Panic in the Paraw

The "Love Song," which was the actual boat we were on.

This is s similar boat that we road on.

You can see how the hammock thing works.

Hello Tebo blog fans. It has been a tremendous amount of time since I have last posted but was compelled to write about our experience this morning. Having kids doesn't automatically quell a parent's sense of adventure. We all want a bit of fun doing outdoorsy type stuff with our kids, right? As a part of our hotel package on Boracay we received a "island hopping" ride on a Paraw, which is a downrigger sailboat.   Being the awesome parents we are, we asked if it was safe and if the ride was rough etc. We were assured it was fine as long as Gabby liked the water. Gabby really likes the water so we felt alright going on a nice leisurely cruise around the island.
A Paraw is an interesting boat with one part conoe, one part catamaran, one part tarp, and one part hammock. After getting settled in our hammock type areas, Cara and Gabby on one side, me on the other Cara put on her life jacket. Gabby also had a decent floatation device that would keep her head above water if we wanted to stop and have a nice swim somewhere on our cruise around the island. I of course didn't accept the offer of  a life jacket because the two guys running the boat didn't have them on and I'm a good swimmer if something happened to the boat so I figured I'd be OK.
As we slowly moved through the shallows I layed back on the woven material, looking up at the sky, thinking about how great it was to experience a sailing trip with Cara and Gabby. The sail caught a bit more wind and we began to pick up speed causing one end of the boat to come out of the water. The pilot expertly managed the sails to push us even faster until Cara and Gabby were suspended at least five feet above the water. Gabby was smiling,Cara was whooping with glee, in short, it was a perfect moment in time...
Boracay is shaped like a dogbone that is roughly lined up North to South. We left from the beach on the West of the island and headed south. As we prepared to round the south end of the island the pilot told me to move over to Cara's side of the boat to give it more weight to counteract the much stronger wind we were about to encounter. The south side of the island has a narrow straight of water between Boracay and a larger island. The gap between the islands funnels the winds and waves concentrating their intensity. We were soon going up and down waves that grew progressively larger as we continued down the straight. Several times the bow would disappear in a wave as spray doused us. The waves were so large they would push up under the hammock mesh we were sitting on and send gushes of water into our faces. For about 10 minutes we were repeatedly hit with wave shrapnel. Gabby began to freak out, I began to worry...
As we made a turn along the Eastern side of the island the waves began approaching from a different angle that made it difficult to gauge how large they would be. The Eastern side of the island is the windward side at this time of year, this morning the wind was whipping the waves into a frenzy. 15 minutes had passed since we began experiencing large waves and Gabby had stopped crying and seemed to completely shut down. Cara later told me that she was bighting down on her life jacket as her arms had a death lock on hers.When a person is in over their head they weigh the options of throwing in the towel or forging on. My mind started going through my plan in case any of us went over the side, or if the boat broke up. The two sailors working the boat seemed completely unworried but could clearly see that we weren't handling the situation in kind. I asked the pilot if we could head for a beach and walk the half a mile across the island to our hotel but he said the water was too rough to manage the passage across the reef that sits offshore. Our only option was to trust our sailors, and keep a strong grip on the boat to prevent being washed over the side.
The north point of the island could be seen in the distance about 7 kilometers away, I locked my eyes on that point and measured our progress down the island by its growing size. It took about 30 minutes to begin rounding the Northern tip of the island and finally we caught a break. When we turned toward the west, the waves came from behind, the pilot perfectly aligning us to ride the wave, surfing for several seconds each time. My grip loosened and my mind relaxed knowing that we were going to be OK. Gabby took everything in stride, emerging from her shell as Cara's grip relaxed. She started saying, "Waves go bye bye, I don't like waves, waves go to sleep and stay in bed or they get a time out, waves go bye bye". The waves must have been listening because it was smooth sailing the rest of the way home.