I set my alarm for 6:30am so we could try and see the sardines. Maolboal is famous for the sardine run, an opportunity just off shore for snorkelers to swim with literally hundreds of thousands of sardines in a shimmering silver cloud. From what I understand, the sardines used to school around the nearby island, but a huge typhoon a few years back changed the sardines’ location and the general landscape of the area. Apparently the best time to swim with the sardines is between 6-8am. 

We walked down the beach to the dock area (maybe 5 minutes) and got in the water at the boat ramp. We swam out to the coral wall (where the drop off is) maybe 15metres out and immediately began seeing sardines. I knew there were a lot of sardines, but this was A LOT! We swam around the clouds of silvery sardines for a little while until Jives’ mask broke (I fixed it later with a bobbie pin).There were quite a few other tourists there, out swimming with the sardines, but there were so many clouds of fish, it seemed easy enough to swim in your own space. 

We then headed back to the room and showered and had an instant coffee on the porch, before heading to the hotel restaurant to order breakfast. I got the Philippines breakfast; rice, egg and a fried fish (milk fish) with cucumber and tomato. Jives ordered a club sandwich and we both got coffee. The servers seemed so friendly there, singing along to music and teasing one another. 

We then went for a walk into “town” or the main road to try and find a place selling instant coffee. The walk into town was full of roosters and doggos, as expected, taking about 15 minutes. We found a little booth and bought eight coffee packets from a lady for 80 pesos. We then walked back to the room and went for a swim. (Along the way we found Jives a bottle opener shaped like a red horse bottle). We also picked up some canned beers for later. The lady at the store counter was belting out Celine Dion songs, and I asked her if she liked Celine Dion and she said “no, I LOVE Celine Dion”.

We then went for another swim and I finally saw a sea turtle! The snorkeling right in front of our hotel is excellent! 

Later we walked back into town to find a place to have a happy hour beverage. We walked all the way to the water front and had a gin and tonic at seats right on the water. The breeze was perfect and it was such a lovely location that we had two gin and tonics. We then found a place to eat lunch (at about 3pm). Jives got a sausilog which I guess is traditional but also basically a sausage and rice. I got a delicious mixed veggie curry and we ordered one mojito each. The total came to 800 pesos, not too bad (about $20 Cad each). We then headed back to our place to snorkel again. We were feeling pretty great after our awesome relaxing day… and then we got stung by jellyfish.

We were swimming out by the coral wall when it felt like my arms had been hit by an electrical current. I thought I must be crazy, but then the pain got worse and worse on my right arm and my stomach. Then Jives started yelling and I knew I wasn’t the only one experiencing the pain. We swarm back to shore. There wasn’t much to see, but then Jives started developing what looked like slash marks up and down his arm and my arm started developing many bubbling blisters. We showered (our shower was salt water) and it helped the stinging a bit, but it took a few hours for the blistering feeling to dissipate, and a day to stop being super tender and sore. Although, as I write this two days later, my arm is still red and covered in blisters, but not in any real pain currently. 

After the pain had lessened we headed to the hotel restaurant to have dinner. We shared a margarita pizza and had a gin and tonic. Two Americans were seated behind us and were talking about divorce. The waitress told the one American that her friend and co worker thought he was cute and they both giggled. As the American’s left they said “thank you” and the one waitress exclaimed “I love you!” Everyone in the restaurant thought this was hilarious and the waitress was immediately embarrassed.

We then sat on our porch for a bit before heading to sleep.