So my mom and dad called me to visit them in the little town of Libertad (Antique province, Philippines), and off I went with long-time buddy Arnold Lorenzo. Libertad is a very undeveloped town, with a rough road going to/from it, the first phone lines were only installed on 2003, newspapers are still a day late, FM and TV signals are hard to receive and only a couple of stations if ever, but best of all: no pollution (air & noise) and lots of trails!

It's awesome to re-discover the joys of stock wheelin' again. Open diffs, measly 30.5" street tyres, no snorkel, no turbo-intercooler, but with a 2.8L diesel pickup (2004 Toyota Hilux with 3L engine). We went from Manila to Batangas City (Batangas province), took a 2-hr., PhP 625, Ro-Ro ferry to Calapan (Minodoro), drove 130km of rough asphalt roads to Roxas (Mindoro), then took the 4.5-hr., PhP 1028, Ro-Ro ferry to Caticlan (Aklan province), then drove about 40km of dirt road to our home in Libertad (Antique province). This'll be the same route to get back to stinking Metro Manila.

In Libertad town, I gave my friend a crash course in 4wd driving. We drove in high speed over dirt roads, 4Lo over rocks in the river, but the best was when I got him stuck in the sand at the beach. I made him very aware of the coming high tide and that we had but a few minutes of daylight left... And when all seemed lost, I lowered the tyre pressures so we can drive out. I loved the look of relief on his face when I was done with that prank!