Family day in Canmore with friends

For family day we took Lyndon out to Canmore for the day with friends.  He traveled well sleeping most of the ride out. On the way home we had to make an emergency roadside stop for a diaper change and feeding. It was nice to get out of town for the day and enjoy a day in the mountains.

 

Lyndon

It's been over a year since we have made any posts on this blog. The birth of our first son has created the desire to start trying to blog again. Lyndon was born on December 22 2011 at 3:35am. He was just under 8lbs and 21in long. Lyndon came to us earlier than expected. Although we knew in our minds he could come any day we had expected him after Christmas. This has allowed us to enjoy Christmas with our new baby and spend less time preparing for him to come. This has been a nice change after a hectic December trying to get our house ready for the baby. Our baby came when he was ready and hasn't made any complaints about the unfinished laundry room yet.

Were home

We are back in Calgary after a long flight. The weather is good, giving us a chance to adjust. We both woke up in the middle of the night last night and felt like it should be day time but eventually managed to get back to sleep, and we feel good this morning.

Heading Home

After an enjoyable stay with the Hansen-Langes, our trip is just about finished; the only remaining task on our end is to make it to the Hong Kong airport. We have really enjoyed our trip and the chance to step back from our ordinary lives and think about what is important to us while we are not in the middle of day to day life. Even though we have enjoyed not having a strict routine, I think it will be nice to get back into the regular swing of things. However, getting to the point of having things set up again may be a challenge. I'm sure we will manage doing the reverse of all we did when we prepared to leave last year, and we will soon be settled back into life in Calgary.

Lazy in Hong Kong

We have spent the last week loafing around in Hong Kong. We also visited Hong Kong (and Debbi and Dave) at the beginning of our trip in November. Last November we went to see many of the tourist sites. We don't really feel like we need to go see them again, so we have spent a lot of time warming up Dave and Debbi's couch, eating great food, and cuddling Jasper (who is definitely one of the cutest babies in the whole world). Debbi must have decided that things were getting too boring because last week she threw herself down a flight of stairs and sprained a foot, so she could take us on a tour of the Hong Kong emergency room. Debbi is OK, but she can still occasionally be sighted hobbling down the streets of Hong Kong with a very stylish cane.

It is very strange to think that we return to Calgary in only a few days. I face our return with mixed feelings that I did not expect. Of course I am excited to see our friends and family in person instead of only over skype. I look forward to coffee dates and long chats to catch up with everyone. My biggest regret about our ten month long trip is how much I have missed at home. So much has happened in all of your lives and I wish that I could have been there. I have been surprised how terrifying it feels to come back home. So many things will change all at once. We both need to find jobs, we need to figure out what part of the city we want to live in then sell our condo and move there, we need to find a new church to become a part of. These choices are intimidating. Our decisions will likely be longer lasting than was our decision to travel. But the very scariest thing of all about going home is the weather. We will be leaving a year of lovely hot weather to return to the beginning of the long, cold, Canadian winter. I'm not sure why we planned things that way.

Back in Hong Kong

Blogging has become more difficult lately. Perhaps we are trying to not spend the last of our time in internet shops or maybe there is less to report. Anyway, we have arrived back in Hong Kong. It is nice to be back in a familar place with people we know and where transport is easy to figure out. It is much less intimidating to figure out the transit second time around. We are looking forward to spending our week here before heading back to Canada.

Delicious

We have not blogged in a while because we were busy lazing around in the sun on Tioman Island. We spent nearly two weeks on the island because we did not want to be trying to travel during the Hari Raya celebrations at the end of Ramadan. Hari Raya is a big deal here. It is as big as Christmas at home. Many people travel to spend the holiday with their families. It was ironic because so many businesses were closed on the island on the tenth and eleventh of September that, while the Muslim locals were eating goodies to celebrate the end of their fast, the tourists were on an accidental fast if they were not lucky enough to find an open convenience store where they could buy some cookies for lunch. We fared alright because we asked around about what would be open when and we stocked up on snacks beforehand.

There is not a lot to do on Tioman Island except sleep in late, read books on the deck by our room or under a shady tree by the beach, and swim or snorkel in the beautifully warm ocean with the bright coloured fish and coral. A few days ago we hiked through the rainforest to the other side of the island so we could relax on that beach instead. On our walk back two days later we saw giant monitor lizards (these ugly critters are all over the island), a bunch of cute little monkeys, two long narrow snakes with bright green bellies, and around 4.5 million mosquitoes.

Yesterday we crossed the Malaysian peninsula and now we are in Melaka. We did not have a good first impression. Our bus ran very late so we did not get into town until around midnight. When we got to the hotel where we had reserved a room, we found the door locked and no one answering the doorbell or telephone. We were in a strange town after midnight and we had to find a new place to stay. Luckily everything turned out OK, and we are staying at a place just down the street from where we originally planed to stay.

Today after sleeping in very late we decided to head over to Chinatown to have a look around. We had a lot of fun. There were lots of things to see and yummy things to eat. We browsed around some really nice shops. Finally we were tired and hungry, so we looked in our guidebook and saw that there was a restaurant nearby called Capitol Satay. When we got there we found a cue that went out the door and down the street. We thought it must be good if this many locals were waiting to get in and we decided we would get into the line and see how fast in was moving. It was not moving very fast. The friendly family behind us in line assured us that it was really good food and we should not leave Melaka without trying the satay, so we stuck it out.

Wow! It was worth the wait. We were directed to a buffet set up where we chose skewers of raw chicken, seafood, vegetables, tofu, and deep fried bread. When we got back to our table they brought cubed bread and cucumbers and placed a giant pot of satay sauce on a burner embedded in the center of the table. Satay fondue. I don't know what genius first thought this one up, but I think I love them. It was one of the most delicious meals of my life. Seriously. I think this rates right up there with European chocolate on my list of things I like to eat.

Indonesian Music

During our stay in Indonesia we really enjoyed the music scene. Most nights as we ate dinner there would be buskers who would come around play a song or two while we ate. It didn't seem to matter if we ate a food stall or restaurant it would usually include live music at some point.The busking is a little different than at home. The musician plays a song and then goes around to collect money. If the musician is good they usually finish the song and then collect from most people. If they are less than desirable someone usually pays them a lesser amount to go before they finish. Some of the bands busking can get very large. I remember one band had eight people including a poor guy who drew the short straw and had to carry around the double bass. On the ship we took from Kalimantan to Java we they had a band that played during our lunch. The second day the crew decided to join in on the singing and we were treated to a couple songs by the chief engineer. There is a mix of Indonesian music and old music from the west like guns and roses for example. Like in other countries Indonesia has one song that almost everybody knows and we can instantly recognize due to it's high usage. A few times I have heard shop keeps singing this song as we go through their store. Fun.

Flores

Dave and I decided that we would really like to visit the island Flores while we were in Indonesia. To get there we did a three day long bus and ferry marathon. We arrived in the town Labuanbajo tired, achy, and grumpy. We had a busy evening to arrange our flight out of Flores in time to leave the country before our visas expired, and to book bus tickets for the following morning so we could go to central Flores.

In the morning we left at six am on the regular bus to Bajawa. The bus ride takes an incredible twelve hours to cover 250 kilometers. When we got on the bus we were dismayed to find that the whole floor was covered in giant sacks of onions. We had to walk on the onions to get to our seats. The whole bus smelled of onions. We drove around town until there was no possible way to cram another person or article of luggage onto the bus then we hit the Trans-Flores Highway. This must be one of the most beautiful highways in the world. It twists and turns through lush forest, coffee, banana, and coconut plantations, and past occasional stunning vistas of the ocean and nearby islands. All along the highway we stopped to pick up more and more people and somehow they fit on the bus. Not far from Labuanbajo passengers on the bus began vomiting. Many people were vomiting. They vomited for the whole trip. I was glad that all I could smell was the many bags of onions. People in Indonesia don't seem to need pee breaks. We only stopped once on the whole trip. When we were finally getting to be within a few hours of our destination, we came upon a section of road that was under construction and was very slippery. After a very long wait and much animated conversation that we could not understand, our bus finally managed to inch around the construction, and we expected to be back on the road. Instead the bus pulled over again. Once again there was a lot of loud, excited conversation that we did not understand. Eventually the bus started to go again, but not all of the passengers were on it. We did not know why but were glad to get moving. As we rounded the next corner we came to the scariest moment of this trip, possibly of my life, when the bus came very close to careening off the muddy road and down a cliff. Luckily we did not. Once again the bus pulled over. The few passengers who had realised the danger in advance re-boarded the bus, and we continued on to Bajawa. I have never been so happy to get off a bus. I was not looking forward to our return trip.

In Bajawa we joined a tour to visit some of the nearby traditional villages. We both really enjoyed our tour. We learned a few things about the local people. Some of the ladies in the villages were making beautiful fabric on manual back strap looms. We also saw some of the amazing things that grow in this part of the world. At the end of the day we went to a natural hot spring to sit at the waterfall where the hot and cold rivers mix and make it a lovely temperature for bathing.

The next day we took another local bus to go to Riung. This trip was much less exciting than the last. The people on the bus were enjoyable to spend time with even though they spoke very little English. They enjoyed looking at the pictures we had taken lately. I took their picture and they took mine. As more and more people boarded the bus we tried to help people to fit in comfortably near us. There were two other tourists on the same bus as us. Even though we do not speak Indonesian we could tell that this Dutch couple (who had been part of our tour group the day before) was not very well liked on the bus. They complained about how long it took to leave town and how many people were squeezing onto the bus. The last straw with the others on the bus came when the couple refused to let someone sit in the isle beside them. Someone always sits there. A man had to stand for the entire six hour bus ride as a result. The people around us began muttering angrily (they politely included us in their conversation by saying "very bad" and pointing at the offending couple). Seriously, if you don't like how anything is done in a certain part of the world, you should probably just travel somewhere else instead of making a jerk out of yourself. Sometimes tourists can be very offensive. I hope that we are not often similarly inappropriate without realising it.

Riung turned out to be a very small town. Really the only touristy thing to do was to hire a boat and go snorkeling by the 21 islands of nearby Seventeen Islands Park. In Riung we began asking around about the options for getting back to Labuanbajo. We were hoping to find a way to avoid a sixteen hour bus ride of doom. The only other option that we found was a boatman who would take us to Labuanbajo for 2 million rupiah. That's a lot of money. In comparison, the bus would cost us between 100 000 and 200 000 each. We talked about it that night and decided that if we could barter the price down to 1 300 000 or less we would go by boat because the trip would be several hours shorter and we really wanted to avoid the bus. The next day the boatman approached us. His family wanted to go to an island near to Labuanbajo. We could come along for 1 million and he would throw in a half day trip to an island for snorkeling for free. We got the price down a little bit more then happily got our swimming gear together to go snorkeling for the afternoon. I think what happened was the boatman's family wanted to go home for Ramadan (he told us they were Muslim) but they could not afford to. The money we paid was enough to finance the whole trip for everyone, but also a great price for us.

We have been traveling in southeast Asia for nearly a year, but we had not yet tried snorkeling. The truth is we are not strong swimmers (I am particularly awful at swimming) and it seemed a bit terrifying. I'm sure that we were very entertaining to the boatman and his helper. We stood in the waist-deep water and stuck our faces in. After a couple tries we found that it was indeed possible to breath like this. Next we tried moving around a bit and found that the water here was very easy to swim in. We floated so easily that we could just lay in one spot and look at what was going on below us. We were excited to see some pretty fish and a bit of coral about the size of a pomelo. Eventually the boatman started waving his arms and yelling what direction we should swim to find coral. Apparently we still swam the wrong direction. He sent his Friend out to show us. I followed him (very slowly) and found an absolutely amazing display of colourful coral and even more colourful fish. Once Dave and I started to figure out what we were doing, we really loved snorkeling. It was so beautiful and interesting. Wow.

Our boat ride the next day was very enjoyable. It was much more comfortable than the bus. We left at 5 in the morning (yuck) and were in Labuanbajo by 3:30. The scenery was lovely. We enjoyed having the family on board. It would have been much more boring with just the two of us. Did you know that babies here don't wear diapers? Their parents just pack a lot of pairs of pants. Well now you know.

We are now in Singapore. We flew from Labuanbajo to Denpassar on an airline with the reassuring logo "Wings Air: Fly is Cheep". Then we flew to Singapore on Air Asia.

Goodbye to WWOOFing for now

Many of you know that we have chosen to spend some of our time while we travel volunteering on organic farms (wwoofing). Our wwoofing list has recently expired and we have decided we don't have time to renew it this trip. Our experiences on the farms we have visited have been very valuable. Our time spent wwoofing has turned out to be as much about learning about and participating in different cultures and living with people different then we are as it was about farming. I found it interesting how each of the farms we worked on had made their connection to wwoofing. The connection usually came from the west either by marriage or other some other relationship. In the Philippines it was the project of a dedicated peace corp volunteer who got the Ecna farm connected to wwoofing. When this relationship was healthy it made for a better experience and working environment. We were able to see some tropical plants grow. The food we were provided with was always good and it was good to be able to see how food is prepared in the home. We tried some interesting things like banana hearts, local ferns, and pig lungs - always served with rice. When we were on farms we ate rice three times a day. At first this felt unusual especially for breakfast but soon it became a normal part of our routine. Now when we go to a restaurant and have a omelet we comment on it would be nice if it came with some rice to fill us up. We learned that making organic compost can be a lot of work as this was by far the most labour intensive project given to us, but it was also rewarding because the progress made was easy to see. I have really valued our time on the farms we have visited and found it to be very important part of our trip . I hope we can try wwoofing in Canada and perhaps other countries in the future.

Interesting

When we were traveling in Indonesian Borneo, we found that they do not get many foreign tourists in that part of the country. As a traveler that means several things. Very few people speak English fluently and those that do all want to practice it on you. People yell out "hello mister" when they see us. Yes, they call me mister too. It can really startle me when someone yells hello mister as their motorbike whizzes past nearly brushing my arm. Because there were so few tourists we were unable to find an Indonesian phrasebook, so we brushed up our charade skills. Western food was unavailable. We only know how to say a few foods in Indonesian, so we ate a lot of those things. Finally, everyone stares at you. We took a two day boat trip to get from Borneo to Java. We bought second class tickets so we had a room with beds to sleep in. Just outside on the deck the locals traveling economy just lay down and sleep where ever they can find the space. We like the sunlight so we wanted to keep our curtains open. We saw several people walk past, do a double take, then come back to stare in at us. Most of the time this was just funny. Maybe some of them had never before seen people who look like us. At one point two men found us so intriguing that they stayed outside our window for a very long time watching us, laughing at us, and waving at us. They called people over so they could look too. They lifted up children so they could see better. A crowd grew outside the window. We felt like very awkward animals in the zoo. Eventually we could not handle it any longer so I waved good-bye to our audience and drew the curtain. Now that we are in Java, we are not the only tourists. Here it feels like we are only interesting when someone is trying to sell us something.

Ghost Town Beach

We have booked a trip on a boat over to the city of Surabaya on the island of Java for August the 2nd. With a couple of days to spare before our boat heads out we decided to go to a local beach a couple of hours north of where we are staying. We were told it could get busy on the weekend so we booked a room using most of our reaming cell minutes trying to convey my name to the hotel receptionist.

D as in dog. I hear her repeat "B" no D as in dog. A as in apple "pinapple".... eventually we ended up with "Ohh!! Mister David".

This and the fact we are staring to tire of eating mee goring(fried noodles) and nasi goring (fried rice) has led us to try and find a Indonesian phrase book to try and at least pick up a few basics as most people here only have limited English. With our hotel booked we head out in a shared taxi which ended up being just Marina and I. The first part of our drive was very slow as we wait in a traffic jam to get out of the city. Once we are out of the city we are able to pass and travel at speeds up to about 80 Km/h including times we pass next to the road congested with school kids. This made me nervous but kids here must be trained to not go onto roads and to listen for horns to warn of vehicles traveling behind them. We arrive at the hotel around noon and check in. The hotel wants a deposit for twice the cost of the room we decline and assure them we won't break anything and check out when we leave. Our room is basic and appears to be in a building shared with hotel employees or family members. We go out to check out the beach and area. It's very nice but empty. Usually this is a good thing but this has strange feeling to it. There are probably over twenty restaurants with seating for well over a hundred people lining the beach but they are all empty. Strange, but we enjoy the empty beach and eat at the hotel which also has very few guests. It does pick up a little bit on Saturday and even more on Sunday so by that point we are feeling the place is somewhat normal. Perhaps even though it's peak season for foreign tourists maybe it's not the peak for local tourists as that is almost all of their business.

We ask at the hotel about a bus back to Pontianak and are offered a ride to the bus terminal not far from the hotel. We get dropped off at the station and look for a bus after handing a map with the name of the town to a group of men they all study the map and eventually end up pointing at a bus. The bus they point at is having some kind of repairs to it which isn't a good sign but we are in no hurry and the driver tells us to hop on so we do. They finish the repair and we head back to town. About half way back we pull over to the side of the road with a flat tire and all four bus staff (the bus only seats about 15 people) jump out and change out the tire with great efficiency. Probably not the first time they have done it. The spare tire doesn't look to be in very good shape either but we made it back. People here have an incredible ability to take things in stride. Whether it's the lights going out a couple times a week or constantly making the same bus repairs. I hope as we experience the different way of living here we are able to learn from it and judge for ourselves what we feel is important as we reenter a western culture.

Indonesia

We are now in Pontianak in Indonesia. Pontianak straddles the equator. Our guidebook has actually marked the equator on the city map. The place we are staying at is several hundred meters south of the equator. Some of my first impressions of Indonesia are that it is chaotic, confusing, very poor, and even more friendly than it is poor. We are trying to figure out our travel plans for our stay here. It is definitely a case of too many cool things to see and too little time to do it in.

Mulling over our options

It seems amazing, but we have recently realized that this trip is quickly approaching its end. Two months from tomorrow we fly back to Hong Kong, and after a little more than a week to hang out with Debbi and Dave and meet Jasper we fly back home. I think when the time comes we will feel conflicting emotions; we have really enjoyed traveling and would love to do more, but we also look forward to spending time with family and friends and to finally being settled in one place. I am not looking forward to the Calgary winter.

As we think of our return home we are faced with a daunting number of questions. Where will we live? How do we want to live? What employment should we pursue, and will we be able to find work in the area of our choice? How can we live out our values?

In part, we chose to take this trip because it would give us a chance to step outside of our everyday lives so we could stop and choose how we would move forward rather than allowing our lives to be set without much conscious decision. Nevertheless, now that the time has come for us to make those choices, it feels pretty intimidating.

Oh well, tonight I won't think about these things. I'm going to bed early. Tomorrow we spend the day on the bus and end up in Indonesia. Once we are there, we need to find a travel agent who can help us figure out the schedule of infrequent boats between the many islands. When and where these boats are going will to a large extent determine where we will go while we are in the country.

Yes, No, Maybe

One of the highlights of our stay at Kebun was working with the Indonesian couple Sam and Luthie on the farm. They are responsible for most of the daily farm work at the Kebun. Our first task was to take apart the old goat barn as this is going to be converted into classrooms and sleeping quarters for future wwoofers. This will be a nice addition and make volunteering on the farm more enjoyable. As it was now we felt at times we were in the way and the farm owner, Adrian, and particularly his family, didn't like having us share the same space, but there really was no alternative. The new area for volunteers to stay apart from the family and other guests should solve that problem. Most days we set out to work with Sam. He would get started on current project and work with us until he had to let the goats out to pasture. We helped make a new goat run, plant terrace, and hang a net that will be used to create a canopy of tall growing vine plants. We also planted some fruit trees and some vegetable seeds. Sam and Luthie were very nice to work with and in the evening we could here them singing along to Indonesian music videos on the T.V. or talking to their six year old daughter who they left behind with Luthie's Mom in Indonesia. They didn't speak a lot of English but often understood what we were saying but found it difficult to respond in English. Sam would often respond to us with an emphatic YES when we were talking to him. If we looked confused he would change his answer to NO. If we still looked confused it was probably not a yes or no question and he would say "I don't know". One evening Sam sat with us and showed us how they cook chicken over a wood fire barbecue. We will be trying this at home as it was delicious. There are a lot of interesting projects on the go at the Kebun, and compared to some of the other farms they were very organized. We really enjoyed the work that we participated in here, and once the volunteer quarters are completed I'm sure they will do a great job of hosting future wwoofers.

A new kind of luxury

David and I have finished volunteering at the Kebun and we are back in Kuching. During our stay on the farm we came in contact with something that seemed to us to be a wonderful luxury:

a washing machine.

After some initial bad experiences with the local laundry services, Dave and I decided some months ago that we needed to do our own laundry. In most places this has meant hand washing everything in the bathroom sink and hanging it to dry anywhere that looked promising. It's not so bad, but we don't change our clothes until they are actually dirty. A washing machine really is an amazing thing. You can shove a whole bunch of clothing into it, turn the dial, and go drink tea or shovel soil for 45 minutes and come back to find everything is clean (except you if you were shoveling dirt in the Malaysian sun). I hope that when we return to Canada we can continue to see things like a washing machine, signs written in English, or being able to buy clothes in our size (especially if the shop keeper doesn't say "I have very big size for you") as luxuries. I think it helps me to enjoy life more when I am able to see simple everyday things through appreciative eyes.

On the Farm Again

Earlier this week Dave and I began volunteering on another organic farm. This time we are not far outside of Kuching, a major city on the southern tip of East Malaysia. It is a really beautiful place. The farm has many different kinds of animals including guinea fowl, heritage breeds of turkeys, chickens, goats, puppies, pigeons, and others. There is also a wide variety of plants including some local medicinal herbs. So far we have mostly been working on construction projects. We have been dismantling a goat shed that will eventually be converted into a classroom where people can come to learn about permaculture, and we have helped build a fence to guide the goats to pasture. Our accommodations are spectacular. The farm is a homestay where people pay to stay in one of two bungalows on the farm. One of the bungalows is not occupied, so we are staying there. It is very big and very classy. We will have to try to post some pictures. There are two bedrooms (in case we fight I guess), a kitchen, three eating areas, a living room, and a huge veranda that wraps around two sides of the house. It is really nice. After two and a half days of working on the farm we have gone on a brief holiday to attend the Rainforest World Music Festival. After the festival we plan to return to the farm and continue volunteering there.

Mulu Park and Kuching

After spending five days at Mulu National Park we have flown into Kuching. We really enjoyed our time out at the park. We did a couple of guided tours which were required to see anything. After the tours we took to walking the boardwalk. Our usually pattern was to walk a few steps and see some interesting bug, plant, or reptile and to stop and check it out, often truly amazed at what we were seeing. Dragonflies that looked like ferries because of their wings shining in the sun light. Bugs that looked like sticks. The park was full of interesting nature and critters which increased with every walk we took or maybe we just got better a finding them. We arrived in Kuching on Friday and have spent a couple of days wandering around here. Kuching is full and we have had to make a guesthouse change in order to find room as there is a running group in town and probably people showing up for the music festival next week already. Last night we met for dinner with the owner of the next farm we plan to visit. He seems very nice and has many interesting projects on the go. We plan to head out to the farm on Tuesday for a few days and get setteled in before we come back to town for the Rainforest World Music Festival next weekend.

Brunei Darussalam

After two ferry rides today, Dave and I are now in the tiny country of Brunei. Brunei is tucked between the northern and southern provinces of Malaysian Borneo. It is a very small and very wealthy country that is on our route as we travel southwest along Malaysia. We will only spend a couple days here before we move on, and we will likely spend our time checking out some lavish museums and mosques.

Food and Water

Our first step out of the cab and into the hostel gave me a very good feeling about the food here in Malaysia and it hasn't disappointed since. The restaurant right below our hostel has wonderful smelling and tasty food. Their is a certain ethnic diversity that coexists peacefully in Malaysia and makes it a little different than the other places we have visited. Islam is popular in this country bringing with it different food and culture. There is a large portion of restaurants that sell Indian food or a least foods that have been derived from Indian fare. I have yet to walk somewhere in Kota Kinabalu and not be enticed by the delicious smell of curries wafting from nearby restaurants or night markets. One night we went to the night market and got a grilled fresh tuna steak with a curry sauce, not something I would have thought of but very delicious. We have also happily wandered back into roti (fried flat bread) country. Instead of having banana and chocolate sauce roti that we had in Thailand there is a coconut jam called kaya that is very tasty. There are also savory roti here. We had a vegetable and egg roti that came with curry sauce and took roti to a whole new level. Next on the list we ate a nice Chinese meal of savory pork soup and a bowl of rice at the restaurant I was describing earlier that is below our hostel and always smells good as we walk by. Overall the food here is among the best we have had anywhere on our travels.

When we moved from the Philippines the weather was starting to get a little wet but somehow after a one hour flight we were to move into the dryer season of Malaysia. I'm still not sure how that works but it so far hasn't. After expressing concern about how wet it must get in the wet season to Marina she mentioned that the guide book refers to the fact that even though its the dry season. There is less of a wet/dry season here and it can pretty much rain anytime of the year. So far that has been the case with rain and sometimes heavy rain coming most afternoons. We have gotten used to carrying our rain gear with us most days when we head out for the day. Today we went to visit one of the near by Islands and have a beach day. We packed for trip the same as we do for most days. I brought my rain jacket and Marina brought her umbrella. We intended to get an early start which turned into a late morning start after a longer than normal breakfast talking with another hostel member who was debating climbing the summit of mount Kinabalu and then we took a stop at the market to pick up some food for the day. We ended up on the boat just before noon and planed to return around four. Around two o'clock it started to rain and we took shelter at a food restaurant and had a warm drink to wait out the rain. The rain slowed up for a while but didn't look like it was going away so when the boat company found us on the Island and offered us an earlier boat we decided to take it. We debated changing from our bathing suits but thought it could be a wet ride and why get more clothes than necessary wet. Wet was an understatement. I think the drier option may have been to swim back from the Island. As we waited for our boat the rain picked up began blowing under the shelter and getting us wet before our boat even arrived. By the time the boat arrived it was raining very hard and Marina said she had to put a towel over her face because the rain drops were hurting her face as the boat sped across the water. The rain continued as we crossed the ocean back to Kota Kinabalu driving under the canopy that was really only protecting a section of ocean next to the boat as the rain was coming down at a sharp angle. Just when we thought we couldn't get wetter the boat would spray up after a big wave then the wind would carry the boat's wave over us and the whole boat would yell out. There was a mixture of some people enjoying the wet ride while others were certainly not. When we arrived back at the harbor in Kota Kinabalu we climbed out of our boat as wet as I have possibly ever been but happy to have found our way back to land in the rain. We then walked back to our hostel in the rain deciding there is now way we could get any wetter that we already were. The nice thing about rain here is it can be a welcome change from the heat and when you are soaked to the bone and walking home you don't have to worry about freezing.