Bohol-boholan

A couple of days ago, I went on a trip with mom to the island province of Bohol. We were fortunate enough to be invited to tag along with my uncle's family who generously  shouldered our accommodations. (we paid the airfare ourselves of course!)

Bohol is located in the Central Visayas region, consisting of Bohol Island and 75 minor surrounding islands. Its capital is Tagbilaran City. With a land area of 4,117.3 square kilometers (1,589.7 sq mi) and a coastline 261 kilometers (162 mi) long, Bohol is the tenth largest island of the Philippines. (source: Wikipedia). Tagbilaran airport (TAG) is roughly an hour's flight away from Manila (MNL)

It was a thrill for me to be boarding a plane again (don't travel much :P) and this was only the second destination via plane that I would be going to, the first being HK. (I have a VERY small travel map). As we made our descent towards Tagbilaran Airport, I looked out the window and saw all these little islets and the corals visible underneath the clear bluish-green waters! Once over the island itself, I was treated to another surprise! 

Bohol's famous Chocolate Hills

According to Wikipedia (again), the latest survey puts the total number at 1,776 hills. That's a whole lotta bulubundikin if you ask me. :P Looking out the plane window, there were numerous little hills stretching out as far as the eye could see (we were already flying pretty low at this point). I was a bit surprised upon landing 'coz the pilot suddenly applied the brakes. The Boholano guy sitting next to us said that the runway there was short, thus necessitating the abrupt stop.

Tagbilaran Airport

Upon landing, I discovered that riding along with us on that plane was none other than former Sec. Art Yap (XS'83)! :P

We got our stuff and met this guy who worked for a car rental company. The dude's name was Nonoy and he told me he'd been working as a tour guide/driver around Bohol for the past 15 years. We were a party of 10, which fit nicely in the brand-spanking new Toyota Hi-Ace we rented. We then got started with the tour.

Sanduguan Monument

Our first stop was the Sanduguan Monument where the original blood compact between Rajah Soliman and that Spanish dude was said to have taken place. Nothing much to see here except the actual monument which presented as a photo-op to kick things off on our 3-day adventure.

The next place we went to was a "factory outlet" of Bohol products ranging from Tarsier keychains to their "famous" Peanut Kisses. We bought a few things for the people back home but generally held back due to our small budget and the thinking that there might be better deals to be found elsewhere..

Baclayon Church interior

After that short shopping spree, we climbed back aboard an Nonoy took us to Baclayon Church, one of the more famous Spanish-era churches in Bohol. It also boasted of a museum but we didn't bother to enter since they wouldn't allow camreas inside. :P Of greater interest to me what what I saw outside.

They were selling candles of different colors, representing different prayer intentions, at 20 bucks each. I personally got one each of red, yellow, and green for intentions related to residency..

Horizontal Traffic light

As lunchtime neared, we were then driven to the shores of Loboc River for their famous Loboc River cruise. At the docks, tourist would purchase tickets from one of four (?) companies operating the riverboats/floating restaurants, and people would probably base their choice on the menus presented to them.

The winning menu

Having picked this menu/company, we were then given our tickets and shown our way to the docks where our boat was waiting.

Ticket

The food wasn't exaclty anything to write home about, and I don't think the ingredients were as fresh as you'd expect from something as "rural" as this, but it was eat-all-you can, and at 400 bucks/head plus the river tour with onboard entertainment, it didn't seem like such a bad deal.

 Eat all you can :P

The tour would have been nice, had it not been for the fact that when we were just barely 200 meters out, the boatmen steered the vessel close to shore because our engine had died out and we had to await a rescue boat! We wasted about a good half-hour's worth of time before we were finally underway again, but the agitation quickly dissappated as wee took inthe sights and the cool breeze of the place.

 Ahoy there, GIGABOAT!!

There were a lot of other river cruise boats travelling up and down river. After all, this was probably a prime tourist spot. I also notices a lot of floodlamps along the riverbanks which were probably used to illuminate the trees on night cruises. Judging by the way the place looked, a night trip would be spectacular.. (must try it if ever I go back ther :P) A minor gripe I have would be the relatively poor quality of the river water. It wasn't even near Pasig River-dirty, but I noticed that the waters were pretty murky, especially when I saw a pool of fresh untainted water flowing into the river. The water quality of this inlet was EXCELLENT! It was crystal clear and you could see to the bottom. Its just a shame that all these boats needed to run on gas, which probably caused the relative opacity of the waters of the main river..

 Shoreline cultural show

While we ewre sailing along, the locals had this small stage on the riverbank where we stopped and were treated to a sampling of the local dances like Kuradang and Tinikling, which was a treat for the foreigners.

Kuradang

As expected, there was a donation box set up alongside the boat so that tourist could drop their hard-earned cash as payment for their momentary amusement. :P 15 minues later, we were off again. The service crew on board told us we would be making our way towards a waterfall where the river started. A waterfall huh? That'd be cool..

 Waterfall..

Wait, what? This is it? Oh well.. And I guess our riverboat captain was a wuss, as we turned around probably 150 meters away from the falls, while we saw other boats go for a much closer look. Hay..

Chowtime was now over, and our driver took us to one of the most popular destinations in Bohol...

 Chocolate Hills (from my cam, the previous pic was from wikipedia :P)

We were going to one of the mose centrally located (and I guess tallest) among these great piles of stone and soil, stategically developed to offer tourists the best possible panoramic view of the hills. AFter climbing around 200+ step (which left mom and her sibs pretty winded), we reached the top where the scenery was beathtaking, although it was a little crowded with all the other tourists there. :P

The Well

There was even a wishing well at the summit, with a bell that you rang after you dropped a coin and made a wish, presumably to tell them that you enjoyed the tacos. :P

Overlooking the base of the path

Luckily, the trek downward wasn't as bad, as there was this gently sloping but less scenic route which took us back where we started.

With aching bodies all around, our driver still had a couple of surprises in store. First up was a Butterfly preserve (sorry didn't get the name) where we were shown the different stages of butterfly development and some unique butterfly-related stuff, including sniffing vanilla-flavored butterfly poop freshly squezzed out of the butterfly itself. :P Despite my inferior cam, I was able to snap a few decent shots of butterflies feeding on one of those honey-dipped sponges they have around which serves as attractants.

 Butterfly shot!

The (supposedly) last stop on the day's tour before we were taken to our resort was at Loboc Forest Camp which housed Bohol's natve Tarsier.

Tarsier here! Yay! :P

To be perfectly honest, the place didn't seem like much, with different species of wildlife in cages as follows:

Grass Owl

Crested Serpent Eagle

Brahminy Kite

However, they had this...

 Albino Python and friend :P

Yes folks, I had a moment of temporary insanity where I said to myself that I just HAD to do it. :P It was surprisingly not as slimy or heavy as it looked. Instead of feeling like pure solid muscle, it was more bones and loose skin. In all the excitement, I totally missed the Tarsiers which were housed in the cage directly oposite me in the picture! :P

Since the place had the facilities for it, I also took time out to try this as well..

Zipline!

It was a pretty short ride, but thrilling nonetheless.

We exhaled deeply as we boarded our ride, exhausted from the all the running around that occurred. We left the main island of Bohol and crossed a bridge to the island of Panglao, which was still part of the province, where our resort which was supposedly "50 meters from the beach" could be found. While on the road, we made a slight detour at the request of my vegetarian cousin who had heard about the Bohol Bee Farm. Apart from the obvious bee product of honey, they had a lot of other stuff there as well like mango, corlander, pesto, malunggay spreads, honey salabat (ginger ale), honey tea, and even their own ice cream (which unfortunately did not come in honey flavor).

Villa Almedilla facade

It was already dark when we got to the resort. It was a small building, more like an apartelle if you ask me. The rooms were cozy and spacious enough, I believe it costs 2500 Php a night for a room for two (but I guess it could fit 2-3 more people had there been extra matresses). There was cable TV and a shower with a heater, and the place had wifi as well, but the connectivity was terrible. We were told that we could have dinner along the beach, where the seaside resorts had all these by-the-beach dining areas. We ate at the Bohol Divers' Resort which had a small cultural show that was held ever Saturday and Sunday.  

Dancing girls

Firedancers

These performers were members of that resort's staff as well, so I guess they save on extra salaries and benefits. :P

Having eaten our fill, we trudged back to our rooms and retired for the night...

DAY 2: Water adventure

Dawn in a banca

The following morning found us aboard a banca at around 6am headed out to go "dolphin-watching". Well, it was more like dolphin-chasing if you ask me. :P

The Boatman

We spent about an hour chasing after what seemed to be a group of dolphins swimming in the distance, after which an entire fleet of these motorized outriggers similar to the one we were in would converge at the area of the sighting. Naturally, the dolphins would dive and hide, as these motors made so much noise you could hear them a mile away.

Convergent fleet

After that fruitless pursuit, the boatman suggested we head to Balicasag Island to continue our adventure. There we had our brunch on the beach consisting of grilled fish, squid, and pork. While the elders stayed behind, we cousins went out to go snorkeling. It was my first time to snorkeling and what I witnessed was just MAJESTIC! Man, I wish I had that waterproof case for cameras! I won't go into detail with regards to the marine life I saw, but man, it was great!

After about 30 mins to an hour of mindless roaming near the coast with our head facing down in the water, we went back to shore to pick up our folks and visited this little island the locals called "Virgin island" where there was no fish to be seen, but the sand was just EXCELLENT! It was so fine and powdery, and some likened it to the sand at Boracay (but I've never been there, so the comparison ends here).

the sandbar

A unique feature of this island is that it has a submerged sandbar extending out to sea which, from a distance, makes you look like you're walking on water.

At this point, everyone was starting to feel a little tired, so we headed back to Panglao to rest up and have lunch.

As with all vacations, you can't really expect everything to go right.. but I'd rather not rant about a particularly bad experience we had there, so as not to ruin all the fun memories in this entry.

The rest of the day was a blur for me, as I spent the rest of the day in the room, going out just to have dinner at that same seaside place.

DAY 3: A few last stops..

Our third day started a little later. :P We had already packed our things the night before, and had checked out already before 8am when our driver was scheduled to pick us up for our last roubd of the island. We first went to hear mass at a nearby church (sorry forgot the name). AFter mass, we had brunch at  Chicken Ati-Atihan

Chicken Ati-Atihan

Having eaten our fill, we then visited another roadside wildlife attraction, and there they had another python.. a MUCH BIGGER Burmese Python weighing around 300 kgs! Naturally, my response would be to do this..

Snake wrangling :P

The handler said this one is fed a WHOLE 30 kg pig once a month. Too bad it wasn't feeding time when we dropped by. It would've been amusing (though it won't be for the squeamish).

Our next stop was the Watchtower in Punta Cruz in the town of Maribojoc. This was a Spanish-era lookout point which faced the southwest, towards the direction of Panglao island.

The watchtower

The structure was neat. It was this squat little structure which had a wide view of the sea it safeguarded, but we didn't linger as it was already too hot to be out in the open. (and it was quite hot in the shade as well) :P

For our last "nature stop", Noynoy took us to Antequera to see the Mag-aso falls,so named due to the fine spray the water produces upon impact on the rocks and stream below.

A long descent (and ascent :P)

197 steps is really a long way down, especially for the elders in our group. I'm just glad there weren't any adverse events that happened along the way. Making our way down, we heard the distant splashing of the waterfall. After a short trek, this is what we found..

breathtaking..

Apparently, these falls have a sinister side to them, as there was a flash flood last year which resulted in the deaths of two unfortunate individuals who were bathing in the river at that time. A tourist was able to catch the flash flood on video, and one of the locals made a tribute video on youtube.

In rural settings like these, I guess its only natural that this incident would be tied in to local folklore. The mythological explanation was that when the flash flood came, it was heralding the arrival of a diwata or fairy, and that those two individuals were "taken" by the fairy that came and went, probably because they were not respectful of the place.

Island City Mall

Our last stop before heading to the airport was the Island City Mall, which acoording to our guide, was the largest mall in Bohol. We were thrilled at the prospect of going malling at a new location since most of us were mall rats. :P

Bohol's biggest mall, was, er.. not so big.. :P It had three floors, a foodcourt, a department store, a supermarket, 3 movie theaters, a National Bookstore outlet,  some specialty boutiques, and a handful of the usual fastfood restos like Jollibee, KFC, and Chowking. It was interesting to note that there was no sign of McDonald's anywhere. :P

Taking up the explorer's challenge, I set out to get lost in this new place, only to finish my trek in about 15 minutes.. :P You can't really blame them. Bohol is just an island, and is relatively sparsely populated at that. There's no point in making a big mall with lotsa merchandise if you have no one to sell to. :P

To cut things short, we made some last-minute shopping before hopping back on the fan for a 5-minute ride to the airport.

Our ride home!

 Overall, it was a really nice place, well worth another visit sometime in the future. :P Don't mind my minor gripes, I'm really just like that. Hehe

Thank you to the people of Bohol, especially to our driver Nonoy, for sharing your island paradise with us! :D