The Much Anticipated Inside MPA Collections!

After 6 1/2 months, dozens of in-person visits, hundreds of text messages, and several international agreements, the permitting process was finally finished (in theory anyway, as you'll remember the Chancellor was out of the country and unable to actually sign the MOA) which meant we had the green light to start doing collections inside of the Marine Protected Areas (MPAs).  Finally!  It was now the week of May 18 which was the absolute last week Robby and I had calculated we could start if he was to finish collections before mid-June.  We were told by the local fishermen, and LGU's (Local Government Units) that we were working with that come June the weather changes in Zambales.  Every afternoon wind, rain and storms come through which churns up the water resulting in poor visibility and also makes going out on the bangkas much more difficult.

With that in mind, we decided to start collections inside of Masinloc as there were three MPAs there, two of which were established back in 1989! So getting these collections completed was top priority if we were going to run into bad weather in a few weeks.  

We moved back into Puerto Asinan with Momma Norma (above) and the underwear-eating ratmouse.

Puerto Asinan was a 15 minute tricycle ride north of town proper, so each morning we had to stand on the side of the road and wait for an empty tricycle to drive by that we could wave down to take us into town.

Depending on the morning, this could take anywhere from 1 to 15 minutes.

Sometimes once we got a trike we'd run into trouble before making it into town.  This particular morning our trike ran out of gas.

Each morning we would stop off at a water filtration store and get a container of clean water for the boat.

Then we would head to the pier/dock/port/waters-edge to unload the trike and load the bangka.

While that was happening, I would go over and get our cooler filled with ice.

They would carve out 20 pesos ($0.50) worth from the block, send it through a machine that crushed it and then would fill our cooler with the ice chips.

The area where we loaded was where local fishermen unloaded and most mornings we would see them laying out their catch in the sun.  Dried fish and squid are big things here.  You can imagine the lovely aroma this left in the air, exactly what you want at 7am.

Once our gear was loaded we left the mainland and headed to our first MPA: San Salvador Island.

It was always a gorgeous view looking back to see the mountains stretching down the coastline (if you look closely you can also see the smoke from everyone burning their garbage, makes you wonder how good it is for you to be breathing on land...).

Looking out toward San Salvador Island was equally as beautiful.  No matter how the morning started, by the time we reached here we were both smiling.  What an incredible place to work!

San Salvador Island is where our fisherman, Noel, lives.

So each morning we would pick him and our lunch up (his wife would cook for us!)

Then we'd push off and head out to the MPA.

Masinloc actually has four MPAs, but we were only doing collections in three of them as the fourth did not have an abundance of the species Robby needed for his research.  The MPAs we were working in were: San Salvador, Taklobo (Clam) Farm and Bani (not Watermelon Festival Bani).

We created a tracker for each MPA, showing each of the six species of fish and the targeted number from each size class of each species.  The black mark is the maximum number in that size class.

As we explained back in Science Volume I and II, Robby needed a range in sizes of each species to see how old they are at each size and how large/old they are when they reach sexual maturity.  This got really tricky because outside of the MPA we had some flex room (as it is open to fishing) whereas inside we were only allowed to collect a specific number of fish, and no more.  During outside collections, if our fishermen Noel came up with a fish that was bigger than we wanted, we just sent him down to get a smaller one and kept the other as an extra, or sometimes ate it for lunch.  Inside of the MPA, however, we only had permission to take 30 of each species so we had to be very, very careful in our collections to ensure that those 30 individuals ranged in size and that we got the whole size spectrum.  We also had to make sure that we collected some of the largest individuals, as well as the smallest and everything in between to get a nice even spread.

Since we had to be so specific, Robby and I only helped with collections on the first day of each MPA when we needed a little of everything.

After that, we either snorkeled or hung around the boat while Noel collected to make sure we didn't go over our catch limits.

Sometimes Noel would want to check to see if he was catching the correct size so he would bring one back to the boat still on his spear.

and then we would measure it and discuss if he should go back for more of that size or aim a little larger or smaller.

Robby and I made the best of our time while we waited.

Did lots of free diving and had fun taking videos.

We got the chance to swim around and enjoy the corals, clams and other marine life inside of the MPAs.


There were so many beautiful fish and we got to finally pay attention to them rather than the six target species!

Collections were off to a great start until Noel's regulator broke.  He started sucking in seawater rather than air when he would take a breath, which is not what you want when you're 40 feet under the water.

Not to worry, he fixed it with a little plastic, some nylon and a zip tie.  Noel never ceased to amaze us!

After a dive, Robby and I would measure the fish, mark them off in the correct size class on the tracker and then put them in a bag labeled with when and where we caught the fish as well as how many of each species were in that bag.

Our boatman waited patiently while we counted and then we would all discuss where to do the next dive: closer to shore for the smaller fish, or deeper to look for some of the larger, or should we find a spot with different coral cover as some species liked different corals.

After the first two dives we would always take a break and have lunch on the back of the boat.

Noel's wife was a wonderful cook and usually made us a pork or chicken dish which was a much needed break from the usual fish we had for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  Lunch always finished with a whole mango for each of us.  Zambales has some of the (or just the if you ask the locals) sweetest mangoes in the Philippines!

Here is a panoramic of the San Salvador MPA, it is on the west side of San Salvador Island.

Around the corner, on the northern face of the island, is Taklobo Farm MPA

Taklobo Farm means Clam Farm, so not surprisingly this MPA was home to a bunch of giant clams!  It is also the only MPA in Masinloc that had buoys marking its four corners which Robby and I really appreciated, as we were never quite sure where the other MPAs stopped and started.  San Salvador MPA had one buoy and the MPA stretched from that buoy to the end of the island (the corner you see above).  We were not sure exactly how far it stretched out from the island, we were told it included everything until the reef dropped off.  Bani MPA only had one marker, a large bamboo stick coming out of the water and none of us were entirely sure where the end was on the other side so we did our collections mainly near the marker.  

You may be wondering how they can enforce an MPA when there is no clear boundary, but the fishermen have been told where it is and know the waters well enough. We have been told that any illegal activity is done by fishermen from other municipalities coming into these waters and fishing inside the MPA.  They also said that buoys get cut or storms take them out so they stopped replacing them years ago.  At the end of the day we can't really know exactly how well the MPAs are enforced, but I can tell you that the bantay dagats (fish wardens) paid us a couple visits when they saw us anchored inside the MPA, so at least we know they are watching!

In San Salvador we informed the bantay dagats we would be in the MPA for three days, but ended up needing a fourth.  We forgot to notify them we needed to do an additional dive, and on that fourth day sure enough a boat came out with the local bantay dagat wanting to know who we were and if we had a permit and what we were doing.  After they saw it was us they said it was fine and went back.

When we were doing collections in Taklobo Farm the bantay dagat came out 3 out of the 4 days we were there to check on us.  It was definitely encouraging to see them out and to know the MPAs are being looked after! 

 Collections in Masinloc went well for the first week, but during this week we also realized that at our rate of collection we would not finish collections before June 9 which is when I was scheduled to leave the Philippines.  This realization then got us thinking about the dissections that needed to take place after collections.  While Robby and I have been dissecting at every spare moment, we calculated that we would still have about 1700 fish in total to dissect once inside MPA collections were completed.  

Having just been in Manila, we had timed ourselves dissecting and found that on his own Robby could do about 40 fish a day (not including otoliths) and together we could complete 80 fish all the way through in a day.  On his own Robby could do about 60 otoliths in a day, and I could do around 80 (all that otolith practice has been paying off!).  So with that knowledge we did the math and realized that it would be impossible for Robby to finish all 1,700 fish on his own before he had to leave at the end of July.  Robby needs the otoliths from these fish in order to bring them back to the US to determine the age of the fish, so the fish needed to be dissected before July 31.  Since we dissect about twice as many fish when we are working together, we scheduled it out and decided that if I stayed another month and left July 9, we would be able to complete all but a few hundred fish which Robby could then do on his own before the end of July.  This was assuming there were no delays or problems so we were just crossing our fingers and hoping that things would go well!  My biggest worry was my head being able to withstand that many days of working so we made the schedule so that I had days off Wednesday and Sunday and have a short day on Saturday.  

Since I had to stay another month I needed to extend my visa, so I had to head back down to Manila to go to the Immigration Office.  Robby also had to go to Manila as the Chancellor was back and had signed the MOA!  So he came back to get the MOA turned into BFAR and I came back to do my visa extension.  

It just so happened that the two days we were in Manila doing this, Robby's friend Lauren was in town visiting some friends that were painting a mural in Manila.  Perfect timing!  So we got to spend an afternoon with her out by our pool before heading back out to the field.

I should note that when Robby turned in everything to BFAR, he was informed that he had to get it notarized before it could be processed.  Of course the process wasn't done!  Although the UP Chancellor's signature was notarized, as was the VP's from FIT, they still needed the signature of the head of the BFAR office to be notarized.  Do they have a notary on staff?  No.  Does the notary have to be present when the person signs the document? No.  Is that person responsible for telling the notary then that they signed it and is who they say they are? No.  Does it make any sense then to get this notarized? No.  Did Robby have to figure out how to do this on his own? Yes.

Unfortunately, the person who needed to sign the document for Robby to then go take elsewhere to get notarized couldn't do so until the end of the week, so we decided to say forget about it, we'll deal with this ridiculousness after we finish collections and are in Manila full time. With that, we headed back up to Masinloc.

I should also tell you that before we left Masinloc I had found that the ratmouse had struck again.

It had eaten another hole in yet another bag of my nut mix.

The nuts were in the top of the blue bag that you see hanging there.  There was no hole in the blue bag, it somehow got inside the bag and went to town.  
Ratmouse 7, Robby and D 0.

I decided if he wanted my nut mix so badly he could walk out to the edge of the hanger and get it. 

I also had it hanging precariously over a trashcan full of water.  Go for them and you're falling to your death ratmouse!

The next morning.  Wrong again.  Ratmouse got to the corner of the bag and nothing but a few nuts were in the water.
Ratmouse 8, Robby and D 0.

I didn't know if it climbed on that hanger or the one next to it to reach the corner of the bag so I moved the hangers further apart and draped the nuts so that it would have to either fall or knock the hanger down into the water to get to them.

I had left it that way when we went to Manila so I was anxious to see if we had a drowned ratmouse when we got back.

It may be needless to say at this point, but we were outwitted once again and it had gotten to the nuts.  Several of them were at the bottom of the water so I like to think it didn't get to enjoy any.  Let's be honest though:
Ratmouse 9, Robby and D 0.

I kept the trap there thinking that one day it would eventually tip the balance and fall in.  Well, it did give up trying to eat the nuts, but that just meant it started going for other things.

It somehow got up to our bread (over a foot high) and ate a hole through the plastic into the loaf.
Ratmouse 10, Robby and D 0.

At this point Robby was just impressed and kept saying, "well you got to hand it to the little guy, it's good."  I was pretty astonished as well.  I stopped even trying to score a point after the next morning.

You see that red bag hanging from the middle?  I put a banana in it before going to bed.

When we woke up that banana was on the floor half eaten!

No, the bag did not rip and the banana did not fall out.  Look again.  It somehow went into the red bag, got the banana out of the bag and took it over to the other end of the room and ate it!

  

Ratmouse 11, Robby and D quit.

While we had no luck with the ratmouse, we were having lots of success with collections!  We finished San Salvador MPA and decided to treat ourselves to a nice dinner (aka not fish) and get some ice cream as well so we headed to Iba, an hour bus ride south, and went to the mall! 

Woo!  Malls!

We got pizza for dinner and then celebrated with ice cream and lemonade!

After several days on the water we were in need of some more air for our scuba tanks so the plan was that Robby would do a tank run and I would take the day to write a blog post.  It's hard to find time to keep you all posted (which is why you get occasional long ones rather than frequent short updates, sorry about it)!  However, we woke up to find that there was no power at Puerto Asinan.  When Brian (our trike driver) arrived we loaded the trike and we decided to drop me off at SeaSun Resort (our other field home) to do work there while they went to Bolinao to fill the tanks.  We were loaded and in the trike to go when Brian told us that there was no power at SeaSun either.  He explained that there was no electricity in all of Zambales, for the whole day.  Evidently this was a scheduled black out that we were not made aware of.  So with that we realized I could not work at all today as my computer was dead so we changed plans and I went on the tank run while Robby stayed at Puerto Asinan and did some dissections.  You certainly have to be flexible out here, nothing ever (ever ever ever) goes as we plan, despite our best efforts in planning!

Brian showed up with some new additions to the trike.  He had an iron door to help hold the tanks inside.

He also had fastened some wooden sticks to his trike for support. 

Which helped us tie the tanks down easier and keep them in place.  He takes his job seriously, which is why we love him!

It was smooth sailing all the way to Bolinao and back to Santa Cruz.

Unfortunately as we passed back into Santa Cruz, Zambales we got a flat.

Thank goodness the Filipino people are so helpful! Within 30 seconds two men were helping Brian prop up the trike and then one of them took him to a shop to get the tire patched. 

I waited with the tanks on the side of the road, looking very out of place, while he got the tire fixed.

All told it took about it an hour until we were back on the road so it wasn't too bad.  When I got back to Puerto I had a meal waiting for me: sweet and sour grouper and calamari!  Momma Norma is the best!

Robby went to the market to buy the fish and squid and then Momma Norma cooked it up for us!

I almost forgot, of course we had rice as well!  They always keep a pot full of rice on their table.

With our full tanks and full bellies we were back out on the boat the next day collecting in Bani and Taklobo Farm.

We started leaving earlier in the morning (5-6 am) as the weather was starting to get bad in the afternoons. Lots of wind and storms (just as we had been warned) were causing the water to be murky making collecting specific-sized fish pretty difficult.

But we pressed on, and after three days we had finished collections inside of Bani!

Which meant another ice cream celebration!

So good!

With two MPAs down these two set out to finish up Taklobo Farm.

We were having a bit more trouble in Taklobo Farm, as the MPA is much smaller and we had been collecting in the afternoons after doing Bani in the morning, so it had been super cloudy and hard to see.

We decided to head there first thing in the morning and that made all the difference.  It was so clear, there were SO many fishes!

We also became much more efficient with our protocols by the time we reached Taklobo MPA.  We had bags labeled and ready to go each morning for the coming day and also got paperclips to keep the tracker held down so it didn't blow around while we tried to record fish sizes on it.  That was a game changer, it was taking two people to hold it down and record as it was so windy out on the boat!  Paperclips fixed that easily.

During our last morning in Taklobo Farm, a boat full of local tourists came .

After seeing the logo on their boat I thought I was witnessing scuba tanks (and thus an air compressor) materialize out of thin air.  It turned out the logo was as much of a lie as SeaSun's and they were not scuba diving after all, just snorkeling.

After around 10 days of cruising around Masinloc's MPAs we had all the fish we needed and were ready to head up to SeaSun to start work in Candelaria and Santa Cruz!

We thanked Noel's wife for lunch and paid her, it came out to $3 a day to feed all of us!  Living here is so cheap!

Then we called Brian to move us from Puerto Asinan up to SeaSun.

It took two runs but we got it all up there pretty easily.  Love this guy and his trike!

While we were waiting for Brian to return for the second round of gear, Momma Norma's son showed us photo albums filled with pictures of what Puerto Asinan used to look like, before a typhoon destroyed most of the place.

Evidently the resort was so nice a Filipino movie was filmed there!  We got to see a young Momma Norma with a bunch of famous actors and actresses! 

Once Brian returned we said goodbye to Puerto Asinan and headed to SeaSun for the remainder of our field work.

First order of business was creating a new tracker for Candelaria's MPA.

It looked so nice compared to Masinloc's, they get quite a lot of use once collections begin!

We then had to secure the boat for Candelaria.  We had been waiting to hear from Candelaria all week about starting collections the following week, but on Friday they informed us that we could not begin because BFAR (yes that same organization that required the MOA) was going to be in the area and needed Candelaria's boats to do their assessments.  With that news we contacted Santa Cruz and thankfully they were able to secure a boat and a bantay dagat to accompany us out into the MPA on Monday without a problem. Losing a week of collections would have been very bad news for our tight schedule!

The MPA in Santa Cruz surrounds half of the island of Hermana Menor.

This MPA has giant barrel sized buoys clearly marking the boundary of the MPA.

The bantay dagats here have a nice guard house, restrooms and picnic areas that tourists are allowed to use if they hire a boat to come out to the island.

We parked the boat on the shores of Hermana Menor each morning to pick up our bantay dagat and drop off the ingredients for lunch.

Then we headed out into the MPA to find a spot that Robby and Noel agreed upon.  Robby wanted to make sure it was well within the bounds of the MPA and Noel wanted to ensure it had the right kind of coral cover for our species.

Once they picked a spot we anchored.

And then geared up to go.  Noel had to wrap up his speargun as they would not allow it on the bus up from Masinloc to Santa Cruz just as it was.  After the first day in Santa Cruz we just kept his gear with us so he didn't have to lug it an hour back and forth on the bus!

Gearing up on the bangkas is kind of tricky as they are very small and scuba equipment is pretty bulky, not to mention heavy.  However, the boatman and bantay dagat were great and made the transition into the water smooth.

Come lunch time we would head back to Hermana Menor

And would have lunch in the guard house. The bantay dagats wife prepared our food using the ingredients we dropped off earlier that morning.  So convenient!

She was a wonderful cook and graciously made us chicken adobo as we were craving anything but fish!

Our second day out in Hermana Menor was much of the same, with one exception.

We had woken up at 6am to load all of the tanks onto the trike to do a run to Bolinao.  Robby was going to get the tanks filled and I was going to go do collections with Noel.  As Brian was finishing putting the tanks on the trike, and we were finishing preparing everything for the boat, all of a sudden we heard a loud mechanical sound.  It took about 5 minutes for Robby and I to register what we were hearing.  We are so used to loud noises that we have gotten very good at tuning them out.  But then, we looked outside of our door to where the noise was coming from


and it was an air compressor filling scuba tanks right outside of our front door!


After all of the trouble we had gone through to find air, one turns up right outside of where we are staying without any word from anyone. We were floored.

Well, it just so happened that the group from BFAR that was using the boats in Candelaria was also staying at SeaSun while doing their work, and they were scuba diving in order to do the assessments.  They said they would be there all week and after much discussion Robby and I were able to convince them to fill our tanks each night after we went diving.  The timing could not have been better, now Robby didn't have to miss a day on the water running up to Bolinao!  With that we unloaded the tanks from the tricycle, paid Brian a little something for having gone through that hassle of tying them down and then taking them off, and then got Robby ready to come out on the boat!  What a wonderful turn of events, we haven't caught much of a break on anything since we've been here (quite the opposite most times) so we really enjoyed getting some good fortune!  We couldn't believe our luck.

On top of that, collections were going really well, and we were nearly finished in Santa Cruz after just two days.  Their MPA was large and incredibly healthy so finding the fish we needed was not an issue!

We were a little worried though because Robby's advisor was coming to join us in the field that night to go out with us the following day.  She was on her way to another field site and would be stopping over to offer some help and see how the project was going.  Robby and I were so nervous that we were going to arrive back at SeaSun to find a broken compressor and be told they couldn't fill our tanks.  As we were using the last of the filled tanks we had that day, we were just crossing our fingers that it would turn out alright and she would not arrive and be unable to dive.

All of our worrying was for not.  We got back to SeaSun and handed over 10 tanks to be filled which they did without a problem!

The next day Dr. Arceo joined the crew out in Hermana Menor and we finished collections.

We finished the inside collections after one dive, Noel just needed to get a couple smaller fish of each species.  We then went outside the MPA to finish up collections there. We had been having trouble finding the bigger fish outside so we spent the rest of the day there with a break of course for lunch.

Lunch this day included fish as Noel decided to catch some since we were outside of the MPA.

He apparently does not tire of grilled fish!

I, however, left the fish for them and ate the chicken!

Our Hermana Menor team: Me, Noel, Robby, our bantay dagat and his wife and our boatman.

After lunch we headed back outside of the MPA and finished all of our collections in Santa Cruz!

Finishing Hermana Menor meant another round of ice cream for us!

Since Dr. Arceo was in town for the evening, it also meant we had a van that had air conditioning (what a treat!) and we were able to go into town for dinner.  She bought us BBQ chicken as well as bloody pork and a couple of other dishes we had not tried before.  It was great that she was able to join us for our collections in Santa Cruz and that everything went smoothly while she was there.  The next morning we were starting in Candelaria.  We had found a way to take another boat out, that was not being used by BFAR, and so we could start collections.

Dr. Arceo had their driver load up the van the next morning to drive us down to Candelaria to meet our bantay dagats and begin collections there.  Having our own vehicle was sooooooo much easier. Unfortunately that luxury only lasted 1 day.

In Candelaria we departed right off the beach from Dawal (and several other) resorts, 25 minutes south of SeaSun.  We chose to stay at SeaSun and make the commute because these resorts are two to three times more expensive as they are right near Potipot Island, which is a tourist attraction in the region.

Noel met us on the beach and got ready on the boat as we headed out to the MPA.

Candelaria's MPA stretches along the coastline, and if you remember from our previous blog, they have a very smooth operation with many bantay dagats and a very nice guard house.

Unfortunately, as it was the first week of June at this point, bad weather started around 2pm every day.

On our first day of collections we were able to get off the water before the storm hit.  However, on our second day in Candelaria, our luck changed in several ways.

We woke up at 5:30am to the sound of BFARs compressor, just as we had gone to bed with the sound of it all week (it was wonderfully convenient but my head was about ready to explode from the constant noise, it takes 30 minutes to fill one tank so doing ours and theirs takes hours).  Unfortunately (or fortunately for my brain) the compressor stopped all of a sudden and did not come back on.  We finished getting ready and went over to find out what was happening.  Apparently they had only filled 5 of our 10 tanks the night before and were trying to fill the other 5 this morning.

As they were filling, you guessed it, the compressor broke.

They told us they couldn't fix it and that they hadn't brought their back-up compressor (their boss was not happy about that) so convenient tank fills were over.  We knew it was too good to last!  We headed out to Candelaria with the tanks we had already filled (I'd been getting a few extra filled each night just in case something like this happened) so we were fine to go out and do collections that day.  It just meant a tank run to Bolinao the following morning!

While tanks were still a constant problem, we had the rest of our process down to a science (pun very much intended).

We started writing down exactly what size Noel was to spear of each species on an underwater slate.  On the other side of the slate were measured lines so he could compare the fish to the line to see how close he was.  

We were asking him for very specific fish, to the centimeter, so this really helped him get exactly what we needed!



Noel would take the time to study what he needed and ask us any questions.

Once out on the boat, Noel would put the slate in his catch bag and then jump in the water to finish gearing up.

He would always just drop his spear (or throw it overboard once we anchored) and then just find it once he got down there.  I never got used to the idea, kept thinking he was going to lose it!

Noel would put his gear on as he sank to the bottom (another habit I was never quite comfortable with).

Once underwater he would consult the slate again before shooting any fish.

Then he would find his gun, wherever it came to rest, and start the hunt.

Once he caught a fish he would measure it against the lines we had drawn and decide whether or not it was what was needed.

If Robby or I were close he would sometimes ask us for the ok on the fish, just to double check about the sizing.

Sometimes Robby or I would help with the measuring, but for the most part Noel handled it on his own.

After awhile he would have to check his bag to see what he had and what he still needed.

He doubled checked with one of us if he needed to.  He took no chances with inside MPA fish.  We could not have asked for a better fishermen!

After each dive Noel would take the fish he collected and hand them to me smallest to largest, by species.

I would then put the fish on the fish board (while balancing on the rocking boat)

Record the length of the fish,

and then tell Robby who would record it on the tracker.

We would do this after each dive, and then while Noel was down collecting we would either nap

Or dive if we had enough tanks.

We had a lot of fun whenever we did get to go diving.  That's me doing a handstand on Robby's tank, no big deal.

One time while Noel was down collecting, and we were out of tanks for ourselves, the bantay dagat on our boat spotted a dynamite fisherman.

He got on his radio to report it to the guard house.

Unfortunately, nobody answered the call and so he just tried to wave them off.

The dynamite fishermen paid no attention and kept going, but we couldn't do anything as Noel was underwater.  However, the next day we had just dropped Noel in the water and they spotted the boat again.  

This time our bantay dagat ditched Noel (I guess because he thought he'd be under for the next hour) and headed off at top speed after the illegal fishermen.  

The fishermen spotted us and sped off, we pursued for awhile but there was no way our boat was going to catch up to theirs.  Eventually, we turned back and found Noel (who had actually popped up because he heard the dynamite and was waiting for us).  Thinking the coast was now clear, Robby got in and he and Noel both went down, only to both pop up about 10 minutes later because of a huge dynamite blast.  

Yes, we've been experiencing dynamite fishing while diving almost daily since we have been here.  Usually, it is always far away and is not dangerous (miles and miles away) so you just hear a loud crack underwater.  However, these fishermen were within view and so the blast was enough to make both Noel and Robby immediately come out of the water.  They said it was like thunder booming through their bodies.  I refused to let Robby get back in, I didn't know if you could get a concussion from that but it seemed like a terrible idea.  Noel was also leery to get back in with them so close so we called it a day.

On our way back to shore it started raining,

Brain picked us up and about 5 minutes into our rainy ride home he pulled over because we got another flat tire!

Another tricycle driver stopped and took Brian to a local shop to get it fixed.  Brian had just bought new tires for his trike since he was doing so many trips to Bolinao with us so it wasn't that he just had bad tires.  He just had terrible luck.

It turns out we ran over this huge nail!  Fortunately, after about 30 minutes of standing in the rain, Brian was back with a patched tire and we made it the rest of the way to SeaSun without a problem.

At the end of each day we would come back to SeaSun and clean our gear.

We'd wash the salt off of our gear in a big trash can filled with fresh water.

Then we would hang it all out to dry next to our room.

Since the BFAR compressor was broken, we had to take a break from collections to do another tank run the following day.  Robby went with Brian this time and I stayed back to finally write that blog!

Less than 30 minutes into their drive, Brian and Robby got yet another flat tire.

Robby waited while Brian went to get it fixed, which he did without a problem and it held for the remainder of the trip. As you can see from the homemade jack above, Brian was nothing if not inventive!

Fortunately, the rest of the day went smoothly and we ended the day with 20 filled scuba tanks.  
What a beautiful sight!

This meant Robby and I could do a lot of diving as there was no way Noel would need 20 tanks to finish Candelaria.  We were actually pretty glad the BFAR compressor conked out as the result meant more diving for us!

Our last days in Candelaria went smoothly.

Lots of grilled fish for lunch

Yes I started eating grilled fish again.

 Mostly because I knew it would be the last freshly caught fish I'd be eating for awhile and they are really delicious!

We also had many mangos to finish up each meal.  June is the end of mango season so it seemed appropriate to be wrapping up just as the mangoes were finishing up as well.

Unfortunately, I accidentally deleted all of the photos from our last day of diving.  I had several of us with Noel and our spearguns and us celebrating being done.  Since I can't give you those, I'll just give you the GoPro shots from that day:

Our dive gear ready to go for our final day of collections.

We couldn't believe it was our last day on the boat, but we were so thankful to have enough tanks for us to dive!

Robby's last spear fishing dive.

We were both pretty sad to be done!  Though, my feet had been rubbed raw (I couldn't even wear my booties and fins) from all the snorkeling and diving so my body was ready to be on land for awhile. 

On our last day we also got to try out the local fins.

Certainly a different feel, more of a breaststroke kick than a flutter kick.  We were so glad we got to try them out!  The bantay dagat, Nick, that was with us let us use his to swim around with.

Well, that about wraps it up for collections.  We have been trying to make a video to go along with this blog for several weeks now, we got lots of nice footage inside of the MPAs, but we are having some technical difficulties (slash have been crazy busy with dissections) so that video will come out with the next blog.  You'll just have to come back!

While I don't have much else from our last day, I do have our celebratory ice cream selfie!

And Robby with his giant bin of lollipops I bought him as a "yay we actually did it" gift. 

While I lost the celebration out on the water, I did manage to keep photos from the party that we threw to thank everyone for their help. 

Robby wanted to thank the Masinloc LGU for all of their help throughout his project.  They are the ones who were filling tanks for us at the beginning and who put us in touch with Noel and just generally made this project possible.

So we took the bus back down to Masinloc

to Puerto Asinan as Momma Norma had agreed to cook for the party and let us throw it at the resort.

We tried to buy as much as we could from her (she has a small store attached to the house).

Everything she didn't have we listed out and went to the market to buy.

We got chicken to make fried chicken.

Pork for pork adobo.

Yes, buying it from the market worried me a little as the meat is just out in the open with flies buzzing around, but our tummies managed!

We got rice, of course (Momma Norma didn't want the Angelica rice otherwise we would have bought your namesake Ange!)

We had been told by the LGU to expect about 20 people so we bought a lot of food.

5 kilos (11 lbs) of mangos 

6 big Tuna

2 kilos (4.4 lbs) of squid

2 kilos (4.4 lbs) of pork

2 kilos (4.4 lbs) of chicken

And of course 3 kilos (6.6 lbs) of rice.

Momma Norma and her neighbors prepared the food, in the outdoor kitchen and inside the house.

I watched a good deal of the prep as I wanted to know how to make calamari. 

Side note: squid have this membrane in them that feels exactly like a man-made plastic.  Very strange.

I also found out while watching them cook that the reason the calamari and fried chicken is so delicious is that she douses it with MSG.  Oh well.

They grilled the fish outside.

In hindsight just the fish would have been enough to feed everyone that showed up!

Noel and his wife were among our guests.

But we only had about 12 people total that actually came (8 of the 20 we were told to expect from the LGU).

As a result we had way, way more food than we needed, but we gave it to Momma Norma and her neighbors and the guests to take home so it all worked out in the end!

During the party Robby showed the video he had made for the LGU highlighting each of their MPA's.

Robby made similar videos for Santa Cruz and Candelaria as well to thank them for letting us do work there and to give them something they can use to show off their MPA.

We also gave Noel this and several other things (a mask as his had cracked when a tank was dropped on it, and some other dive gear) to thank him for all of his help.

Everyone had a really nice time and then we all headed home.  We had invited Brian our trike driver and his wife to thank them as well as they were integral in the project being able to finish, so we got a ride back to SeaSun with them.

We also gave Brian this to remember us and all our crazy long journeys to Bolinao!

Our party was the weekend of June 6 and we had been communicating with UP for over a week trying to coordinate a van to take us, and all of our gear, back to Manila that coming week.  We were having no luck.  We had 20 scuba tanks and many bags of gear so taking the bus back to Manila was not an option.  The truck that Robby had used to bring the scuba tanks and other gear to the field he was told was actually only for UP professors so he could not use it again. Confusing.  They did however find a van in another department that we could use but it was going to cost almost $200 and take two days as the driver wouldn't do it all in one day.  Additionally, the earliest we could use it was June 15 so we would be stuck in the field until then.

Robby and I didn't like that as we had 1700 fish to dissect and needed to get going or we wouldn't finish before I had to leave (we couldn't extend my time here any longer) so we asked the Masinloc LGU at the party if they had any ideas.  They immediately got on the phone to call around and ask, these people are amazing!  They told us we could use their municipalities government van, but would get back to us on the price.  Brian also said he had friends with cars and would ask around.

Over the next several days we went to three friends of Brian's to inquire about being taken back to Manila in their respective vehicles.  

All of them were going to charge us almost $200 so we decided to wait and see what Masinloc came back with.  

The Masinloc LGU van said they could take us June 12 and would only charge $110 so we decided to go with them.

June 12 was Independence Day here (even Google celebrated!) so we were immediately concerned that this plan would fall apart because of the holiday.

  They assured us that the driver would drive on the holiday (we asked several times) and it was not a problem.  On June 11, however, we got a call.  We were informed that actually the van's license plates were restricted from driving on holidays (there are lots of regulations here due to traffic in the city so certain plates can only drive on certain days).  Evidently nobody had realized this until now and so they told us they couldn't take us until the following Monday, June 15.  Robby and I had no other option so we decided to wait over the weekend and use the van Monday.  We decided to move our things back to Puerto Asinan, there were far fewer mosquitoes there than at SeaSun, and we were going to spend the next 3 days dissecting so we wanted to be bug free.

We said goodbye to Nelly who runs SeaSun, loaded our things on Brian's trike for one last time and left!

We arrived back at Puerto and had a nice last weekend dissecting and spending time with Momma Norma and her family (her children and grandchildren were in town).  We were told that Saturday the driver wanted to do the first leg of the trip to go and get our fish from the freezer in Bolinao (it is north and Manila is south so he didn't want to go in the opposite direction and add time to our long day Monday, understandably).  We had been shuttling fish each time we did tank runs as the Marine Station in Bolinao has a huge freezer and we had waaay too many fish to fit in Momma Norma's freezer.  Why the driver could do this on Saturday and not take us to Manila until Monday we have no idea.  Sometimes you just can't get a straight answer here so we just said thank you and went with it.

When the van showed up Saturday we were pretty excited (part of us thought this would fall through), but there it was in all its hugeness and it was all ours!  So convenient!

We made it to Bolinao and got the fish from the freezer.

And put them in our coolers to then be brought back with us to Masinloc.

It turns out Masinloc has a giant empty freezer that we were able to use to keep the fish until Monday (yes, it would have been nice to know that information the past couple of months...).  Anyway, come Monday we packed up and waited for the van.

We had the 20 scuba tanks

Which fit with no problem.

Then we packed in all of our other gear.

Then went and picked up our coolers full of fish.

We filled the van up pretty well in the end!

But still had enough room to stretch out ourselves.

Definitely the easiest trip to Manila to date!

On the way home we started turning our attention to the 1,606 fish that needed to be dissected.  We had done a little over 100 over the weekend while in Masinloc but not too many as we wanted to relax some and enjoy our last days in the field.  We did the math and made a schedule and realized that we could finish all the fish before I left July 9, but that we really had very little wiggle room if we were to complete them all!  We can do 80 fish in a 10 hour day so to do that math for you that was 20 full 10 hour days of dissecting to finish.  We can't be in the building on Sunday so that meant we had exactly 20 working days starting the following day going until the day before I was to leave.  So when I said very little wiggle room, I meant none.  Of course, we knew Robby could do 60 or so fish over the course of 2 days (yes, it is so much slower to do this on your own there are just so many things to do!) so we did have some wiggle room, but we didn't want to leave a lot for Robby to do as he would have other things to take care over in the weeks leading up to his return home.

While we were crunching numbers we also figured out some other fun things about the project.  All told we figured out the following:

• We used 7 different air compressors to complete the project.
• I spent 24.9 hours underwater scuba diving.
• Robby spent 48 hours underwater scuba diving.
• We made 6 trips to Bolinao on Brian's tricycle.
• We spent 47,100 PHP ($1,050) on boats.
• We spent 260 hours on the water.
• We collected 2459(ish) fish.
• We ate roughly 5000 mangoes, which was not nearly enough.

While the above was fun to reflect on, the fun fact I'm actually going to leave you with is what happened on the ride back to Manila.

 A couple hours into the drive Robby started to complain that he had a headache and didn't feel well.  We thought he was just dehydrated and so we stopped for some water and then he fell asleep.  When we arrived back in Manila we took the van to UP to unload the fish and other gear and Robby looked awful.  I felt his forehead and he was burning hot.  We got home as quickly as we could after that and I spent the afternoon running errands (laundry, food, medicine) while he slept.  I gave him medicine when I got home that knocked his fever down and then I figured out a plan for what to do if he got sicker throughout the night.  Darryl (the graduate student we work closely with) was concerned Robby had Dengue Fever.  I called his mom to talk through options that first night and she advised to just wait it out and see if he improved, but to have a plan in place if he got worse.

Well, the next morning I woke up with a fever as well. We both slept the entire day with awful headaches and on and off high fevers.  We were on the phone with our parents on and off trying to decide what this was and if we should be concerned.  The fever kept coming and going and the intense headaches also ebbed and flowed so we thought we would just stay in bed and ride it out.  Well, then I developed a rash all over my entire body (my skin has really had a rough time over here) and then I couldn't look to the left or right without getting severe eye pain.  At this point I did a virtual visit with my doctor, and he said I had Dengue Fever.  So Robby and I spent the entire first week of being back in Manila in bed with Dengue.  You get Dengue from mosquito bites, but there is no vaccine and nothing you can do if you come down with it.  It is a virus that just runs its course so we just slept.

We slept for the entire first week we were back in Manila.  Yea, our schedule was shot to hell.

Why can nothing ever go as planned with this project!?  We thought for sure we could rely on ourselves to actually get things done in the time frame we needed!  We hadn't expected to get sick and lose 6 working days.  Are we actually going to be able to finish dissecting now?  Well, that remains to be seen, but now that we are healthy we are in the lab all day everyday trying!  We will write one last post on this soon! Stay tuned!

P.S. Anyone want to fly over to help?  We need it!