squishNjohn

Going through the security footage of the burglary that happened whilst I was still ibn Manila and found this . . . . . . It's footage of Max and Rory's reaction when I got home Wednesday Morning - a hero's Welcome Dogs are simply the best https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzTJqCone_M... read more

Just some pics i thought were interesting - apologies if there's some repeats in here... read more

This blog will be out of sequence. "Here I sit lonely hearted . . . . . ." to coin a childhood poem. 7,000 km from anyone I know with 6 people who can hardly string a complete sentence together in English between them. (all but one have disappeared on their daily routines anyway). There's no (reliable) internet, 1 viewable TV channel and that's in TAGALOG, it's raining so I can't go outside and one of the dogs has just walked into the bedroom and pissed on my sandals. This "holiday" has hit a new low point. Might go and pay that penny now . . . . . . Later in the day, I went to Sonya's Secret Pleasures at Sonya's Garden and had a Hot Stone Massage. . . . They heat some largeish ... read more

So it's Sunday morning and pretty much everything in the city is shut (except for the bars of course), so we head back to the airport to the Philippine Airlines (PAL) office to re-ticket. The guy behind the counter seems pleasant enough and asks how my day is (it's JUST after 9:00am). I tell him and explain why and he says "Well let's see if we can do anything to change that for you." It's at THIS point that the pleasantries cease and the sniveling little sycophant does absolutely nothing except stick to the rule book showing NO willingness whatsoever to budge one iota. His first solution was going to cost an additional AUD2,500 in air fares and airline penalties alone. it was until Squish started questioning and negotiating in Tagalog that we found there were ... read more

The day after Pagsanjan falls I'm told were going to have lunch under another waterfall and that I'll get wet like yesterday so i should take a change of clothes again. We all pile into the car and head off; destination Villa Escudero. Villa Escudero was one of the original Spanish plantations in the area and was founded back in the 1800's. Back then the main crop was sugarcane, but this was replaced with coconut plantations in the early 1900's. The estate has remained in the hands of the family and was opened up to the public in the 1980's. Hope I've got the dates approx correct, but I'm sure someone will be more than happy to correct me if they read this and disagree - leave your comments if you do. There's probably 4 main ... read more