A long weekend was coming up because of the Chinese New Year so we rushed to do a road trip. We’ve been to Mati City so many times already so we thought we’d go further up the road to Manay. We called ate Jojie and got her to come with us because she’s from there. So there we were – April, Joel, ate Jojie and me – road trip to Davao Oriental.

Day 1, we went straight to San Ignacio, Manay, Davao Oriental and enjoyed the remaining time of the day at the beach. Wild waves that afternoon. No surprise though considering that these places along the coastal road face out towards the Pacific Ocean.

We stopped at the Ferrando Family’s Whitesand Beach Resort just as the sun was settling down below the horizon. I couldn’t pass up the chance to take photos using the Fujifilm XT-10. It’s been a while since I’ve done a lot of landscape photography. The camera’s compact form factor was a welcome respite from the previous cameras that I’ve used for my landscape photography.

We headed back to Mati City; about 45 minutes of driving time from San Ignacio. Big thanks to ma’am Michelle Rabat and ate Lala for accommodating us at Casa Rosa. Dinner was at Baywalk Grill consisting of pork barbeque street cooking style, grilled bangus and a hot bowl of soup.

Day 2 started out very early. 4AM early, in fact. We wanted to do a sunrise shoot at the Amihan Boys Surf Camp in Dahican. We got there way before the sun even started rising. And when it did rise, it was awesome! The kids at the Amihan Boys Surf Camp were nice enough to pose for us and let us take photos of them while they practiced their skim surfing skills.

We finally ended the trip with a short trip to the last barangay of Mati City – Lawigan. Unspoilt beaches. Surf worthy breaks. Fresh seafood. Idyllic afternoon. Best of all – no cellular signal. It’s a perfect setting for when you just want to disconnect from the world and slow things down.