I am sitting on steep ground overlooking a nicely shaped right-hander rolling in shallow pristine waters over a slab punctuated by sea urchins and corals. Around me a bunch of local kids approximately eight or nine years old are screaming for every wave coming in and talking to me in Portuguese, commenting on how they could have caught that wave like any other surfer from any other place on Earth would do. I suddenly realised then that I just happened to have arrived in one of the liveliest surf communities I ever been to in my life.
A heavy grey sky and torrential rain greet us as our tiny twin-prop plane makes its bumpy descent towards the tarmac of Siargao airport. After more than a day and a half’s travel and four separate flights to get to this small tropical island lost on the other side of the world, we’d been hoping for a slightly warmer welcome. Seems we should forget all about our ideas of a bit of r’n’r watching the sunset to end a very long “day”.
