Down South

On Saturday we caravaned down South to look at a few sites and swim. Our first stop was Fort Nuestra Senora de la Soledad—one of the last Spanish Forts constructed in the 19th Century in support of the Spanish Galleon trade. Sitting on the cliff just to the south of Umatac, Fort Soledad has a beautiful view of the Pacific Ocean and Umatac Bay where Magellan landed in 1521.

While we were there we watched a pod of dolphins, 

interacted with a carabao and her rider and enjoyed some local star fruit. 

We drove on stopping at Merizo Pier and then Priest's Pools in hopes of swimming. The water at Merizo was not safe to swim in and the pools were not flowing with fresh rain water. We drove on to a little spot along the road. Strangely enough, we'd swam there before. Only this time we discovered a pool among the small islands that was deep enough to actually swim in. It was quite nice.