We went island hopping on 3 islands. We arrived at San Antonio, Zambales at 3 in the morning, (yep, it was too early lol) we were supposed to arrive at 5 in the morning but my grandfather, who we didn't expect would come with us, insisted we go ahead so we departed home at 11 in the evening and there was no traffic so yeah. haha

When we arrived at San Antonio, I got some more sleep in the car and they went and ate an early breakfast at 7-11 while waiting for our tour guide/tour operator. They were supposed to pick us up at 5 AM. Upon arriving at Pundaquit, we parked our van, changed to swimming clothes and off we went to the islands. 

First Island: Capones Island

Okay, I may be a little bias here because I took a lot of pictures in Capones Island. It was the first island we hopped into and the sun was rising and it was deserted. It was really a good idea to start the day on early weekend. And I don't know, this island really just took my breath away. I only used a digital camera on my of my photos so it probably didn't do this place any justice.

Second Island: Anawagin Cove

Anawangin was the my least favorite of the three islands. Don't get me wrong, it's beautiful there, too, but it gets crowded on weekends, especially in summer. I didn't really feel the ambience of it. And I'm not a fan of beaches/islands that get crowded because it doesn't really feel peaceful/relaxing anymore :(

Third Island and where we stayed at for 2 nights: Nagsasa Cove

Pictures above: Tent we used, Nipa Hut (though not very visible), ihawan (which we used for cooking our own food) P.S. Don't worry, we threw away the garbage before leaving :) 

When we arrived after the island hopping, (it was still early), we prepared our food and ate brunch. Rested for a few hours until it was time to swim in the beach until sunset. We didn't have lots of pictures swimming, because we were enjoying it. And come night time after dinner, we set a bonfire! We had s'mores and chill music, of course. You're probably wondering where the music was coming from? Well, there was no electricity in the island but a group arrived earlier that afternoon and they brought a guitar and they were singing all night! They're good singers. And also, my grandfather brought his bluetooth speaker so we played some music, too. 

The next day, adventure begins. 

We started the day early so we can hike up the mountain that has the view of the cove and go cliff diving. 

The trek going up was easy but still I felt like I was gonna die or something. LOL probably because I don't have enough exercise. Haha but the view from up there IS SOOOOO WORTH IT

Oh yeah, dab it LOL

Of course, a selfie lol

and a little pictorial when we went down

After, we went to rest for a few minutes then we're on way to cliff dive. Upon arriving there, our bankeros told us they couldn't anchor the boat near the cliff because there many rocks. So we had to swim to get there. It was only a few meters from our boat anyway so it was okay. When we got there, it was hard for us to climb up the rocks because there were a lot of seashells that got stuck to it so I ended up wounded. 

It was a great experience, you know, watching my family cliff dive. LOL I couldn't do it because I was too scared. Maybe next time, i'll try. 

So this was the hard part, going back up in the boat. Don't get me wrong there was a little bridge for you to climb up on but I couldn't reach it so instead I climbed up using the I don't know what it's called but it's beside the boat and boy was it hard. LOL the struggle was real. But don't worry, I survived. There was a lot of laughter from my family though. 

Back to our tents, we ate lunch and waited for our boat to come pick us up. but my grandfather insisted we stay another night so we did. I guess he enjoyed staying there and there was lot of people compared to our first night. He liked it when many people arrived there the next day. So we just stayed, shared stories, teased my cousin (because he didn't cliff dive, we waited for a few minutes for him to jump but he didn't lol). My cousins and I went to watch the sunset together and nag-kwentuhan lang about life while waiting for dinner.

This is one of the many experiences I will never forget. Kwentuhan with family just gives me a lot more affection for them. And you discover a lot about them that you'd thought you wouldn't know forever. Haha I love it when I spend time with them especially at times like these. We also wished that we could go back to Zambales with our other family who couldn't go with us at the time. I bet they'll enjoy it there, too.