Philippines : Mile Post #1

I am at a loss for how to begin dictating the adventure that was my first visit to the Philippines. So I guess I will simply stick to a chronological progression of the voyage. A half dozen or so posts will describe our adventure and I hope readers will remain interested in the tale.

Only having seven days to explore this country, composing over 7000 islands, demanded a significant amount of research since so many options exist. Since our flight was from Taipei to Manila, we originally contemplated staying on Luzon (the largest island) and explore a few northern areas. After more research than I care to admit to, we decided to scrap all that planning, blow our budget, and fly to Palawan instead to check out this rumored beauty of an island. Such is the framework I will be writing from.

One major stipulation about the landing visa that enables me to stay in Taiwan is that I must leave the country every ninety days. Hoping to couple these “visa runs” with some southeast Asia exploration, our trip to the Philippines came about in a mad rush late one night about a month before I arrived in Taiwan. Because we needed to fit our trip around Twin's work schedule, Chinese New Year was his only time off and so we searched the internet for tickets to various places we wish to visit: Bali, Thailand, Cambodia, India, Nepal, Indonesia, etc. This is when we noticed a problem, all the flights were fully booked. For people familiar with traveling during Christmas, imagine the craziness of air travel during that time but instead of competing with a few million people, imagine doing so with a billion. Thus, because of budget reasons, Manila was the cheapest available flight and we took it without thinking. The Philippines must be a cool place to explore, we thought, and were happy enough with our decision until the planning stage actually began. After days spent trying to figure out a possible Luzon tour schedule, it became apparent that such a voyage would be a bust. So, Lonely Planet and hiking websites set our gaze onto Palawan, and hence set our trip into motion.

Not only am I a novice when it comes to international trip planning but finding up-to-date information about hostels, buses, vans, boats, etc. on Palawan is next to impossible. Perhaps the thing I learned most from this trip is that I need to improve at normal life stuff: ie. booking reservations, keeping track of my stuff, planning, being prepared, thinking things over, etc, because, at this point in my life, I fail miserably. Although dozens of blogs attempt to describe the logistics of the island and the voyage to the town of El Nido, most are a few years old and contradict one another. I emailed a boat-load of people who'd written these blogs to little avail. So it appeared we would wing the majority of the trip.

Here is what we knew: we could fly into Puerto Princesa, the largest town on Palawan, and take a bus to El Nido (destination spot) where hiking, hot-springs, and snorkeling could take place. From there, we could take an eight hour “banca” ride across the ocean to the town of Coron (destination spot), on the island of Busuanga, and visit one of three salt water hot-springs located in SE Asia. A guesthouse (hostel) on Coron actually responded to my emails and we obtained reservations for the few nights we would be in that town. Nobody in El Nido would respond to my emails and we set off without having lodging reserved. From this point, everything else that transpired would be luck, misfortune, ill-planning, ill-communication, indecision, and fortune. Furthermore, the research I'd done regarding our trip was forgotten, by me, and left on a sheet of paper at home. Probable transportation methods was about all I could remember besides the name of the two vegetarian friendly restaurants in El Nido.

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So after printing out the boarding passes on Saturday morning and boarding "Her Highness", we left on the three + hour train ride up to Taipei. Our tickets to the Philippines had us leaving Taiwan at 1 am on Sunday and arriving in Manila at 3 am. From there we would have a flight at 7 am to Palawan. The international airport in Taoyuan does not have a train leading to it and one must procure a taxi or bus to get there, and so comes the battle of finding ones way around Taipei, a bustling city of three million. Instead of being able to spend our time visiting a museum in Taipei, we spent the next few hours looking for a vegetarian restaurant and finding a bus station / bus that would actually get us to the airport.  Neither should have been that difficult but the part of town we found ourselves in seemed devoid of both. Big cities are also not my thing and am easily lost. But finally, both tasks were accomplished and we arrived at the airport and went through security with a small hiccup that should have been an indicator but, being from the US, didn't cause me to think twice. I'd printed out our boarding pass and checked in online, yet the security guard seemed to question the ticket. After explaining what these sheets of paper were, she let us through and we hung out at our gate, trying to sleep in the frigid airport (seriously, even with sweatshirts and hats it was cold), until we the boarding process began. About half of the passengers had boarded when we presented our boarding passes and the employees looked at them like, "What the fuck are these." We told them we checked in online and these were the passes given by their airline and the staff seemed incredulous, these would not work to get us on the plane. So, I pulled out all of my information about the tickets purchased only to realize that the one key sheet of paper was not with us (instead it was sitting next to all my notes at the house) but, fortunately, could be found online. But wait, Dacota's ipod touch would not jive with the slow internet connection at the airport and the queue line was fully exhausted without us being able to board. Although the boarding passes were sorted out, we need the confirmation numbers so that we would not be immediately rejected when we arrived in the Philippines and the airline company demanded we present this information. So we waited for the internet to load my email account with the stress and knowledge that if we didn't present them with the information soon, we would not be allowed to board. One of the nice girls working for the company had even gone so-far-as to broadcast a signal to us so that we might connect better. But nope, it didn't work, and time was running out fast. I finally convinced her to pull up the information on her phone which was finally accomplished. I took a photo of the information which would hopefully suffice once in the Philippines and allow us to enter the country. Without remembering, or having time, to log out of my account on her phone, we grabbed our stuff and managed to make it on the plane just in time. No negative consequences, to my knowledge, came from the week long "compromised" email account and it only makes me appreciate the honestly of some people. So with that ordeal over, we made it to the Manila airport without a hiccup minus the inability to sleep. We waited around the, also, frigid airport for a few hours with the eastern horizon slowly growing lighter. Seriously! What is up with the fifty degrees airport terminals blowing conditioned air as if it was going out-of-style? Does it really need to be that cold? Why isn't sixty five acceptable? We did see the sunrise from the airport, which was quite beautiful, so I guess it wasn't all bad. Anyway, after a last minute gate change, we boarded the plane and flew to Palawan.

Our plane to Palawan

Islands far below us stood out against the shining reflection of the sea, as if Robinson Crusoe could be the inhabitant of these minor islands. Actually, hundreds of these could be seen at variable sizes. Yet, at the rate we encountered these land masses, the 7000 island of the Philippines would've been easily exceeded. So what exactly classified an island in the Philippines is unknown to me because, although local maps charted these land masses, only a few were considered part of the Philippine 7000. Anyway, it was beautiful and like nothing I've seen before.

We arrived!

Once in Puerto Princesa, we needed to find out way to the San Jose Bus Terminal located about nine kilometers away. Plenty of tricycles (pictures will be featured later in these synopses) waited as well as a flood of people attempting to convince arriving tourists to hire their private van to drive them to El Nido. We shuffled past the crowd and began walking from the small airport into town. Before leaving this larger town, it was recommended to purchase sun screen, alcohol, and various other goods at the only "mall" on the island. It wasn't a mall, per say, but more reminiscent of a standard store instead of a shop (sari-sari) smaller than a 7-11, with significantly less selection. After finally ridding ourselves of the hagglers trying to convince us to take their private transport, we made it to the mall which, as rumored, featured a morning dance show after the christian sermon. It is pretty funny to watch the dancing employees and made the mile hike / detour worth it. We bought some stuff and took a tricycle to the bus terminal for the 10 am bus to El Nido. If we'd had the foresight, we would have purchased fruit in Puerto Princesa because, shockingly, the further more we went north, the harder it was to purchase fruit. But hindsight .... you know. Anyway, we began the seven hour trip.

A picture of the bus taken during one of the stops

A creepy Santa looked over us during a brief stop

There is a few reasons we took this slower method of travel as compared to a private van. The positive aspects of the bus is that it was about seven dollars cheaper a person, it held to a fairly rigid schedule (unlike the vans which sometimes presented problems and delays), and offered a few stops to check out a few smaller towns. The downside is that the bus offers rides to locals and school kids which could slow down the already slow trip with frequent stops. But since there isn't any school on Sunday, our trip was only slightly hindered and so we watched as the country side flew by and struck up conversation with a few tourist couples on the bus.

A farm worker transporting goods

Palawan country-side

One couple, a french man living in Taiwan and his Taiwanese girlfriend, and the other, an american man teaching in Japan and his Filipina girlfriend, provided a few hours of conversation and we made it to the El Nido stop with minimal delay. They were in the same boat as us, no ability to make reservations in town and, thus, were also on the prowl for lodging. From the bus stop, we parted ways and walked the mile into town by ourselves, searching for accommodations. Neither of us new what to expect from the town and, as we moved closer, we realized that this was perhaps the most touristed place / touristy thing we'd ever done. Far outnumbering locals, tourists moved to and fro as we walked through the small town towards the beach, hoping to find a hostel. People of all nationalities could be seen and heard although mostly Europeans and Chinese composed the crowd. Since we hadn't eaten all day, we were hungry and hoping that we could find a vacancy at one of the many places along the water front. It turns out that after four locations on the beach, none had openings. I remembered that a place called the Cliffside Cottages, located on the main road into town, was positively reviewed and were able to get a room for the night.

The Cottages

Our cottage

Interior sleeping room

Bathroom

It was a cute little place and headed out to find food and play hacky-sack on the beach. A middle eastern fusion restaurant offered us falafel and humus and we devoured my first none-Taiwanese food meal since arriving on my new home island. It was delicious.

Sunset on the beach

Hacking until nightfall

We played some sack, returned early to play a game of cribbage on the front porch of our little cottage and went to bed early having not slept in 36 hours. Thus is our first two days away from home.