Day 3 of Amazing Busuanga

We started the day early. At 630am we scaled the 700 plus steps to Mt. Tapyas (Tapyas literally means carved - so its called the Carved Mountain). The view is breathtaking! Mt. Tapyas has a giant lighted Cross on its peak, serving both as beacon for boatmen at night time as well as one of major tourist destinations of the municipality. It was a big pain scaling those 700 plus steps! I tried counting but i lost count trying to catch my breath. At the top, Mt.Tapyas offers an awe-inspiring panoramic 180 degree view of the Busuanga islands. The scenic nature view is so fantastic that you would want to make a realist mural painting of it and put it up in some lobby of a hotel.

After a 15 minute break at the top panting for air and forcing smiles for memoir photos of Busuanga in between breaths, we went down the 700 steps thankful to a vendor who was selling bottled water at the 350th step. I guess he knows when the real thirst kicks in for tourists who scale Mt.Tapyas.

Upon reaching Coron Village Lodge, Dexter, our tour guide has packed our breakfast meals and raring to go. Finally, we are going to Malcapuya Island.

It was a 1.5 hours boat ride and this time we used a bigger motorboat so we can move swifter across the hypnotic waves of the Palawan seas. It was a fun ride, and Malcapuya is one of the farther islands from the Coron town proper and it is really an effort to reach it.

Dexter did not disappoint us. Malcapuya is truly an awesome island! Fine white sands! Well not truly close to the Boracay white and fine sands, but the place in its pristine state provides a most appealing factor.

What was more amazing is the Giant Clam show treat underwater. Just a few meters away from the shore, you can snorkel and experience an upclose visual treat of live Giant Clams.

The tour guide was explaining that the Giant Clams are protected by the local authorities because they are decades old and will be worth more money as a tourist attraction than for eating :-). Indeed, he was right, the Giant Clams were very nice to look at and my wife and I can literally stay afloat for minutes in snorkels gawking at them intermittently moving like giants' mouths.

Towards the afternoon, my wife and I walked around the beach area and we saw uniquely formed sand and rock formations. They were very nice, and at that instant you wonder how they even got formed that way.

Both were amazing creations, but while the first is quickly created and destroyed by the daily high and low water ebbing tides, the latter took few scores to form into its unique forms.

As we left, Malcapuya Island I knew in my heart that i will not probably see the place in a long time, hoping that somehow when and if I do again and when the kids have grown up, Malcapuya, and the entirety of the Busuanga Islands remain as pristine as it is yet today.

We celebrated our new discoveries that night as my wife, my sisters-in-law, Aileen and Au, who happens to celebrate her birthday that day (June 3) as well, and my brother-in-law Gerry, gather around with San Mig Light to quench our thirst...thankful as well that Mama insisted that we take the time out as a family as her birthday gift, else we would not have seen a beautiful place like Busuanga (http://wikitravel.org/en/Busuanga).

A few more days, it will be back to reality...