El Nido continued (Dagmay beach) 2/20/13- 2/23/13

While walking around El Nido we found a place, called Verde Safari, which had information about a beach 45 mins north of El Nido, off the beaten path.  It included an in town pick up with round trip transportation, tents on the beach, and a hot breakfast.  This sounded excellent to us.  The property turned out to be run by an American ex-pat, Doug, from Arizona.  He picked us up in town and we had a chance to chat with him on the drive out.  He had his house with common area on the bottom, a nice back porch, a couple of nice rooms to rent out back, and a few tents for cheap backpackers like us.  He was only a month in getting things under way, but we thought he had a gem of a place.  It was great to get away from the noise of El Nido and out to a beach that was so quiet and empty.  

Dagmay beach

View of Doug's place from the beach

Doug's place

View from the patio area

Our beachfront tent

View from our tent window ;-)

Doug's cute dogs- Dinky and Pepper

Not only was there a secluded beach with no other buildings on it, and perhaps 4 tourists staying the night at a time (a number of people came out for the day and made a lunch stop at his place while riding motorbikes out to some of the nearby waterfalls and beaches), but there was also plenty of activities:  football, frisbee, body surfing, skim boarding, volleyball, and a rock climbing wall with all the proper gear (our FAVORITE).  Doug had a portable rock wall back home so he showed us the basics and taught Matt how to belay so we could do it as much as we wanted during the day.  Plus hammocks for taking a nap, books/ magazines to read, and plenty of time so stroll up and down the beach.  In addition to all of that, the food was delicious.  He had a garden out back where he was growing vegetables and watermelons among other things.  Watermelon with every meal and fresh green veggies = happy campers :-).

Matt giving it a go

Cheese

Kristin's turn

Matt perfecting his skim boarding

The cook grilling up the tuna for our dinner

Kristin loved being able to walk up and down the beach in peace and quiet.  The only people she saw along the way were the locals from the fishing village.  The kids were so curious at seeing us because they don't see many foreigners in their village, and Doug's place is still fairly new.  The locals she saw on her walks were so funny because they really wanted their picture taken!  They spoke very little English, but enough to say, "Take my picture" and then they'd pose.  The man took his shirt off and said, "show people in America" ;-).  She had to oblige.

Empty beach

Villager's fishing boats

Typical Filipino boat, aka- banka

Peaceful setting

Peaceful setting again

Local kids posing :-)

Man posing for his picture

We really enjoyed our two nights out at Doug's place.  It was great getting to relax in such a serene setting while getting to know Doug and the other travelers.  Plus, we loved all the activities at our disposal.

Thanks Doug!

We left Doug's place and headed back to El Nido to catch a bus to Puerto Princesa where we stayed the night before catching our flight onward to Bangkok the next afternoon.  We were sad to have to say bye to the Philippines.