Got up yet again at 3.30am to catch our 4am pickup to take us to the airport to catch our 9.30am flight back to Manila.

Stopped off for breakfast around 7am.

Which turned out to be a bad decision as we got right into the morning Cebu rush hour.

Made it to the airport by 8am where check-in and security was quick and easy.

Wow, electronic gates at a domestic airport. I don’t know why that amazed me but it just did.

Post securit-ah.

In the waiting area zoo.

The Filipino equivalent of Starbucks that uses local coffee beans.

Gloom in Cebu.

Boarding and push back on time and we were off pretty quickly into the sky.

Yum.

Back on terra firma.

The office sent a van to pick me up from the airport and it took 20 minutes with regular traffic (which is a good thing) to get to the hotel.

They mess around when it comes to security. Mirror + canine check.

Once I pulled into the front, the staff welcomed me to the Shangri-La, took my bags and I was escorted to the front desk. The bags were taken away to be scanned (again airport style) before being allowed in the building. Check-in was a breeze and I was assigned a corner room on the 35th floor.

Lounge area straight ahead with the High Street Café off to the left for breakfast every morning.

My co-workers and I usually had breakfast at 6am after working the 9pm-5am shift every day. We had a choice of going with the buffet or a la carte option. The first day was buffet and then I went with a la carte for the rest. The buffet spread was amazing and is typical of the Shangri-la standard (well, except for Sydney which was ok) but you can never really do full justice to a buffet unless you have the appetite of a 19 year old.

That’s one big sausage.