Carabao seems to exist solely to supply Boracay. Carabao is the island of the serfs. Everything is brought to Boracay. Labour and live cows on bangkas. Mangoes, pineapples, bananas, rice. You can’t even buy fish on this island full of fishermen. What remains here is a big nothing. Nothing is much better than Boracay.
There is hardly anything to eat, but what little there is tastes better. Even if you don’t have a choice: it’s still much freer. Carabao is conspicuously deserted during the day. But after their ten-hour shifts on Boracay, the residents are happy to have visitors. The internet is on its last legs, but the few minutes are put to good use.
David survives his Montezuma. He comes over from Boracay with Miri. Unaware that there is a hotel 50 metres from the jetty, the boatmen first send them on a motorbike to the other side of the island before they find Ivy’s Vine Resort through the small, hidden back entrance. Finally, the right places and the right people come together.
The snorkelling in the underwater desert off Lanas is miserable. So what? The food is good. And what next? The campfire on the beach doesn’t burn properly despite plenty of petrol. So what? The rum is empty. What next? The new king of the island reports extreme enmity. The henchmen of the local earl impose draconian punishments for distributing flyers for Carabao in the kingdom of Boracay. So what? The new king here hurls his unfiltered opinion at me, so I’ll just bring him the guests who should find their way here via the Internet.
I sometimes feel guilty just by offering to create a homepage for a hotel. In the end, I only contribute to making what I think are good places more expensive and more crowded. So I’m riding the same absurdity as Lonely Planet to death. Sometimes I try to talk myself out of it by saying that I’m only contributing to the shift. Then I see the same sea rubbish everywhere on the beach and I know: distribution is not good.
What can be done better? People and places change. Was good, is good, stays good – that’s not the case when travelling. Find your own places!
Frank Woelky, born in 1973. Kitesurfer since 1998. Since 2006, I have been combining kitesurfing and web design on trips lasting several months off the beaten track.