Today was an action packed day, with injury and regret.
WARNING: If you’re sensitive to a bit of blood/cuts, you probably shouldn’t read this post.
So today we had planned a kayaking trip. We were supposed to have a van come pick us up at 8 am to take us to the boat for kayaking. The day basically would go like this:
- Go to monkey island, do a bit of hiking(see some monkeys)
- Go to a place to kayak, do some kayaking
- Have lunch
- Go to a place for swimming, then go home
We started a day a little rushed because I spent all morning writing a blog from the previous day. This stuff takes a lot longer then I’d expect; it usually takes me an hour to write everything down from the previous day. And even then, stuff is pretty “raw”.
Anyways, we were able to order some banh my just in time before our ride came. They picked us up, we got on the boat, yadda yadda yada, boring logistics.
The trip itself also started out strong with some beers at 8 am. Here’s Sean double fisting:
Once we got to monkey island we did a bit of hiking. Here are some pics from it:
That beach on the left is where we started, just before the house.
START OF INTROSPECTIVE RANT
Remember those girls from the previous day that we met while climbing? The California ones’ from around Shasta? Well I ended up running into them at the top of the hike. We chatted a bit, I found out they were staying at the Full Moon Party Hostel for $2 a night in a dorm room. I asked them if they were climbing again and they said that renting the rope was a bit expensive($10), and there weren’t a lot of climbs they could do(which is true for us as well; a lot of shit is 10d+ or harder). Then I told them we were staying in this “fancy” place with a sea view on the 9th floor and that it was super cool. I don’t quite remember the phrasing, but they said something along the lines of “is that an invitation?”. I laughed it off, we chatted a bit more, and I said we’d probably see them around. Then I left to go to hike back down because I didn’t want to miss the boat.
Once I was back on the beach, I saw them again. Or at least I think I saw them again. I’m fucking god-awful with faces; even though I had just talked to them, I wasn’t 100% sure what they looked like, so I didn’t want to go approach some random people that looked like them from far away and start chatting them up just to realize I had the wrong people.
Anyways, I regret not asking for their contact info so we could meet up later and have drinks or something with them. It seemed like they were open to the idea, but I was being kind of closed-off to them and sort of shooting them down. It could have been really fun to hang out with them, seeing as they also climbed and were California, near SF. And were girls of course and pretty cute.
Maybe I was reading into it too much, maybe they would have turned down the offer. I also don’t like “hanging out” with people I meet while travelling if they’re not into it. A lot of times people will hang out with you just to be polite(especially if you’re a solo traveler). It really bothers me because then I can’t tell if someone genuinely enjoys my company, or just being polite. In this case, even if we exchange contact information, it might just be because they were being polite. But then again, they initiated the conversation with me at the hike, so maybe they did want to chat?
I also have this weird problem where I suck at socializing, so anyone that I DO end up socializing with I do it to the point where they get annoyed/irritated with me.
But alas, I’m thinking too much into it. The moral is just take more social risks, and talk to people more.
END OF INTROSPECTIVE RANT
Once I got down to the bottom of the island, we took a couple pictures of the monkeys. I even got a picture of a monkey drinking a beer, and another picture of the monkey holding my finger! The quality on the second picture isn’t that great because it was on Sean’s older phone:
Here’s two monkeys making out or something:
Sean and I hanging out on the beach, waiting for our boat:
Here’s me being a goof on the boat ride:
We also saw some fishing villages earlier on the boat ride. They’re basically houses and everything you’d see in a village, except they’re on the water. Here’s a pic:
Here’s a video of the fishing village:
Anyways, once we got to the kayaking place we went exploring. Here’s a pic:
I really liked the rock formation on this spire, the way the diagonal lines cut through the rock:
Here’s a cool pillar we saw on our way in that would be so cool to climb:
The kayaing was really fun. There were tons of little tunnels that we went through(I’ll upload a video of one once I get can get my gopro footage working). There were a lot of spires/walls that you could “talk to”, and your echo would talk back to you 1-2 seconds later. It was really fun.
This is also when the injury happened.
So at one point I saw an outcropping that would be cool to take a picture on. I asked Sean to row me up close to the rock, I’d get out of the kayak and jump on the rock, climb up to the top, and Sean would take a picture of me. Note that I was not wearing any shoes, because the tour guide told us to take them off before we got in the Kayak(probably because he was afraid they’d get wet; but I was wearing flip-flops anyways). But I took them off. So when I went to climb this outcropping, I was barefoot.
When I first hopped out of the boat, the rock was super slippery, so I instantly slipped and almost fell into the water. I caught myself, but I’m pretty sure I stepped on some really bad stuff. Then I slowly proceeded to climb up the piller. This was the SHARPEST rock I had ever felt in my life. So sharp you couldn’t stand. It was basically like standing on coral, but much much worse.
I got to the top and Sean snapped this picture:
You can barely make me out in my gray-outfit(groutfit) against the gray background.
In the process, I really cut up my foot. I think when I fell in the water it happened. Here’s a picture of the aftermath just after:
I had created a bunch of lacerations on my foot, the worst one on my toe.
You can see in a bit more detail here:
I cut up two toes, a gash on the outside of my foot, and a couple of gashes elsewhere. Luckily because I have such thick callouses most of the lacerations didn’t bleed. Yayyyyy
Anyways, I cleaned it up, got all the rocks out of the cuts(thanks to Sean for having a SIM card remover that acted as a tweezer!), and I think I’ll be just fine for climbing tomorrow.
The rest of the kayaking was uneventful(comparatively). We found a secret tunnel that went to another cove, but the cove was filled with a bunch of bro-y australians. I’m pretty sure I heard something along the lines of”Hey all, I know we’re all in our 2o’s, and I’m glad you’re all here”. “Actually I’m only 18!”.
We paddled out of there as quickly as possible.
Next we ate lunch. I talked to a cool German family, we also met some cool folks that are from Mexico and were studying abroad in Seoul. They told us some cool tales from visiting the DMZ in North/South Korea. I definitely want to go there at some point.
Next up was swimming. The water was really cold, and after saying I wasn’t going to go in for 30 minutes I finally relented. I jumped of the top of the boat a couple times(which was fun!). I’ll upload those videos later…
After that the boat trip was over and nothing else noteworthy happened.
Later on that evening we decided to go to the Full Moon Hostel and see if we could book our Junk Boat. Most Junk Boats were booked up at this point, seeing how it was just about NYE. However, as soon as we walked in, the manager of the place saw us, and motioned us towards a little “travel-agency” desk. This was the same manager that we bought the Santa Hats from a few days before.
We talked to the guy there(I think his name was Micheal). We told him we wanted a party boat for NYE, and after making a BUNCH of calls, he landed us a room in the 2nd-most expensive boat(the most expensive one was already booked). We also mentioned we wanted to go to Sappa, so he booked that for us as well. It’s quite an action-packed itinerary, as we’ll be sleeping on buses and getting back to hotels around 4am. But it’ll be fun.
I think both Sean and I are relieved that we were able to book both the Sappa trip and the Junk boat. We were both a little worried we wouldn’t be able to find anything.
I would like to say that booking these two things was a MUCH more pleasent experience doing it through a person. If we had tried to book it on our own, we might not have gotten a boat with the right “vibe” that we were looking for, or been able to link up or boat tour and our sappa tour so nicely. But because we’re talking to a human and not a search bar, he understands these things, such as “vibes” and logistics. So he was able to create a great itinerary for us.
I’ll have to book stuff in person more often.
I’d also like to note that both Sean and I are getting a bit sick of the island. We’ve been here 4 days now, and I think it’s wearing on both of us. The day activities are fun(climbing, kayaking, driving around), but the going out to drink every night is getting tiresome. We’ll be climbing for two more days, and then moving onto our next destination. And having that destination booked makes us both a bit more relaxed.
One more note to close it out on: I had some pho today, and this time, it was delicious:
Time to sleep. Tomorrow we’re going back to the crag(Butterfly valley), and we’re going to do some more climbing(foot and weather permitting).