the hike from hell (el nido, palawan)

after leaving bryan in naga, i flew back to the manila airport and met up with pert and his friend wilbert (native of the philippines.  works at accenture with pert.  lived in sea for two years and recently moved back.) before flying out to palawan.  we made our way up to el nido via a six hour car ride and had the afternoon to kill so we thought it'd be fun to hike up to the top of the limestone cliffs since this is what this area is also known for.


the tour agency we had booked a tour with said it would be best if we had paid for a guide because it's easy to get lost going up and down.  we weren't sure if this was a scam or not but thought it was probably better to play it safe.  the hike was only supposed to take an hour and naturally my assortment of footwear only consists of flip flops so the havainas would have to do.  wilbert was also in the same boat.  pert was all prepared with nikes.  we start what i thought was a hike and it very quickly turned into the climb from hell!!


in my head i envisioned some sort of path that we would walk up with switchbacks...you know...similar to the trails at home.  WRONG.  the only way to get to the top of the cliff was to climb on extremely jagged and large limestone rocks the entire way.  not only that but there were so many mosquitoes everywhere.  i coated myself with bug lotion before i left but we were sweating so much i don't know that it made a difference. 


slowly but surely we were making our way up.  i had to look at every single step we took because if you fell, it was going to be 1. extremely painful and 2. a bloody mess.  this was probably one of the stupidest things i've done.  luckily it was dry so the flip flops were slightly helpful since they were rubber...but not so much when you only options were to step on this extremely jagged rock, or that extremely jagged rock.

mid-hike

view from midway

sweaty disgusting mess

our guide felix (see those rocks?!)

we finally made it to the top after about an hour and it was awesome!  the view was fantastic and we enjoyed it for about oh...3 minutes before it started absolutely POURING.  so in my head i'm cursing a lot, and a little out loud because not only am i just wearing stupid rubber flip flops, but the rock is now getting wet therefore everything will be slippery, and my feet are starting to slide in the flip flops.  great combo for going back down and trying to not fall to my bloody death. we all know that going up is way easier than going down. 

view from the top!

about another hour or so more later we finally make it down despite the weather conditions.  luckily no one fell or got hurt.  i slipped and landed on some mud but that was it.  our guide, felix has taken lots of naive tourists up this trek as well and said that he's had people cry this journey...no tears from me though!  just relief when we finally made it back!  no more hiking attempts in the flip flops...

yea...i climbed that