Mudskippers and a little railroad Bridge

Sunset at the pantalan.

My family and I spent our Holy Week in Inaclagan, Gumaca, a coastal barangay in Quezon Province. We attended her family's annual reunion. The place was not a Boracay nor a Palawan but the place had its own beauty, rural, provincial, simple and sad to say it was also a poor community; not unlike the place where I live, if I may say so.

To enjoy the beach, I had to walk a few hundred meters away from the community because the beach along the barangay was filled with trash. This was sad but if the people in the community would just come to their senses and start cleaning up their beach, the place could attract tourist especially summer vacationers. But...

My favorite spot. This is a little secluded place found a few meters from my in law's house, a railroad bridge that spans over a river that flows into the sea. Sitting down here and listening to my Mp3 player was so serene that I already missed the place. Of course I had to be alert because the train here had no regular schedule that the folks knew of. If ever a train arrived, I would have had no choice but to jump into the water. I didn't know how to swim but it seemed the water was not that deep to drown me. Anyway, Looking at the calm water, I saw a lot of ripples on the surface. Curious, I went down to investigate.

When I sat down, there was panic on the water's surface. I thought they were shrimps frightened when I stepped in the water.   . I sat down motionless for a while so that I could take a closer look, but they were not shrimps. I was surprised to find two little bulging eyes staring at me just a little above the water's surface. My little knowledge of biology (thanks to David Attenborough's " Life on Earth") identified the creatures as mudskipper fish.

I was looking ta the mudskipper fish, and they were also looking at me curiously, as if we were both trying to figure each other out. Just a little movement and  I imagined even a threatening smile would make them scamper away. (Wikipedia photo)

There are many ways to enjoy a vacation. I found out that I enjoy mine by looking  at little things and exploring, imagining I am a little boy again discovering my surroundings, looking for nothing but looking for something that could stir up my curiosity. There are a lot of places to explore my brother in law told me that there also water falls in the mountain, but I didn't have the energy and the courage to get that far away.