What we liked about the tour schedule and itinerary prepared by Naidi Hills is that it was not too cramped, providing just enough free time for their guests to either rest and relax or just go about exploring Batanes on their own. For our Day 2 afternoon in Batanes, we settled for the latter.

Kuya Bhong was not able to pick us up from Time Travel Lodge to accompany us to the bicycle rental shop in Basco, but he still made sure that we were attended to as he sent his son Kiel to fetch us.

Kiel drove us through the rustic, narrow streets of downtown Basco until we reached the bicycle rental shop. He introduced us to the shopkeepers, and as soon as he was certain that we were already being taken care off with our biking needs, Kiel went ahead. Ran and I then chose mountain bikes for our afternoon stroll. I cannot remember anymore how much exactly we paid, but it was not more than PHP 500.00 for two bicycles for the entire afternoon. From there, we took off, passing through the plaza in front of the provincial capitol, then heading towards the port area.

We were already hitting the road when both of us realized that we didn’t really know where we were headed to, so we just rode through the road which we have become familiar with during our guided tours. While plying the route to Mahatao, we reached a bridge overlooking the sea, and saw that there was a sandy beach below. There was a problem though: there seemed to have no path that leads to the beach. Ran then went off his bike, looked around, and found a gap on the side barrier of the bridge. In the gap lies a wood which connects the bridge gap to the beach below. Viola! Beach!

When we were there, we totally had no idea what the beach we went to was called. Further readings afterwards told us that the beach is just being separated by the rock formation from Pahanebneban Beach which is a known nesting ground of sea turtles.

After taking our photos, it was time to climb the bridge up again through the wood in the gap. While going up through the wood, we cannot help but laugh as just a week ago, a similar wood caused Ran some trouble.

When we got back on the main road, Ran then checked his phone. I told him to be the navigator. He is always the navigator anyway, except that we were both driving bicycles that time.

Where were we headed? We had four conditions put in place as we explored on our own: one, we remain on familiar roads as much as possible; two, we focus on places that the organized tour did not cover; three, we do not wander too far off; and four, that we would just breeze through the places we would visit so that we will be back in the town center before dark.

So what happened next? We explored the magical isles on two wheels the renegade junctures way: just the two of us, not knowing exactly where we are headed to.