Day Seventeen - Kawasan Falls

Very tired from the night before as we just arrived from Bohol. Last minute decision to go to Kawasan Falls so Fred could possibly see some birds.

famous roundabout in Carcar

Got up about 6am, Nang Veron had to cook adobo and porkchop to bring to the falls. Also got drinks from Petron ie water, coke, sprite. Invited Susette's family with Tia Eileen including the children. Kids seem excited.

Started our journey about 8am, on the way to Badian, we planned to stop in Carcar to buy their famous chicharon and also buy some lehchon. Dondon went out with me to the markets to get the meat then my cousin Susette walked with me to get the chicharon along with the ampow. Lots of vendors trying to sell us the same thing, very facinating as we don't see this in Oz all the time. We also got bocarillo in different colours, too sweet but nice, not good for diabetics.
Next we need to buy lechon manok, supposedly chooks to go around Carcar but still not open, we were a bit early. So carried on to stop at dumanhog to buy lechon manok also bought more puso (hanging rice) just in case if we run out.
Carried on until we reached Moalboal where my brother Guy was staying the night before. Text my brother to let him know we are on our way as we are meeting him at the Badian falls.
Finally got to Badian Falls after 3 hours of driving. Mind you the scenery on the way was not bad at all.

Arrived, realised that we can only park the cars at the front of the falls and we have to walk bringing our stuff to get there. There were actually porters at the front saying we can get them to bring our stuff for P150 pp, they will stay with us as for as long and then come back with us after. I guess it was not a bad idea for someone carrying our things.
Got to the falls, water looked a bit muggy. Apparently it was raining the night before, normally water is pretty clear. Hired a table which wa about P300.

Kawasan Falls Badian

Hired a bamboo raft, my cousin Susette and her kids with Richard has so much fun swimming in the falls, jumping off and pulling the rope as the guide.
The whole day was fun spending time with relatives. Fred at one stage, went off to the 2nd stage of the falls, it was quite slippery. Came back stated there were no birds but he did slip.

Came back home very tired and practically flat. Everyone was dead tired when we got home.

Day Sixteen

Still at the resort but we go back to Cebu today, but first, the girls go off to get their free facial and massage and stuff, I went off birding.

strange blue bee

White-collared Kingfisher

Yellow-vented Bulbul

Olive-backed Sunbird

Birds were good, I got a couple of new species and some ok photos as well.


After that it was lunch, check out and back to Cebu, fairwell Pangalao Island Resort, we will miss you.

Day Fifteen

Off to the Pangalo Island Nature Resort and Spa.
We go down for breakfast again, check out and transfer over to the resort.

The lobby of the resort

As we arrive they offer us free drinks, we check in and then escorted to our chalets on golf buggies, this place is huge.

Driving around we can see that the gardens are beautiful, every inch of this place is green and fresh.

Sheila does the Happy dance

We reach our chalet, Shelia and Richard are in the chalet next door, and settle in then off to the pool again hahaha this is the life.

We stay in the pool all morning, snacking, drinking, swimming and enjoying a glorious day. This is the life.

We go for a guided tour of the local cave, swim some more, then lunch.

After lunch we go down to the beach and hire some kayaks, that was great, kayaking over the reef, seeing all the coral and fish and starfish right below us, wow.

Richard decided to challenge us to a race so we thrashed the water for a while racing each other up and down the beach in the kayaks, it was great fun.
Everyone was laughing and having a great time.

After a while we decided to go back to the pool as our arms were so tired.

Shelia and Richard were having fun.

Back in the pool, laying in the spa, just living life really.

Had a nice dinner, serenaded by musicians and then more swimming. Finally went to our chalet and slept.

Day Fourteen - Bohol

Well here we are, Bohol.
We had a good sleep although Pinky isn't well still, her cough has turned into some kind of chest infection but she is a trooper and carries on.
We head downstairs for breakfast and discover it is raining, they reassure us that it does that every night and today will be fine, they were right, it was a great day.
Breakfast was nice, bacon, scrambled eggs, juice, not bad.

Our driver/guide has arrived so we head off for our adventure across Bohol, I am quite excited as this looks like a beautiful country. As we drive out of town it becomes green very quickly and the traffic is a lot less. It also becomes obvious that our guide does not speak English as every time I ask a question about something, he just ignores me, oh well, I'm getting used to that.

Our first stop was some statue where someone killed someone or something, apparently there was a lot of blood, I really have no idea but the view was great.

Then we stop at some church, the oldest in Bohol or something, still don't understand and no one is offering to translate so...

the stairs to the top of the hill

We make our way up to the Chocolate Hills, this is a natural formation where the hills just pop up out of the landscape, very strange and wow, they just go on for ever, its like looking at a cartoon beehive field but they are huge, I wanted to climb one but no one would let me.
You start out by climbing this one hill with stairs, 214 to be exact, very steep and its very hot.

As you can see in these photos these hills are very green, why chocolate? well, in summer the grass on them goes brown and therefore Chocolate Hills, I know, that is the stupidist thing I have heard, so dumb.

Next we go to a Butterfly Farm, very nice... they have some butterflies, you can see them, you can walk around with them... thats kind of it but it was nice. :)

Then we stop at the Man Made Forest. It is called this because man planted all these trees so they can use them for construction, great, destroy all the forest here so you can grow a forest and the destroy it again... ?

Pinky and Me on the old bamboo bridge

As we head back we stop at a old rope bridge that crosses the Loboc river, really nice but again they have turned it into some strange tourist attraction, there is shops (if you can call them that) on one side and as you walk over there is a family offering to show you how the cut open Buko (coconuts), didn't care as its not that hard or impressive to watch some guy smash it open with a machete, we cross back over on the other bridge and back in the car, time, 5 minutes wow the people I'm travelling with don't really get the grasp of taking in the surrounds mmmm.

our boat for lunch

this is the big waterfalls at the end of the cruise

Next is lunch, this is something I was looking forward to. We get on a large, flat river boat equipt with a bar, tables, and a live band, lunch is served while slowly cruising the Loboc river, cant wait.

So the reality was you have to choose which boat you want to go on based on the menu, our guide recommended one so we went with it. Chad (pinkies brother) has joined us now with his family.

The boat arrive and we jump on board, it looks really nice. We head off down the river, and we get our complimentary drinks but just after we start moving we pull over to load the food.

Well we all start getting annoyed with this as we paid for a river cruise not to set on the side watching the other river boats go past. We were there for ages, and still no music yet.
Eventually we start moving again, the river is not as clear as it was on the website, they said it was because of rains, ok.

Now we are pulling over again, this time to watch a bunch of girls do some native dance, it was nice but.... anyway, off we go again, we get our food from the buffet in the middle of the boat, there wasn't very much actually, in fact I don't think there was everything that was on the menu back at the dock.

We cruise down the river a bit more, we stop and turn around. Chad points out some water that is running between some grass and says 'thats the waterfall'. What the hell, this is the great falls that the website talked about, well now I'm just pissed, yet the scenery is nice, huge forest all around us, no birds though, middle of the day and too hot, again.

We float back down river, ooo ah look at that, and we are done, not happy Jan!

After we start heading back to the city.
We stop at this small building on the side of the road, this is where we will see the Tarsiers.

Unfortunately many people steal these amazing creatures from the wild just so they can charge people money to come see them, government doesn't even care.

Although I didn't want to support them it was going to be my only chance to see them so I went in, but I refused to spend any money there, no merchandise, no tips, not even a drink.

They are amazing, about the size of your hand and so cute. To move about they just through the trees with amazing spring, they look so slow but they can sure bounce when they need to.

We took a bunch of photos and got out of there.

As we travelled I saw many Cattle Egret in the rice fields, nice. I even saw a Bee-eater on a wire as we drove past which kind of cheered me up.

a flying lemur, very rare and now in a cage.

While heading back to our hotel, Richard insists we go see this huge python they have on display. Great more tortured animals for the want of money.

We arrive and yep, sure enough, a whole bunch of animals and birds in cages, great. Although I was discusted with seeing these amazing creatures all caged up it did give me an opportunity to see some animals that I don't think I could ever see otherwise. Oh and the host was a drag queen, great.

Back to the hotel and Chad suggests we head over the the Panglao Island Nature Resort and Spa for dinner and a dip in there pool, so off we go. Panglao is a small island off of Bohol and joined by a bridge so we get a cab and head over there.

Oops!

It was beautiful, we all start saying we wish we stayed here instead.

We dip in the infinity pool, amazing, and hit the beach where you can walk out to an island for a private dinner if you wish, wow.

Richard and I swim around the island a bit and it is just amazing, fish everywhere, the water is so warm and corral reef all around, is was amazing.


Over dinner we all decided to transfer in the morning and spend an extra day here at the resort.

We head back to our hotel, pack and call it a night looking forward to tomorrows events at that amazing resort.