Tej Turner

Travelblog#37: El Nido & Puerto Princesa – the Philippines

14th-19th January, 2015

El Nido, with its dramatic landscape of limestone mountains and white sand beaches, is the top tourist destination in Palawan. When we reached there we were greeted by the usual signs of a popular beach experiencing growing pains – inflated prices, cluttered streets, white people outnumbering Asian – but I had already guessed that it was going to be like this so I was mentally prepared. Jody, James, Chloe and I got ourselves a family room (it was one of the cheaper options in town but yet it still cut a bit more into our budgets than we would have liked) and then booked ourselves for ‘Tour A’, to see some sights in the archipelago offshore the next day.

Our first stop was at a small cove on an island 30 minutes away, where we were told we needed to jump off the boat and swim through a gap between the limestone karsts.

Have I mentioned yet that my new travel buddies own a Go Pro? Well they do. So, for the next couple of months, while I am travelling with them, you will also be able to see photos of the more watery places I venture to.

James and I swam on ahead and reached a lagoon.

In fact, we were taken to many lagoons that day, and a few beaches, most of which were very beautiful. ‘Secret Lagoon’ could do with being renamed though, as you have to queue to get into it these days. El Nido really does have some fantastic scenery but the way that dozens of people are carted around just a handful of famous locations, on these pre-made tours, makes it a little soulless.

We figured out that it is not too hard to get away from all the hustle and bustle though: the next day we hired out a pair of kayaks because we fancied a bit of freedom.

We rowed out to a really beautiful island which had a nice beach, calm waters, and better snorkelling than any of the places we were taken to the previous day, and the only other people we saw were a few fishermen and one couple (who also happened to be on kayaks). It was a really lovely way to finish off our time in El Nido but, on our way back, our kayaks were unfortunately turned over by a sudden wave. As soon as I pulled myself back up to the surface, I began scrambling to collect items and managed to recover Jody’s wallet, bottles of water, the oars, and a few other things, but I lost my snorkel and sandals to the tide.

We caught a bus back down to Puerto Princesa the following morning and our time there began with a trip to Palawan Butterfly Garden, whose friendly staff were keen to show us around the place. I found their collection of cocoons, which had several species of butterflies in the process of hatching, particularly interesting.

It wasn’t just home to butterflies either, but also scorpions, reptiles, stick insects, and even a pair of rescued Palawan bearcats which had been orphaned by poachers. After we were done admiring all the various creatures and taking photos we were coaxed into the nearby Tribal Village.

When I first saw the ‘village’ – where a few men clad in loincloths were waiting to begin the ‘show’ – I did worry that it was going to be a bit false and tacky, but I was actually pleasantly surprised. They were Palawano tribesmen from the southern mountains, and they gave us a demonstration on some of their customs; how they hunt with spears and blow-darts, spark fires by striking two stones together, and one of them even played a traditional guitar-like instrument with only two strings. They didn’t speak any English, so a Filipino translator narrated, and she told us how these tribesmen are volunteers who stay in this village for two weeks at a time, on a rotation scheme, and the money generated by it goes towards several programs to help keep their way of life thriving in the modern world.

In the afternoon we went for a wander around the town, soaking up the atmosphere as we strolled through the local market, along the waterfront, and past the Immaculate Conception Cathedral, where hundreds of people had come to watch live footage of the Pope – who was at the time in Manila – give a speech.

I then finished off the day with a sunset beer on the rooftop balcony of the guest house we were staying at.

In the morning I made a quick trip to the Palawan Heritage Centre – a museum which is filled with lots of interesting information on Palawan’s culture, fauna, and history, but does not seem to get as many visitors as it deserves – just before we caught a tricycle to the airport to fly to Cebu.

For the next few weeks of our journey, we will be travelling across The Visayas.

For more photos from El Nido and Puerto Princesa, check out my Flickr account. Some of the photos from this blog were kindly donated to me by James, who not only owns a GoPro, but also a DSLR. He is a very talented photographer, and his website, James Robert Eldridge Photography, is worth a browse if you want to see some more professional snaps from Asia.

Travelblog#36: Port Barton – the Philippines

11^th-13^th January, 2015

We arrived at Port Barton in the early evening and my first impressions were, to be honest, not great. The beach was nice, but I was soon to discover that the accommodation was all hideously overpriced, yet somehow nearly everywhere was full. Large colourfully painted signs advertised nightly barbeques, stone-baked pizzas, grilled cheeseburgers and all kinds of western foods, all sold at very western prices. Where was the Filipino food? When Roy, my former travel buddy, had described this place to me it sounded like a secret little haven which only received a gentle trickle of travellers, but he had been here over five years ago. It seemed this place had since been ‘discovered’, and its clientele had predominantly shifted to the flashpacker party crowd.

It did feel a bit like I was in Thailand.

I eventually found a place for the four of us to stay – a nice cottage with two bedrooms, a living room, kitchen, and balcony with a hammock – and I even managed to haggle it down to a fairly reasonable price.

The next morning we were taken out on a boat trip to explore the archipelago of islands just offshore and we managed to avoid paying all the extra tout-tax by organising it directly with the boatman rather than an agency. The snorkelling spots we stopped at had some nice corals and so-so marine life. The islands, however, were paradise.

The first place we settled upon was a pair of twin islands which it was possible to wade between across a bar of sand beneath the shallows. Our boatman and his assistant cooked us a lunch of fresh fish and vegetables over a fire while we explored, swam, snorkelled and lazed.

In the afternoon we got back onto the boat and were taken to German Island, which had a lovely sandy beach dotted with coconut trees. We even managed to spot a turtle while snorkelling there and our guide showed us a spot where a turtle had laid its eggs in the sand.

Port Barton did grow on me – as it is a genuinely beautiful area – but at the same time the way it is now set up, with its expensive prices and all the pre-fixed tours, makes it feel a bit like you’re on a holiday rather than travelling. It is all a little bit too comfortable. A little too crowded. Locals are so used to seeing foreigners now that they are no longer interesting to them, and thus only speak to them when they want their money and that, to me, as a traveller, creates a distance and makes you feel like you are not really connecting with an area, just seeing all these pretty things from behind a glass as you are whisked around.

I think I may have come to Palawan a few years too late, but I am already here now and, like I said before, it is a beautiful place, so I am going to make the most of what it is while I am here and just hope that other parts of the Philippines, such as The Visayas and North Luzon, might be a little more adventurous and rewarding, when I get there.

Jody, James, Chloe, and I got a little bit attached to our nice little cottage by the sea, so after our boat tour we stayed in Port Barton for an extra day, to relax, soak up the sun, bathe, and read books in our hammocks.

For more photos, click here.

Travelblog#35: Sabang – the Philippines

10th-11th January, 2015

After a very comfortable Christmas and New Year spent with friends in Taiwan, I was back on the road again. Destination: the Philippines.

No longer alone, I had three travel buddies with me: Jody, James and Chloe. All of us are old friends and went to University together. Jody has been living in Taiwan for the last four years, teaching English. James and Chloe are a couple, and have also been travelling around Asia this year – while I was roaming around Indonesia, they were backpacking around Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam.

We left Taipei in the early hours of the morning and had a three hour stopover at Manilla airport, where we waited for our connecting flight to Puerto Princesca.

It was during this transit at Manila airport that I first encountered the carefree attitude Filipinos have towards time: almost every flight was delayed that morning, but nobody seemed all too bothered or surprised. Even when the planes were ready to leave, the airlines then had to chase up missing passengers who had not turned up to their gates. Streams of names were called out in the intercom over and over again, followed by; “your flight is ready to leave. Can you report to gate [X] for boarding… please?” each time, a little more pleadingly. The delayees were, presumably, sat in cafés, obliviously slurping upon drinks without a worry in the world.

I decided that I was going to have to ‘get with’ this laid-back vibe during my time here, or otherwise it might begin to annoy me.

We reached Puerto Princesca in the morning and caught a bus straight to Sabang.

We were too tired to do much else other than find ourselves a lovely little cottage by the sea to stay in, book our permits to visit the nearby underground river the next day, and finish off a long journey with a beer on the balcony.

The Puerto Princesca Subterranean River National Park has recently been named one of the Seven New Wonders of the Natural World, and has thus become a little overcrowded. After we had finished patiently queuing alongside all of the tour groups, through several stages of a hopelessly bureaucratic system, we were finally loaded up onto a boat and taken to a small cove further along the coast to the entrance of the cave.

It was a very scenic area, with large monitor lizards wandering around and cheeky crab-eating macaques trying to scrounge food. The brackish waters were a beautiful greenish colour and were teeming with fish. Swimming was not allowed; as the eco-system is very unique and part of a protected area.

Once our group number was called out we were loaded up onto another boat and we began our tour of the cave.

Our guide’s commentary was comical and gimmicky, rather than scientific, but entertaining. Between all the wise-cracks and one-liners, he did tell us a little bit about the history of the place. Mostly, he pointed out different formations and told us their names: “this is Medusa, can you see the hair?” “that one is The Dolphin,” “this one, is for adults only.”

It was a very nice cave, and definitely worth the visit.

Once our tour was over we decided to walk back to Sabang through a jungle walkway I had read good things about in my Lonely Planet guide, only to discover that in the year since my guide was written the footpath – which locals and travellers alike have been casually strolling through over the years – has been rebranded as a trail which, for the purposes of ‘safety’, (*cough* *cough*) white people need a guide.

To be fair, the price for the guide was quite cheap so we grudgingly paid it. It vexes me though, when the concept of Health and Safety is abused as a money-making scheme – it is a very western habit which seems to be slowly creeping into Asia. Most of the path was paved, and it was all very well signposted – there really is no need for people to be ‘guided’ through it.

The walk went past some lovely limestone scenery, swamplands and mangroves. We even saw a snake along the way, as well as a cave which is used by monitor lizards to lay their eggs.

When we got back to Sabang, we grabbed our bags and jumped upon a bus heading towards Port Barton.

For more photos, go to my Flickr account.