Time Out: San Juan (La Union)

This is a retrospective on a recent trip to the Philippines.  Chinese New Year came and went - and once again I got the hell out of Dodge.  A brief aside, Hong Kong is bizarrely still for a few days during this massive Chinese holiday.  Everything closes with the exception of a few restaurants serving traditional New Year meals.  Living in Central, there is rarely a day I am not raging against a mass of people - a veritable salmon swimming against the current, wary of old ladies carrying wheelie bags and knocking shins.  Stepping outside was ethereal:

There was space.
It was quiet.
The streets were empty.
There were no cards, no horns, no hydraulic pounding of constant construction.
Peace and quiet.

 I worried shortly that I made the wrong choice.  That the relaxation was here - in Hong Kong - not travelling the world busting out road trips to isolated beaches, with burning sun and ice cold beers.  But the travel bug runs deep and ten days in the Philippines beats a few quiet days in HK any time - also ice cold beers and burning sun sounded amazing.

I turned off all electrical appliances (as one does - got to do my part to limit my carbon foot print), watered the plants and ate as much as I could of the food left in the fridge. 

As it turns out, chugging 20 oz of milk followed by 20 oz of orange juice does not taste like an orange creamsicle.  In fact, if you ride on a bus shortly afterwards, it churns it up in a weird and horribly uncomfortable batch of curdled milk - word to the wise. 

So with that delightful concoction rumbling in my gut, I locked up, and walked out into the world.

45 minutes later, I hopped off the Airport Express, the artery that links my Central MTR station to the booming HKG airport.  2 hours after that, I found myself sweating in Clark International Airport of the Philippines.  Clark has recently been utilized as the budget airpline base for the the Philippines, and while it is a little more difficult to catch the island hopping planes from here (they all leave from Manila Ninoy Airport) the North of Luzon is easily opened up to cheap travel - with good surf and trekking all around.

Also of note, Angeles City was created in response to Clark US Airbase.  As a result the industries that abound are geared towards taking care of the one time economy consisting of American GIs. I might go so far as to say the entire industry of the city is hookers and alcohol.  So unless you have a nice resort to get away in, you do not want to spend any more time than is absolutely necessary in the town.  I did manage to find a hotel that did not rent by the hour - it only took two hours to find.

An old college friend arrived late that night (you can read her stuff here - its good)  so after a few beers and a final walk down the main drag, we decided to try our luck in San Juan.

6 hours later our bus drops us in San Juan La Union. All I needed was a bed and a beer. The next day, saw us sitting on the coast, renting a surf board, and trying out the swells.  The surf was pretty consistent -  nothing really savage during our time there, but good enough to be able to stand up a couple of times ( I am still learning - and quite slowly I may add).  A contributing factor to the slow curve, my first day in the sun resulted in the most vicious of burns I have yet to experience even with regularly applied SPF 50.  It forced us into the shade for the next 3 days as aloe and sun lotion slowly brought us back into the land of the light and living.  Also, be wary of the weekends - a bunch of Manila City Dwellers arrive for a few days on the beach making it real difficult to find any space on the water.

The Filipinos of San Juan were kind and welcoming.  The beers were cheap.  The food was... well... pretty good... I did pull a staple out of my spicy chicken pasta - but I blame roof repairs for that being around and the pasta itself, aside from metal objects, was just delightful.  Expect everything to run on Island Time - which is ironically - glacial.  But also expect there is be plenty of friends made and stories told as the city is a great little place to meet fellow travelers and get in some surfing at the beach.   

Topia de Beer 2013

Bob Dylan's Rainy Day Women comes to mind when looking out at the weather. It's been raining for the past six weeks. Likely to continue for the next. Good thing everyone's getting stoned. Helps keep me from feeling alll alooonee. Thank God rain isn't rocks - or we'd all be dead as well. 

Welcome to Hong Kong and Spring is in the air. Breathe it in, deeply, but not too much lest you fill your lungs with fluid and Nitrogen Dioxide. It seems as if breathing in water is possible. Jacques Cousteau must have lived in Hong Kong for a spring or two in his lifetime. Google it.

Yet in a brief respite we had, on this past Saturday, a touch of sunshine.   So, what do we do?  To the BEERS!  Saturday marked the Second Annual Beertopia in HK, and my first attendance.  The place was freakin amazing.  Set up on Kowloon West Promenade, same location as Clockenflap, My Lovely Lady and I went to the evening edition, and were shocked to find ourselves victims some sort of newfangled, ass-backwards, ticketing system.

In order to get into the land of many beers, we first had to line up in the online ticket collection line.  This line ran about 100m.  I began the walk to the end, but my better judgement and lack of patience overwhelmed this upstanding mode of action.  I walked about 15m, and then sidled up next to a random group, where the wait was minimal - only 10 minutes.  Meanwhile, Courtney had waited in the second and similarly sadistic line for the drink "tokens."  Why weren't the lines combined? you might find yourself asking.  Why not just give the tokens and the tickets together you ponder?  Having lived in Hong Kong now for a year and a half - I don't ask these questions anymore.  Logic absconded with frugality and left chaos and consumerism to run the show.

Once in, we were surrounded by beers and people.  It was hard to tell who had the greater numbers.  In the end, I would say the beers were outnumbered, but for each drink consumed, two more were there to take its place. I pictured myself Hercules fighting the Hydra.  The reality of the story is that the Hydra only had one head and good old Herc just got hammered and couldn't get it - so he made up a better story about a crazy creature with tons of heads that grew back.  Consider that Greek Myth explained free of charge.

The beer list included over 200 different beers and marks a stark departure in Hong Kong from the regular beer selection - namely Carlsburg, San Miguel, Asahi, and Tsing Tao.  The big beers of HK have got some fresh competition - based on quality, not quantity.  Some of my favorite beers came out of Seoul from Craftworks Brewing Company. The Moon Dog IPA and the Oatmeal Stout were some of the top contenders in winning my palette - a prestigious award.  My patronage in our next trip to Seoul is assured.   

New distributors here have opened up the world of Craft Brews to the populace of HK.  now, through the helpful endeavors of Hop Leaf and Americraft,  access to the delightful brews of Imperial Stouts, American IPA and Anchor Steam among others abounds.  The success of Beertopia excites me to think that soon there might be microbrew bars springing up all over the SAR , bringing a little bit of something from home to the far east.

and the sun for a day was an added bonus.