I'll be the first to warn you peeps, this posts will have A BUTT LOAD of pictures, in fact more than I ever have put into my posts in the past so be patient with the load up ya?
[Our stopover fishing resort]
After spending the late last night introducing and getting to know the rest of the people from around the world, we still decided to get up relatively early to have our breakfast in the hotel and took the opportunity to check out the Placencia village we were at the moment.
We were told that the boat will only arrive at 1 p.m. because some have yet to arrive in Belize and we would have to wait for them. This was extremely good news because since we were up so early which gives us ample time to go nuts and explore the village!
[Good Morning Belize!]
[Started my day with a large English breakfast, a glass of OJ and strong black coffee!]
Funny thing happened during breakfast, I realized some of the Colombians were already up and early for breakfast by the time I reached the cafe. Me being the curious one started to snoop around what they were doing and I suddenly realized that the person sitting next to me WAS A COLOMBIAN MORNING SHOW DJ and HE WAS DOING HIS SHOW as I was sitting there!
Andrea, who was the radio DJ, was busy making his morning rounds on air and out of the blue, he pulled me into his mic and wanted me to say hello to the listeners of his show in Colombia! I for one DO NOT SPEAK A LICK of Spanish, nervously stuttered a few things in Spanish and continued to say hello in English!
Talk about morning pressure...
[The girls were up and ready for their morning stroll!]
So as we were set to go about running around in the village, we decided to split with the girls, who were quite keen to walk around the town nearby and check out some local souvenir shopping since they have the time to do so. I would have to agree as I felt it was way to early to do souvenir shopping since we just got here!
[First look at Placencia town]
Being a sun surf township, we realized that the town itself manage to maintain its "rusty beach" feel to the town which is seriously refreshing coming out from a big city like KL. Everything around here moves slowly with no pressure of people rushing to go somewhere and most of the places are still connecting with narrow lane dirt roads everywhere. To some this may look as a deserted, boring place. I however was loving the environment a lot!
[You would imagine Caribbean towns would look like this!]
[Small stalls by the side of the beach]
[The girls managed to find a craftshop that makes hand made Mayan Calendar replicas!]
As the girls we busy walking and shopping around the village township, their attention suddenly shifted on some of the coconuts that was around the area and wondered if they could actually have the coconut drinks to try. This is the part that I am not sure what really happened (perhaps either Miss Ave T or Fay would be so kind to update us on this) but the next thing you know, the locals there was more than happy to chop down two coconuts for them, split the open to give them a try!
[Really nice Belizian chap took the trouble to chop open two coconuts for the girls]
[Coconutty success!]
The things that pretty girls get these days...
So after a long walk around town, the girls decided to head back to the resort to have their complementary breakfast at the hotel cafe.
[Photo op with the owner of the resort, who was the friendliest hotel owner I have ever met!]
While the girls opted to walk around the town because it was easier for them to spot any shopping opportunities, I was in cahoots with the boys that we wanted to cover more grounds than the girls. Problem was that there was no way we would have enough time to cover that much by just walking around like how the girls did.
[The boys are ready to raise hell in the sunny morning in Belize!]
So we started to search around then hotel to see if we can find a solution to what we want. That was when David found a brilliant idea that we can use to achieve this.
Boom. Manly bicycle rides around town.
So there we were, trailblazing with the three us on the pebble laden dirt rounds of Placencia as we explored what the town had to offer to us. I have to admit that it has been a while since I last rode bicycles in a group and it does add in to the somewhat "macho" feel to what we doing. Unfortunately the condition of our bicycles were not exactly helping in giving that feel at all.
I had a bicycle that had a basket in front with a ring-ring bell. Shen Thuu's had a bright yellow one with the bar facing downwards and as you can see, David was riding a bright pink bike.
damn.
[Couldn't resist doing my "oh what a feeling" pose here]
Nevertheless, the three of us was clearly enjoying the beach breeze of the town as we rode around in full glee and tried to check out what was going on in town in the weekend morning. We found out that apart from ours, there were other resorts located nearby as well which focused more on boating, fishing or even surfing resorts as well! Of course we also saw some river side houses which I assume would cost a bomb.
[Decided to chillax at one of the fishing pier at the resorts]
[Found a boat so I decided to practice my pose when we arrive at the island]
[Can you imagine if a bank looks like this in Malaysia! Uber awesome!]
[Main road in the town. Seriously.]
We honestly took our time in exploring and it was clear that we were really enjoying ourselves. David couldn't stop saying hello and good morning to every person that we met and Shen Thuu was constantly taking pictures everywhere we went. I even got into the groove of stopping in every shop we found to check out what was sold there.
I think it was the feeling of being out of the big city that kinda got us going and we were completely into the whole environment of being in a sleepy beach town, let alone actually believing that we are actually in the Caribbean doing all this.
And then of course, we experienced what a tropical beach town was famous for.
Tropical rain.
Out of the blue, it suddenly poured like no tomorrow and we were still stuck in the middle of town on our bikes. All we knew is that we need to be back in the hotel pronto before the boat arrives to pick us up to the island and we suddenly realized we took too long exploring the town.
Giving into our primal instincts, we decided to leg it and ride as fast as we could to the resort despite the rain. I have to admit I was annoyed at first but all this suddenly reminded me again on how I use to play in the rain when I was growing up with my brothers and friends.
Minus the bicycle with the basket of course.
[Catching up with our friends, from Ecuador!]
As we reached the hotel we realized that almost everyone was already there in the resort waiting for the weather to clear up and also for the boat to arrive. Once again I was enjoying the company and at this stage, there were new people arriving from different parts of the world and I took the opportunity to introduce my loud self and getting to know these people as well!
Thankfully the weather cleared not long after and hence, we waited for the boat to arrive!
[Fay and Ave were busy showing off their matching nail polish]
While we were waiting, we realized that Fay was busy taking her pretty pictures, doing what she does best posing in gorgeous looking backdrop. I started to feel a bit mischievous so I hatched a plan with the boys to sabotage her by taking OUR VERSION OF POSES as well everytime she does it.
Coz we want to be pretty too. :D
[Duck face meets duckface]
Boy was she pissed and Ave could only shake her head. I proceeded with my evil laugh. Muahaha.
Soon enough, the boat arrived!
[I'm on a boat!]
As people hurriedly shuffled their way through to load up the boat with our bags and stuff, I decided to chill with my new found friends, Eduardo and Alessandro, who seem to be more busy enjoying their happy juice rather than getting onto the boat.
[taking some photo op before the boat ride!]
[Everyone seem to not have the party mood on yet...]
[... so I decided to change that!]
Everything was going on perfect. As the last of the people from Europe arrived at the docks, we started to load up the boat for our ride to go to the Anarchy Island and boy we were excited. The weather seem to be holding up much better after the shower and we were expected to have a clear weather all the way through our journey.
Things was going great. Too great to be honest. Time for me to sabotage this picture perfect situation.
Boom. Bromance Titanic picture. Done.
Once again, Ave could only shake her head.
So as we cruised out to the open sea, we were joined not only by those that arrived today, but also the organizing staff from Axe who was going to tell us the all important program that they have set for us. We were told that were going to be there for 4 days 3 nights and we will start our activities with checking into our rooms, followed by extreme beach activities, dinner and a open air movie night they have prepared for us. Sounds pretty good and as expected all of us were extremely psyched about reaching by now. Also they concluded that there is a surprise waiting for us at the island. Wonder what it is....
The boat ride took about 1 hour 15 minutes to reach the island and for most of us, it seemed like forever out in the open sea. I took the opportunity to sit in front as a look out and out of the blue, the boat started to slow down and I saw this over the yonder
[What in the world...]
It was then I realized, this was the surprise waiting for us!
[Presenting... THE AXE GIRLS!]
20 beautiful bikini clad ladies were waiting to greet us at the pier and was ready to take us on the island itself!
At that moment I quickly scurried to the front of the boat (much to the horror of the organizers) and produced my epic "I'm on a Boat" pose. We are officially now in Anarchy Island!
[Our boat arriving the island, with me in the front!]
[Hellooooo ladies!]
[We're HERE!]
[Ave managed to shuffle herself on the docks first and was greeted with a drink!]
As we boarded onto the island, we were escorted by the girls to the registration area where were given our designated rooms. If you guys are wondering why some of the pictures do not have my watermark on it but rather the Axe Anarchy Island tag on it, its because of this:
[Our smart RFiD tagger!]
Each of us were given a tag bracelet that contained an RFiD chip inside. What the organizer have done is hired a few professional photographers and fitted the girls with mobile cameras as well. At any given time, pictures will be taken for you and they will tag those pictures via those bracelet. Those pictures are immediately uploaded on our Facebook so that just in case you do not have your camera with you or just forgot to take pictures because you were partying to hard. Superb!
As soon as we were done with registration, we were escorted to our rooms. The awesome part was that not only we were given a room but an entire chalet that housed team Malaysia in it, complete with a kitchenette and living room as well.
How did we know which one was our room?
They had driftwood attached on our doors with our names on it!
[Super awesome!]
[The rooms had an awesome beach resort feel to it!]
[Don't know why but I am loving the color coordination of the room!]
[They even provided us with our very own stockpile of Axe products each!]
As we got ourselves settled down in our rooms, we were told to get ourselves ready for some beach activities that they have organized for us today. Not wanting to dress my best for the occasion, I took the opportunity to change my clothes to suit the activity.
Boom. Beach Suited Up laik a baus.
I have to admit it took us quite a while to warm up to the idea of jumping into the sea and splash around with it. Plus we had no clue what was going on and what the activities were. So first thing first, I jumped in for some beach volleyball to start.
[Getting myself warmed up]
As I was playing around with the group, something caught my attention over the docks that some of them were gathering at the edge of the platform.
[What the heck...]
That was when I realized that the organizers have set up what we know as the "Human Catapult" on the sea. How this works is that we have a floating pillow in the middle with one person sitting at the edge of it. Two people would then jump on it causing the other person to basically thrown into the sea with a considerable airtime to it.
[That's how much hang time we can get when we launched one of the Axe girls]
Since there we quite a lot of people who wanted to get launched over the pillow, I volunteered to become the cannonball first.
[We planned our landing spot with Anil looking rather worried...]
[... to which I missed the damn cushion!!!]
So after a disastrous run at being the cannonball for the people (I had a few good shots in), I decided that it was time for me to get myself launched instead, just to find out how high I could fly.
and this happened...
[Crap...]
However we do have one successful launch from the Malaysian team. Check out Fay's attempt!
We were seriously going at it from one cannonball to another and some even had some spectacular shots into the sea. As we got ourselves around the activity, the crowd started to gather again back on the beach because they got another activity lined up for us. As I saw them coordinating the activity I suddenly realized what it was...
[That's right folks, its the Slip and Slide with the Axe girls!]
[I believe this would be a much better angle of the slide? :D]
The basic idea was to get yourselves launched on the slide, which was literally covered with soap (by Axe of course!) and slide yourway down to the open sea at the bottom. Some of you guys might wonder, how in the world could we do that when our bodies were not even slippery enough for the slide? Surely there would be friction right?
[This is where the girls will come and help! :D]
We carried on the activities until it started to get dark and we were told to get ourselves ready for dinner and movie night later on after that. To be honest I was already so pooped from swimming around the sea and jumping around the catapult. Not to mention that we did spend the whole day travelling to the island. Nothing to do with the fact that I am older now obviously...
[Dinner was served with roast chicken on the port!]
[Us recapping what we did today]
As we finished dinner, the organizers rolled out the projector for our movie night, which was The Hangover (suitable movie for the event) and we all took our places. It was planned originally that we would want to watch it at the beach but it started pouring again so that was a no go.
[Bring on the movie!]
[Got ourselves comfy seats right in front of the screen!]
[Everyone ready for movie night]
As the night went by some of us decided to call it an early night to rest for the next day, as a lot got really tired not only from the activities but from their journey to get here. Ave and I decided to join the rest of the boys for a late night hangout session and talked and joke til the wee hours. Afterwards, we decided to turn in as well.
So there goes our first day on the island so far and I was already having the time of my life. I forgot to mention that we were told to rest sufficiently for the next day as they warned us that the activities we are going to do next was going to be even more crazier than today. We did think to ourselves how can they actually top what we did today.
They did. They really did.
But you guys have to wait til Sunday to read about it! :D
