December 2018: Hippies, Healers, and Feliz Navidad

The Diagnosis

You may have heard it through the grapevine: Stefan did what all travelers hope they won’t do and contracted a mosquito-born illness. Thankfully, it wasn’t Malaria, but Dengue Fever. This painful tropical disease sent him home, in case his poor little immune system couldn’t handle the drop in blood cells (spoiler: it could).

The plus side? We got to spend a lot of time with our oft-neglected family:)

Before, there were Bubbles

The Philippines wasn’t entirely a bust, though. In fact, not at all. We finally broke the bank a few times and experienced some really breathtaking scuba dives. It’s us we’re talking about, remember. When we say “broke the bank,” we mean we spent under $20 a dive, making it some of the cheapest in the world.

Highly recommend the diving on Malapascua Island, where you can see the friendly (but still intimidating) thresher sharks. We write more about that, here.

Tori the Flower Child

Well, not quite. But she did concede to meditate once or twice.

We spent much of December learning to love small communes of travelers that have made their homes on the islands. There are a lot of expats, probably thanks to the lovely tropical location and the prevalence of English.

It turns out that if you look on Workaway hard enough, you can find opportunities to hang out and/or do art in exchange for free accommodation. This chill lifestyle is very unlike us, but it’s a great way to embrace the islands and get to know some communities (local and foreign alike) better.

We had a blast. Shoutout to Tinkerbell, our favorite, gender-bending cat.