Beaches - Post #5

I am going to White Beach in the Philippines. The capitol of the Republic of the Philippines is Manila. The Philippines are a group of over 7,000 tropical islands. It is surrounded by the South China Sea, the Philippines Sea, the Sulu Sea and the Celebes Sea. The GPS coordinates are 130 North and 1220 East. The climate is tropical. The average temperature is 21-34 degrees Celsius all year long. The hottest it gets is 38 degrees Celsius. There are an average of 20 typhoons each year. They bring heavy rain and strong winds and cause millions and millions worth of damage. It rains 82 inches a year.

There are a lot of sailboats on the beach and in the water. The sand is definitely white. Palm trees are everywhere. People are walking up and down the beach and the Ocean is a very light greenish blue color.

First inhabitants were Tabon man who lived there at least 47,000 years ago. People lived in the caves to survive the ice age. People walked to the Philippines over land bridges from the Malay Peninsula, Borneo and maybe Australia 250,000 years ago. Tool-wielding Indonesians arrived 48,000 years ago. A thousand years later the Tabon man arrived.

The Maylays came 2000 years ago and they were potters, weavers and sailors. They built permanent settlements and prospered until the 16th century when the Spanish arrived. Ferdinand Magellan landed at Samar on March 16, 1521. The Spanish took over the Philippines and named the islands after King Philip of Spain.

America fought the Spanish and defeated them and took over the country until Word War II. During World War II fighting took place on the islands. Japan occupied the Philippines. Gen. Douglas MacArthur came in and fought the Japanese and took back the Philippines. 1.1 million Filipinos died during the war. After World War II the country including more than 3/4 of its schools and universities were in ruins. The United States gave aid in the form of high-interest loans to rebuild the country. The country is now ruled by a president that was elected by the people of the Philippines.

The location is important because it has been owned by several countries.

White Beach, Boracay Island, Philippines is 5,247 kilometers from Ocean Beach, Australia. I will get there by airplane, driving and boat.

First you have to fly from Perth, Australia to Manila, Philippines by jet. It requires one stop. The cost cheapest airline, Malaysia Airlines, is $590. Then you have to take a 50 minutes flight from Manila to Kalibo, Aklan. then you need to travel for two hours by land by bus or jeepney to Caticlan. In Caticlan you have to fill out some travel forms and then you can go by boat to the island of Boracay Island and White Beach.

It feels stupid because I can just go to a beach in America and not waste as much gas and also not pollute the environment so much because it takes thousands of gallons of jet fuel just to get there just so I can enjoy myself. The only way I would go out of the country and this state is if I was completely surrounded by other countries and there was no beach. I'd prefer to stay in Maine and go to beaches rather than waste time and money going around the world and give other countries our money so other countries can get a better economy, so why not just spend the money here and help our state economy.