Hello from Santa Cruz, Zambales.  My back is also sore from riding in stiffly-sprung buses and jeepneys for several hours yesterday and today.

Dominic and I are in an Internet café in Santa Cruz, rather than Olongapo or Iba because, when at lunch today in Dagupan, we asked a waitress if she knew where we should get a bus to Iba, she suggested that we stop here, en route to Iba, to check out the atmosphere and white beach(es).

We arrived in Victory Liner’s Santa Cruz bus terminal at 6 p.m., shortly past sundown, then walked to a nearby hotel, Villa Roma, to get cheap rooms (P500 each).

Rather than walk ten meters to Villa Roma’s restaurant, we walked to downtown as darkness came to see what we might and perhaps find a restaurant.

Dominic and I ate dinner then made our way down a dim side street toward the South China Sea to look at a trashy, narrow beach in darkness (no moonlight).  I don’t know if garbage is everywhere on the beach(es) of Santa Cruz … Tourism is apparently not an industry here, so I’m assuming that this doesn’t have wide, white beaches.  In darkness, we saw nothing like the wide beach of San Juan.

But tomorrow we’ll see what we can and inquire about the town and rental homes.  And we’ll ride a bus further south to Iba (also in Zambales Province) and/or Olongapo – or ride back north toward Hundred Islands area.