Castillejos loop de las loonies

The Wednesday Walkers took a long thirty-minute Jeepney ride out to Castillejos and proceeded to do an almost 8K stroll on the backroads of town. It’s almost crazy the lengths we will go to in order to see some relatively new scenery. There, I made this post title somewhat sensible now, right? Here are some photos from our journey:

Exiting the Jeepney
Posing for the group shot
Let the roadwork begin
Are we having fun yet?
I’ve been known to worship light beer
Govic Highway, let me slip away on you…
The wide open road
A more pleasant stretch of road
A horny carabao
Faking a leg injury
Dirt is better than pavement for walking
Taking in the view
Marching on
Saluting the Wednesday Walkers
A peaceful village of shanties
Country living
The way ahead seems peaceful enough
Nature’s arch
In Flanders fields?
This pink teddy appears to be escaping
And then we came upon this huge, vacant, haunted-looking mansion. I’d love to know the story behind this.
Always look both ways before crossing
We had planned to conclude our hike with lunch at Mad Willies. Alas, the hours have changed and now they don’t open until noon.
But we had the good fortune to catch a passing Victory Liner bus for the ride back to Barretto. Air-conditioned comfort is much better than a Jeepney for only 20 pesos more.
We wound up having our lunch and liquid refreshments at It Doesn’t Matter. It’s all good!
We went thataway!

Swan and I spent a good portion of our Wednesday evening at BarCelona.

The view from our regular perch
Looks like Mama has a homeless friend
My date
Me and my date
Who cut the fart?
Then we moved out to the rooftop area
The space between By The Sea and Central Park Reef resorts
Looking up the highway
And looking down the highway
A colorful sky

We had our nightcap downstairs at Green Room. We shared a table with my friend Tom, who regaled me with stories from the good ol’ days in Barretto (he’s been here for twenty-five years). It’s tame here by comparison to what he termed “the Wild West,” when things were a lot crazier. I’ll take it the way it is, thank you very much.

We ordered our dinner to take out from Sit-n-Bull.

The options for a dieter exclude my usual favorites. I had these ham slices with a side of coleslaw.

But you do what you gotta do, right?

I did manage to come in under my target goal

I’ll do my weekly weigh-in in the morning. The last pair of shorts I bought had a size 42 waist. When I loosened my belt as I prepared for bed, the shorts dropped to the floor, still fully buttoned. I’ll take that as a good sign!

Today’s memory is the view from my apartment window in Seoul twelve years ago:

That’s snow, not fog. And speaking of fog, I’m not sure if that’s from my apartment or not. It doesn’t look familiar to me now. Plus, I think we were higher up. Oh well.

Today’s YouTube video gives a glimpse of life in Barretto in 1992 when it was still the “Wild West.”

And the daily dose of humor:

Hey, I resemble that remark!
It’s more than a feeling
That pun crashed on takeoff. Sorry!

I’m not sure what’s in store for this evening, but tomorrow morning, I’ll be heading to Pozorrubio in the province of Pangasinan to participate in this year’s running of the Haggis Hash. It’s always good to get out of town for a change of pace. Don’t worry, I’ll be posting my lame crap from there so my loyal reader(s) won’t miss out on the fun!

And the “first time hearing” video:

5 thoughts on “Castillejos loop de las loonies

  1. re: “loop de la loonies”

    I guess you can write this however you want since it doesn’t really match any Romance language, but if you wanted to follow the linguistic rules, you should know that, in French and Spanish, “de la” is followed by a SINGULAR feminine noun.

    • loop de la loonie

    If you wanted to keep “loonies” plural, you would have to make changes according to the language.

    • Spanish: de los/las loonies (masc/fem)
    • French: des loonies (either gender)

    Dirt is better than pavement for walking

    I disagree. Dirt means pebbles in my shoes.

    This pink teddy appears to be escaping

    Poor thing needs eyes and a nose. I get a little sentimental about certain stuffed animals.

    Good walk, and good luck tomorrow.

  2. Re: Pavement vs. dirt – I agree. Definitely can go faster on pavement, but IMO the little bit of extra cushion found on dirt or grass makes a difference on the legs and how they feel after a long walk.

    Re: “Wild West Days” in Barretto – is that because the US Navy was still there in Subic Bay and there was spillover from that?

    A pretty natural smile in that pic of you and Swan. Good to see. LOL

  3. Brian, yes, and walking in dirt feels cooler without the reflected heat off the pavement.

    I understand it had a different vibe in the Navy days, and most of the nasty bars were in Subic. The stories my friend told were more about law and order issues. He said back then, the cops were the gangsters, and you always had to be careful not to piss off the wrong person.

    Smiling ain’t my style, but Swan insists. I guess it’s the little things you do to keep them happy!

  4. Kev, well, I was going for the Spanish vibe, but I see now that I should have used the plural. However, what do you use when the group is mixed? I guess I should have gone with the singular since I’m obviously the loonie.

    I’ve never experienced the pebble issue except when wading through water. I just enjoy the vibe of being off-road.

    Swan can’t sleep without her Teddy. Sometimes, I hide it and smile while watching her frantically search the bedroom for it.

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