I awoke to the sound of Lucas turning on the TV to watch the Super Bowl, which had a kickoff time of 8:30 a.m. Palau time. We had a lazy morning in the hotel room watching the game -- ESPN broadcast the game to their international audience, and all of the commercials were for ESPN programming. We didn't get to see the fun commercials that aired in the U.S. We were happy to see the Saints win, as the city of New Orleans needs that boost to their pride.
As the game was winding down, I arranged for a rental car with Hertz. They delivered the car to the hotel and I signed the paper work. It was a mini-SUV with the steering wheel on the left side (thankfully), a Chery Tiggo. Chery is a Chinese automaker, and the little car handled great.
Palau is divided into 16 states, across several connected islands. Most of the people and development are in Koror state, and this used to be the capital. Several years ago, the government chose to move the capital to a larger island, to help spread new development away from Koror. With funding from the U.S. and Taiwan, they constructed a new highway that loops the large island of Babeldaob, and a massive new Capitol building which assumes much of its design from Washington, D.C.'s architecture. We drove out along the main highway, amazed by the constant vistas of rolling hills, lush foliage and turquoise waters. We spotted the huge Capitol building looming on a hillside, and we were surprised to find absolutely no other development near the new center of government. We're not sure if the plan to spur new development was a failure, or if the plans are still in the works. We kept going past the Capitol to a seaside village, where we found a really quaint waterfront restaurant for lunch. Lucas enjoyed pad thai, I enjoyed pork udong. We then returned to the
Capitol complex to walk around it and snap photos.
We hit the road again, and armed with a tourist map, tried exploring a few of the side roads. Most of these side roads were unpaved, and numerous ruts and potholes tested the rental car's suspension. We got a great view of how many Palauans live -- homes are much more developed than what we saw in Yap, and they retain a strong sense of community. Whenever we passed locals, we exchanged friendly waves.
One of our planned stops was to a waterfall, but by the time we got to the location, it was 5 p.m. and a chain was up blocking the driveway. But we spotted a footpath nearby, and parked the car along the side of the road. We then started our way down a very steep and slippery path, leading to some abandoned rail tracks from an earlier Japanese mining company. Following the tracks, we found the next path that would take us to the waterfall. We crested a hill and saw the waterfall across a valley from us. But by this time, sunset was only an hour away and we decided not to continue the hike. But we got some great views of the interior of Palau.
We made our way back to the hotel, and now we're just relaxing before going into town for dinner. We are flying to Guam tonight (a 2:30 a.m. flight!) and we will drive ourselves to the airport and return the rental car there. With the night flight, we will be "recovering" tomorrow at the Guam Hilton and don't have anything specific planned.
