Road Trip: Lanuza (Part 2)

When we arrived in Lanuza a little after noon, several things struck me as odd.  First was that we had been cruising at a reasonable speed along the highway and had to stop suddenly because it appeared we had just entered a subdivision.  We were about to backtrack when Joey turned the van onto a road that led to the ocean, which was only meters away from where we were.  Of course, Joey got out immediately to check out the waves and we (Ed, Chi-Chi and I) got out to take pictures.  My brother then communicated with his friend, who was the Mayor of the town, and we were instructed to go to a certain house.  When we got there, I got my second and third surprises.  One, the mayor was a young man (I guess my image of "mayor" is a tad old-fashioned, that he/she must be older) and two, the house he was directing us to was to be our 'hotel' or homestay.

What is a homestay?  Instead of looking for capital and constructing new buildings, the local government unit decided to convert their old houses into vacation homes, much like in the US.  They are actually fully-furnished houses whose occupants find the space too big for their own use, so they let out rooms to travelers, or surfers, in this case.  How much is the rent?  Oh, just the minimal fee of P200/head/night.  It's a municipal ordinance; we were impressed.  The house we were given was owned by the mayor's aunt.  So we chose our rooms, brought in our bags and settled in... at least the rest of us did.  Joey disappeared immediately.  Hehe, well, it was to be expected.  After all, we did come to this far place because he wanted to chase some waves.

Anyway, later in the afternoon, when the sun wasn't too hot, Ed and I decided to explore.  The town proper wasn't very big and you could walk right around it in just a few minutes.  There was a small plaza, with a basketball court and the municipal hall, a small market and an eatery right next to it.  Then I got my fourth surprise.  The main highway tapered to a narrow two-lane road and appeared to end just a couple of blocks from our homestay.  When we walked over to the corner, the road turned to the right and widened again as it flowed on out of the town.

All in all, it is a quaint place to be.  Everybody knows everybody, even the bus drivers and jeepney drivers.  Everyone had a smile even for visitors like us.  It was pleasant to see a family set up a banana cue stand just around the corner from our homestay and as the afternoon became evening, all their bananas were bought by none other than their neighbors.  We ate dinner at the small eatery.  At around 6:48 pm, there was an earthquake.  The ground shook, the eatery shook and we could hear the stones from the beach shaking.  We were looking for something sturdy to hide under, yet, the people sitting at the next table didn't even react.  So we asked them if earthquakes were a common occurrence...  They said yes.  Okay, no worries.