Archive for April, 2008

It was quite the journey from Boracay to Bohol, but even the multitude of travel devices it took to get from one to the other was well worth it– I’ll explain the various varieties of vehicle in a second. Boracay, as I previously mentioned was very beautiful, yet very touristy; with that it was expensive and didn’t paint a very accurate vision of Filipino life, and the idea behind traveling really was to see life in other countries, and that brings us more to Bohol.

We left Boracay first thing in the morning, ready for a long days travel from island to island. Our first part of the trip was to go to the travel office and book a flight. Yea, due to the time left on our visa we couldn’t afford to make the longer trip without the use of a winged buddy to shorten the hop; but that’s not the only transport used that day.

After booking the flight we jumped onto a local trike (Vehicle #1); a sort of butchered motorbike/side car effort that’s seen the country over. These popular taxi vehicles are basically standard road bikes, with a welded frame side car added to the side, providing enough space (just) for two people to sit, while round the back is an open top storage pit that’s just the right size to fit a few rucksacks in (conveniently). So the trike took us to the local boat port, where we switched on to a small wooden passenger boat (Vehicle #2); these little devices ship locals and holiday makers between Boracay and Panay the whole day through.

Once we reached Panay, only some three or four minutes later, we then changed in to a Jeepney (Vehicle #3). Jeepney’s I’ve mentioned before, large, pimped, ex-war vehicles that have since been converted into hop on buses that as Filipino as the people; each uniquely painted and adorned in some of the craziest of bright colours and symbols. I Wish I’d have spent time photographing them as they were all so unique and interesting that I could have dedicated a full album and post to their style and varying degree of workmanship.

We rode in the Jeepney for over and hour, along with a guy and his chicken; I’d finally sat in a vehicle alongside live poultry, a travellers dream come true.

With the end of the Jeepney ride came a food break as we’d finally reached the very small airport where we were to wait to catch our next vehicle of the day. The delayed plane (Vehicle #4) finally arrived to take us to Cebu, a delay I was happy to see thanks to the airport, small as it was, offering free Wi-Fi, (sad I know).

The flight was short, but saved us a good day or so worth of travel; it was so short in fact that no sooner had we boarded and I’d decided what drink to order, the captain came over the airwaves telling us to belt up for landing.

While I was busying myself surfing the free net in the airport waiting for the delayed plane, Amanda bumped into another traveller, Pennie, who originated from back in Southampton, UK. We met back up with her after landing while waiting for our baggage. We also met a comical, yet very informative guy called Barry from just outside of Dublin, Ireland, who lives in Bohol.

The four of us, Amanda, Pennie, Barry and myself, joined forces to venture forth on the next part of our vehicle adventure. We left the airport and jumped into a meter taxi (Vehicle #5). Ok, not the most exciting of transports, but it’s the destination of the taxi that was the important part, as we were heading to the local pier to board a ferry (Vehicle #6) to our final destination. That’s right, the final vehicle of the day was to be a ferry, complete with onboard entertainment, icy-cold air-con and trolley-dolly snack services.

We finally arrived on Bohol fairly late in the day, but thanks to Barry’s local knowledge, we were soon walking (Could you count feet as Vehicle #7?) over to a hotel where we’d finally get to drop our bags and reward ourselves with some fine Chinese food and beer at a local restaurant.

The journey went super smooth, again a testament to the Filipino people (maybe not the few that try to earn those extra Peso’s by charging foreigner price, but we can’t let them dampen our journey).

The next day finally brought an episode of the trip that I’d so been looking forward to for quite some time, the trip to the Tarsier Visitors Centre, a breeding program and sanctuary for the world’s smallest (and cutest) primates. It’s one of Bohol’s main attractions, sadly that also means that there are many smaller venues around that have these animals caged for human perusal, which, like any zoo-like scenario, puts the animal under great stress, resulting in an uncomfortable and shortened life.

The Visitors Centre however isn’t one of those zoo-like places. It houses ten Tarsier’s in a huge pen, where they can be observed and bred in hope to release and raise the numbers in the wild. They say that there are only around one-hundred remaining in the wilds of Bohol.

The place is really nice, it’s far out, it’s not tourist led, so there aren’t any ice-cream stalls, hands-on opportunities, or anything else that comes with a modern day attraction. The place is far out, it’s quiet and very peaceful; the guide is strict on the noise levels caused, as the monkeys are very timid and shy. It is possible however to freely see them face-to-face in their natural environment, which is such an amazing sight.

The centre also has lots of information about the history of the Tarsier and lots of news paper clippings regarding the centre, as well as a photo of our very own Prince Charles posing with a Tarsier (Royalty it seems have the ability to hold the pretty little primates).

With the fun of the day time over with, the night brought in a whole different piece of Filipino life: Videoke.

I swore after the many drunken nights before that I’d never do karaoke again, but this was videoke right, it’s not the same… That’s what the many bottles of Red Horse beer told me anyway.

So the four of us went out to a local bar, drank more than we should have, and wailed the night away singing 1980′s and early 90′s pop classics.

The Philippines as a whole love Videoke, like much of the rest of Asia; and they’ll happily run the night through spouting western ‘classic’ after ‘classic’ into a TV machine, which scores the performer on something other than skill, it can’t be skill as I refuse to believe that I’d produce anything that would come near close to the 90% plus, scores I was receiving.

The night ended with a drunken feast of Balmut on the way back to the hotel, not the best thing to eat just before falling asleep.

With the excessive amount of beer and heightened strain on our vocal cords caused by the previous nights merriments, neither Amanda or myself felt like doing much the following day. Penni disappeared in to the sun set as she was on a fairly tight schedule, Barry I believe had to show his face at work. So with that, we spent a rather lazy day watching TV shows and movies, followed by an easy stroll around the local town to eat food and avoid alcohol.

We couldn’t procrastinate for long though, our time in the Philippines was growing shorter and there was still more to see. So we packed our bags and hit the road again, fully charged after a days worth of doing nothing.

This time we headed inland to a place called Loboc where we’d read about this rather cool sounding backpacker retreat called Nuts Huts; an eco-friendly community of huts built next to a river, featuring lazy delights such as hammocks and fantastic balcony views of the surrounding jungle. I’ve never read a description that matched it’s final product so well. Actually, there was something that didn’t make itself clear until we arrived, and that was the massive number of stairs that we had to walk down to get to the place. It really was in the middle of nowhere, around 750 metres off the road, down a dusty track, and that was before reaching the aforementioned stairs.

We arrived during a rain storm, fairly wet and very tired and sweaty. But at the same time delighted to see how great the place looked. And no sooner had we settled in when Rita (one of the owners of the place), started on the hard sell of all these fitness ideas; like climbing down over two hundred stairs wasn’t enough! She’s a persuasive woman though and some how we both found ourselves diving into the river under the instruction of swimming 600 meters upstream to some waterfalls; and this was all before we had chance to eat!

It was a fun swim though, a little frustrating for Amanda as she had to put up with my poor form, I never claimed to be a good swimmer, well, maybe back when I was ten-years old. We got there eventually, found ourselves some homemade weights on the river bank and decided to show off our finely toned bods. This eco-retreat was a gym in jungle disguise and we’d not seen the end of it.

After showering and finally getting to the lounging area to eat and have a well deserved drink we met with Chris, the other owner and husband to Rita. Before we knew it we’d ordered a pair of mountain bikes and signed up to cycle 60 kilometres the following morning. They’d done it again!

So there we were up next morning, bright and early, all ready to cycle more kilometres than we believed possible. It wasn’t just a fitness test though, there was purpose to the crazed idea. Another one of Bohol’s attractions are the Chocolate Hills, a geological marvel of humped back proportions. I don’t know the exact story behind their creation, there are many versions from the byproduct of coral sediment forged over many millions of years as the island rose from the sea, right up to the story of two giants fighting a great battle. Believe what you will, but none of the reasons changed the fact that we were cycling there.

There was a second bonus item to the day; before the Chocolate Hills came a Butterfly farm, it sounded like a nice idea for a place to stop off on the way, it’s not like we were hunting for excuses to delay cycling as much as possible, honestly.

So we grabbed our bikes, climbed the 159 stairs to the exit of Nuts Huts (I do wonder where that name came from), and began to pedal away.

The start of the journey was to be the hardest, around 16 kilometers up hill. It was tough going, and we made a good few stops. The scenery was great though, one of the highlights being a mahogany forest which gave us a nice natural canopy to protect us from the rain, oh I forgot to mention that, yea, it was raining too.

At the end of the up hill cycle came the Butterfly Farm and a break in the rain.

It’s a really nice little place, the staff there are very enthusiastic and knowledgeable about the fluttering little winged insects. Our guide took us round the enclosure, showing us all the different species, in all their fine forms. We even got chance to hold a few of them too, the caterpillars were nice and sticky feeling.

After the short tour we got the chance to stroll round the open garden area taking photos of the insects in the wild. We also decided to eat lunch here, especially after I found Carrot Cake on the counter!

After taking as many photos of butterflies as I could and having my fill of Carrot Cake, we decided to delay the cycling no longer, and get back on the road towards the Chocolate Hills, just as the heavens opened again.

The road from this point onward was fairly flat, wet, but flat. We soon started noticing these strange hill formations popping up out of the surrounding landscape. Not knowing exactly what we were looking for we took some photos of the hills and contemplated turning back thinking we’d done our days work. But, just to make sure we thought we’d go on a little longer just to make sure. That turned out to be one of the better ideas of the day, as not a few hundred metres up the road did we come across a sign post advertising ‘Chocolate Hills Turn Right’. We’d not yet made it.

We pressed on down the road, knowing our destination was close, when trouble struck. Something happened to my gear system resulting in a few key components of the bike falling off on to the road. Amanda eventually noticed that I was no longer cycling along side her (It took a while), and she returned back to find me looking for these missing pieces. Without them my bike was as good as useless and we were almost 30 kilometres from Nuts Huts.

Luckily for us though, the Filipino people came to the rescue. An old woman from a nearby house came over to see what the problem was. We explained about the missing pieces and we all started to scour the road to see what we could find.

The old woman had some sort of augmented vision, despite the rain, the fact that she wasn’t wearing any shoes, and was carrying an umbrella, she managed to find all the missing pieces within a few seconds of looking.

We took the bike back to her house, where the rest of her family and friends came out to help. Before we knew it we had a Filipino pit-stop working hard in the rain to fix my bike and get me back on the road. And what a job they did, we were soon waving goodbye and cycling back on our way to the Chocolate Hills.

We finally made it, up one final climb and there they were in all their glory, all brown(ish) and hilly. It’s like a real world Teletubbie landscape, so unnaturally rounded and cartoon like.

Our journey back to Nuts Huts wasn’t as hard going as it was the way there, all those up hills we struggled through came back to us as nice down hill ride, no pedaling necessary.

There wasn’t a great deal more to do in the Philippines, well that’s a lie, we just ran low on time to make the venture elsewhere before we had to fly back to Bangkok. There was just enough time for us to have one last night out with Barry, which did feature a little more videoke (When in Rome, when in Rome). Oh, also a visit to the Filipino phenomenon that is Jolliebee; a fast food venture that’s took all the elements that all the other big hitters have and put them under one jolly rooftop.

Our flight back to Bangkok was something a bit special too, little did we know that it was actually the maiden voyage from Cebu to Bangkok, and it was launched with free drink, food and goodies as well as a pop quiz while on the plane itself. It still doesn’t stop me from feeling bad that I’ve made so many flights recently, and I do promise to try not to do as many in the future.

So that was the Philippines, with its wonderful people, incredible diving, love for all things Power Ballad, loathing of all things vegetable, crazy Jeepneys and many thousands of islands.

Ponder Box

Quid, Buck? Where does money slang come from?

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We left Puerto Galera on an early morning Jeepney ride enroute to the next island on our itinerary, Boracay. Like the previous journey, it too went without hitch, and even though we didn’t know exactly where we were going, the local people were there to help us every step of the way. Even when we arrived at Boracay itself, a young guy from one of the local bars took us under his wing as he helped find somewhere for us to stay.

Gladly this time we didn’t have to share with any ants, and although the room was more expensive, again this is due to Boracay being very much a tourist area, the room did come with Air Con and a TV, allowing us to chill out and watch some fantastic Filipino shows about people loosing weight and dancing.

The main attraction of Boracay is its white beach and crystal clear waters, and despite it being very touristy, it’s hard not to be taken by the picture postcard quality of it all.

It was nice to spend a few days chilling out round there, enjoying the water (it’s my new found friend now, I’ve really turned into a sea baby, actually make that Sea Monkey; no on second thoughts, Amanda is the Sea Monkey).

Keeping the aquatic theme going, we took a day trip out to do some snorkeling, not quite the excitement of plunging into the water with an air tank strapped to your back, but it was fun none the less. Again we had the chance to witness so many wonderful sights: more Clown fish, snakes, fantastically coloured coral and rocks as well as many other species of fish that I don’t know the name of. It also gave us chance to try out our underwater cameras. I had to admit defeat in that department though, I just couldn’t capture the quality snaps that Amanda managed.

During our day out snorkelling, we stopped off on a beach to eat some BBQ (lots of pork, chicken and sea food… I’ve actually been eating fish and other aquatic specices, I know, traveling can send you a little crazy). On the beech we got to play about with a monkey, a crazy woman hating monkey (The best kind)

After a few days of fun and beaches, it was time to head off to the next island, Bohol.

Ponder Box
When umbrealla’s were invented, did they realise how much they’d be used out of the rain?

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We set off from Manila fairly early in the morning, heading down to the port town of Batangas to catch a boat over to Puerto Galera on the island of Mindoro. It was incredible how easy the journey went, and a testament to the kindness of the people of The Philippines.
We first took a taxi to the Jam Bus Station in Manila, which the taxi driver happily helped us with the direction to the information area. No sooner had we got out of the taxi, one of the workers approached us to ask where we were going to, he then told us where to go to get the right bus, as well as shout over to a guy to take us straight there. The story was the same on the other side, people want to help you every step of the way.

So after an hours long boat journey from the island of Luzon to Mindoro, we arrive on the beach of Puerto Galera. A very hectic and bustling sandy beach front covered in bars, restaurants, food stalls and dive shops.

It was obviously more touristy here, with the bulk of its business being made from the holiday makers flying in to sample the scuba and the many females found around the bars during the night. With the higher level of tourism came the extra cost, most of the hotels on offer were charging premium prices for their rooms, and being peak season, most were fully booked too. Not to be put down though, Amanda took to the streets in hunt of a cheaper option and came up successful. She managed to find a room at less than half the cost of the other options. Sure at such a saving it meant loosing out on those extras such as a TV, Air Con and hot water. Oh, and we had to share with ants and a rather yucky smell from the toilet, but cheap is cheap and we’re on a budget.

So we dropped off our stuff in the room of glistening delights and went off to see what could keep us entertained for the few days we were set to stay there.

It quickly became apparent that if you weren’t interested in picking up women there was only one other attraction on offer, Scuba diving. We got chatting to two English guys at a floating bar (A raft like drinking establishment situated about thirty metres out to sea), they were both out on holiday with their sons, returning to Puerto Galera for around the fifth time for the scuba. They did a pretty good job of selling the idea of scuba to us over a few beers and a few dips in the ocean from the floating bar’s very own water slide. So by the end of the night both Amanda and I agreed that we’d be at the Scuba place at nine am the next morning to see what the whole deal was about.

Sure enough we were there at nine where we got to speak to Rick, the owner of Frontier Scuba about the details of diving, where he explained that we could go in for the Open Water scuba course which would give us the license to dive in open water (sea or fresh) anywhere in the world. The course included everything we needed to do it as well as four training dives out in the waters surrounding the bay.

We both agreed to taking the course and were sent away with a text book and instruction to read through the first two of five chapters about scuba diving, completing the questions at the end of each chapter. It was kinda like being back at school, apart from the fact that we could study in a beach front bar looking out towards the ocean that we’d soon be swimming under.

The first afternoon we got to meet our instructor for the course. A German guy by the nickname XC. He’s an amazing guy that’s been diving for many many years, clocking in something in the region of over 7000 dives.

It didn’t take long before we were donning our wet suite, mask, fins, weights and tank, and jumping into the pool. That’s right pool, new divers are taken through all the necessary lessons in a pool before dropping into the ocean.

The first task was to get used to breathing under water, which was a very strange sensation at first, but in very short time became easy and second nature. We then had to learn some other tasks such as moving round comfortably with the wet suite and tank on.

Over the following few days we went through a number of lessons in the pool many of which were based around the safety aspects of scuba diving. Obviously to a new diver, the idea of something going wrong at the bottom of the ocean sounds like it would spell death being so far away from a real source of air. Through the lessons however, its amazing how much you learn of what is possible while under water. It’s really all about being confident and not panicking. As long as there is air coming from the tank you can get through pretty much any problem, even if there’s no air in the tank you can still just switch to using someone else’s spare (each suite comes with two supplies).

The other very important lessons we learned before going into the ocean were about pressure and depth. It’s important to breath all the time so that the lungs don’t come under any pressure issues, as the further down you go the more air gets pumped into your lungs due to the heavier density on the air supply. So swimming to the surface after taking a lung full twenty metres down would see your lungs pop as the air expands again. So yea, it’s very important to breath constantly.

Once we’d got most of the basic lessons out of the way it was time to go and try it in the real thing.

[Sadly there are no photos from our actual dives as we were going deeper (over 10 metres) than our cameras were built to go]

We suited up and jumped on the boat, where we were taken out to a nearby dive site offering depths of about twelve metres. One by one we dived into the water and swam down, meeting up with XC at the floor of the ocean. We were actually there sitting meters below the surface, happily breathing away. It felt so good, so free. Then came our tests, we had to do things like take out our breathing apparatus, flood our masks and practice breathing from each others emergency supply. It should have been scary, but it really wasn’t; it was too enjoyable to be down there.

We finished off our first real sea dive with a swim around the nearby coral, seeing how life is underwater. I was so happy when we came across a family of clown fish living around a sea anemone, i’d finally seen a Nemo with my own eyes.

Over the next few days we continued the class room style tests, more pool lessons and a few more real dives. Each real dive got better and better, with us seeing so many amazing under water creatures and plants, all so colourful and beautiful. The final dive however had one of the most impressive sites of all, a total surprise as we were swimming down to around twenty metres down, we saw a turtle, I was so excited I wanted to shout out; the only draw back to being underwater when you see something like that, any attempt at making noise just results in a load of wasted air and bubbles.

After spending a few days longer than we originally planned, we were happy to leave Puerto Galera armed with a license to dive. It was a total surprise to have done the course, it’s never been something I’ve thought of doing before, but I’m so glad that I have now, I can see why so many people return back there year on year, the waters are truly magnificent, and we were told from a good few people that they’re amongst some of the best in the world; which may mean that I’m now going to be a hard to please diver, but hey, I got to see Nemo!

   
Ponder Box

Sometimes I don’t ponder.

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