The Mancation

We had been planning a trip to Kallalan ever since we went camping there on Thanksgiving weekend. When we found out how expensive a boat was, no one wanted to pay it. They wanted to charge us $200 one way. With only about 15 people going, it wasn't worth it. But fortunately you can walk between all the islands, it's just a long ways. Some of us were down with hiking out there though.

The girls went back and forth for awhile but finally backed out. A couple of the guys backed out too so it ended up being Ben, Damien, Rudy, Mitch, and me. We took a boat to Enemanit and started walking the rest of the way. We started around 3:45 in the afternoon. By sundown we were at one of the Three Bag Islands, but we still had a long way to go. We walked for awhile after dark and then camped on a small, deserted island. The wind was crazy, but I slept ok for the most part. Rudy didn't bring a hammock so he piled up palm branches and slept on them. He slept horrible and woke up the next morning saying he wanted to go back. We finished the hike to the island and got there mid-morning. The tide was coming up and you can only do it at low tide. Rudy waited for low tide and left at 4:15 the same day to go back. Mitch left with him. I have no idea why they left so soon except that neither brought much food.

Ben, Damien and I had a blast after that. We went snorkeling a bunch. Large schools of fish swam past us while Black Tip Reef Sharks cruised the shallows for unsuspecting prey. Fish of every color, blue, green, red, yellow flitted in every crack and crevice. When it was too hot to do anything we would sit in our hammocks or lay on the beach reading or talking. A light went always blew through keeping us cool. Each of us took our turn climbing the thin coconut trees to chop down our food and water with machetes. We became expert at opening coconuts. We couldn't carry enough water so we relied on coconut milk to sustain us. I stayed hydrated the whole time.

We made a fire every night and every morning to cook over. One fire stands out. We made it on the point and it was a huge blazing beast. We made clothes from leaves and vines and danced around the fire. Ben and Damien lit dry palm fronds and ran around the beach waving them while I got it all on video.

One afternoon we practiced knife throwing with our machetes. With a given distance we got pretty good, but if the distance varied it went out the window.

We called it The Mancation because it was a man's vacations. It was the ultimate bro session.