September – December 2016: Here’s a few more events and pictures from the rest of our year that didn’t make it into one of our other blog posts.
Nukaat went to visit his Filipino family a few times this year, including when we spent summer in Canada and when we made a short hop over to Singapore for a few days in October. The kids miss Nukaat when he comes back to the boat and always ask about him. Near Christmas, the whole family came to MOKEN one afternoon for a visit…mostly to for a “ming ming” fix.
I met Betty (from Belgium) through the book club in Subic earlier this year. She got me into hashing and includes us whenever her family is doing something fun, whether its diving, celebrating the New Year or a boat cruise on the bay.
Whenever Chris arrives back on the boat (and we’re not out cruising), he has a long list of projects to work his way through. Of course he has a certain knack for things that involve wiring. I, on the other hand, primarily look after the pink projects. Provisioning is one of my favourites.
Sometimes, when we’re not working on MOKEN, we take a day off and go check out the surrounding area. This is much easier to do if we rent a car. One weekend, we did a day trip to Mariveles, at the south end of the Bataan peninsula. On another Sunday, our friend Rich was visiting from Puerto Princessa so we took a break and drove to the beach at Pundaquit where we ended up watching a live boxing match on TV featuring Filipino hero, Manny Pacquiao. Manny won so everyone was happy.
Christmas is a big deal in the Philippines. The festivities begin in September and last all throughout the “ber” months. By December I’m pretty tired of Christmas carols. Being the festive season, it’s also a really good excuse for organizing get togethers with friends and catching up.
Typhoons are a fact of life in the Philippines but we have been spared the full force of them thus far in Subic Bay. Lawin (October) and Nina (December) were the two we kept a close eye on, but neither one amounted to much in our area. The same cannot be said for other parts of the Philippines that got hammered.
That wraps up 2016. Now on to some posts about our cruising adventures in 2017.
M/V MOKEN 
I like the BER months sign; that’s funny.Who are Matthew, Charlene, and Nina?Funny: a month or two ago I’d mentioned hash runs. They don’t seem to have them here in Raleigh, though I had done some in Houston… Is Chris still working? I thought to mentioned he retired. Has that baby been born? Healthy?
Hi Michi, answers to your questions:
Mathew, Charlene and Nina are Nukaat’s Filipino family. They help mama Mylene take care of him when we’re away.
Chris retired in December.
Baby Sarah was born last night. Both her and mama Daryl are doing fine.