My first post in almost three months!!!
We finally made a return trip to Matuod beach, the same trip we'd last made out of Manila when we had the accident. It was kinda scary seeing where we'd wiped out last, but the trip was for the most part uneventful... Until we hit the dirt road section heading for the beach house proper from the highway, a 2 kilometer stretch of pretty bad road made worse by two straight days of rain.
Puddles were wide and deep, sometimes two abreadth, leaving little more than a few inches of slippery path above muddy water to traverse on a fully loaded R65 with a passenger. We made it safe enough, but not without a few scares, like when the bike slid
sideways a couple of times while passing sloping puddle edges.
After we'd finally arrived, we thought that so long as it didn't rain that night the puddles would at the very least remain unchanged or at best dried up a bit to make passing easier. But guess what? It rained cats, dogs and other four-legged creatures for most of the night! To play it safe, we asked our host for a four-wheeled escort early the next morning (we had to leave early to be with our kids as we usually do as it was Sunday) which my wife would ride while I muscled the bike back to the highway.
In the end we had a beautiful ride back home, albeit with the sun in our eyes for nearly half the way. Our stay at the beach itself was wonderfully relaxing, if a bit tempered by what we were thinking we had to go through for the first part of the trip home. Still, I figure it was something we just had to do. All's well that ends well.
Our next plan is to visit and bathe in natural springs near Mt. Makiling, a dormant volcano and a two-hour ride from the city, but this won't happen for another few weeks. Keep you guys posted.
P.S. -- The bike's now a bit filthier than when we first started out, but runs as beautifully as ever. What a wonderful machine!
