Winter Vacation in the Philippines
Dan, Morton and I arrived in the Philippines and spent the evening in Manila before heading north. It was brief but we were impressed (overwhelmed?) by the traffic and the chaos of the city. It felt like there was no city planning, no city ordinances on what could be built and where. It felt like insane chaos – even the electrical wires hung in crazy disorder.
The next morning we rented a car and spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to get onto the Skyway to get above the traffic and out of town but our GPS wasn’t working correctly and we kept missing turns. After quite a struggle we realized we were about to make another wrong turn. Dan pulled out of the turning lane and went straight. A cop pulled us over, took Dan’s drivers license and was saying something about our need to go somewhere on the 23rd. After passing him some money we were finally able to move on and get out of town.
We drove north through lots of towns and villages. We tried to find a place to grab some food for lunch. Morton and I ran into a supermarket but only found a chocolate bar that was grab and go food. No yogurt or cheese or peanut butter or crackers. Lots of cup of noodle but no way to prepare that even if we wanted to . We bought a few things at a bakery that we weren’t thrilled about and then made it to Mt Arayat for a hike. It was nice to get out and see some beautiful views and stretch our legs but it wasn’t fabulous.
At the bottom we saw the park had a sign pointing to a pool. Ended up being a bunch of pools – one of which was at the bottom of a waterfall. Dan and I couldn’t resist – it was so lovely and felt great after hiking.
We then headed to a small guest house near the base of Mt Pinatubo.
On the route we suddenly found our selves driving on these wide, well lit boulevards that were slightly overgrown in the middle of what seemed like no where. We saw one block actually had a couple impressive buildings on it – while there was nothing else around other than foliage.
Later we read up on the area. It is called New Clark City. After a number of relatively recent natural disasters in Manila, someone in the Philippines government developed a plan and got a bunch of support to develop a new city that is supposed to replace Manila but at this inland location. A bit of the most recent East Asian games took place in the buildings in New Clark City, but other than that its development seemed to be stalled. Very strange.
The next morning an obligatory guide picked us up in a very rough – McGivered together jeep type vehicle. The driver and guide drove us for about an hour over a gorgeous and surreal landscape of volcanic ash covered wide river bank valley. (Mt. Pinatubo had blown its top in 1991).
The jeep had to go through many rivers running through the valleys- it was nerve racking going down river banks and through rivers and then trying to find ways to go back up.
A couple places we saw what appeared to be old car bodies half buried in the ashy sand. We conjectured how they got there – got swept up in the water when river was flowing heavily? Got stuck in sand and abandoned?… We later found out that once a year the U.S. military comes and does join training exercises with the Philippino military and the cars were put there as part of the training.
Eventually the jeep couldn’t go any further and we continued up on foot. Apparently how far they can drive greatly varies season to season. The front of my old hiking sandals quickly blew out and I hiked on with them flapping from my ankles – we laughed that I had flop-flips. But then they flopped off – breaking off completely – leaving me to bare foot hiking – which wasn’t so great . Periodically we’d hike by a stand that locals, who were seasonally living in the dried out banks , would set up. For what I imagine was a hefty profit (but was only a couple dollars) they sold me a pair of actual flip flops to wear.
We eventually made it up and then down into the crater which is a beautiful lake. Locals were selling BBQ meats and cup of noodles. We hung out for a little while – the boys skipping rocks- when the rain started, we decided to head back down.
On the way down we saw a helicopter approach to land in the middle of the dried out, lava dust filled, middle of no where river bank. It approached them didn’t quite land and hovered as we drove by on the jeep. Very strange.
The next day we got into a different jeep in worse condition and headed out to a village a ways up and over the river bank. We stood in the back – looking over the driver, relieving our bodies of the bouncing seats. About fifteen minutes into the drive smoke was coming from under the dash. The driver pulled a jerry rigged wire that killed the motor. There was some looking at the engine, some starting and stopping of engine, then the driver decided to continue on. Didn’t give us a lot of confidence. We finally made it to a village and from there we hiked about an hour and a half to a tiny isolated village in the hills.
As we approached we saw farmers harvesting sweet potatoes and tilling the soil with an ox.
In the tiny village we stopped at the store and bought some chips for Morton who had gotten grumpy when we realized we needed to hike in and out – there was no pickup in the second town – as there was no street in – just the path we walked. The town had a beautiful basketball court where seeing us sitting some young boys decided to play for our amusement. They played in their flip-flops- occasionally loosing one- but I was impressed by their ability to run in them.
After we got back from this trip Dan had read about “the largest water park in Asia“ in Clark City. We thought how strange the empty city would have “The largest water park in Asia”. Who would go there? Before heading out I pointed out to Dan that the water park was in Clark City not New Clark City. We were disappointed but decided to check it out anyway.
It was supposed to be about an hour and a half drive but typical of our driving in the Philippines experience,roads on our GPS didn’t exist or dead ended leaving us to back track.
Suddenly there was a fancy Swiss Hotel – seemingly in the middle of no where. And then a fancy looking Japanese hotel/casino. Then the water park next to a large fancy looking 3/4 done decaying hotel.
There were maybe 30 cars at “the largest water park in Asia”. We went to buy tickets and they told us there were closing a couple hours early – so we only had an hour and a half. We figured we’d made the trek so we’d enter anyway. As the park was greatly understaffed and under utilized there was a schedule which rides were open when. Despite the restrictions, we ran around and had fun.
Afterwards we drove to Manila, dropped off the car and checked into the apartment with two bunk beds where we were spending the next two nights. I then ran back to the airport to pick up Celia. Unless one had a ticket you couldn’t go into the airport, so I waited outside at the crazy hectic airport until Celia arrived around 1:30 in the morning. I couldn’t believe how hectic the airport was at 1:30 in the morning. Dan read that Manila airport had been rated the worst airport in SE Asia so a few years ago they did a major renovation. Now it’s rated the 5th worst.
The next day I scheduled a bike tour of the old walled in neighborhood of Manila which the Spanish built and occupied with a moat around it. It was fun to explore and get a bit of history.
That evening the boys met a volleyball friend of Dan’s for a game and Celia and I went to a delicious vegetarian Japanese noodle shop.
The next day we flew out to Caramoan peninsula – a remote peninsula on Luzon island – the same island Manila is on. We took a quick flight to Virac where we jumped in a van to the other side of the town to where we jumped on a boat for a 45 minute trip to where we’d stay. It was a fun way to arrive.
We stayed at a very remote resort called Tugawe Cove. The first 24 hours we were their only visitors. It is a lovely resort that was built with the hopes of more visitors and now other than two weeks a year is only open on weekends. It was under cared for and the few lovely employees were not quite winning the battle with nature that was fighting to regain the land. The place is on a steep hill. Our accommodations and the restaurant were at the top. The beach, at the bottom. The first 24 hours there was a good amount of rain and I took quite a fall on the cement, moss covered steps as I was going to complain about having no water running in our bathroom. But as the sun arrived we didn’t mind as much about the electrical outings and we learned to request special food accommodations to make food we liked. The views were stunning and we spent our days snorkeling, doing a little kayaking, and playing billiards. The first night we were there the staff were having their Christmas party – which was odd to have while we were there- but was fine.
The second day after the beach activities we took a short hike up to a light house above the resort.
We could see from there a neighboring village.
The next day Dan and I paddled out to near the village and thought we’d hike there later with the kids. That afternoon we headed out. The path we took ended at the ocean a bit before the town. We ended up bush whacking for a while before finding our way.
When we finally arrived it felt a bit uncomfortable four white foreigners emerging from the jungle but as we walked around kids ran over to check us out and people said hello.
We stopped and bought some snacks to taste before heading back to the shore. We asked a man arriving in his boat if he’d drive us back to the resort – which we were quite grateful he did. A boy swam in the water to help the boat get off shore.
A couple days later we headed back to Manila. There was only an early morning flight a couple days a week so we had to leave at 5AM to catch The boat to the van to the plane.
We had to spend another night in Manila as there was only one flight out for our next destination. Dan booked the Fairmont Hotel – which was a completely different Manila experience- it was lovely -upscale and connected to- an expansive also upscale – mall that had restaurants more to our taste. Morton was desperate for clean clothes so we dropped his clothes at a laundromat. Both kids had run out of their prescriptions. I figured it was worth trying to get a pharmacist to give them to us without a prescription- though I thought the odds weren’t good. I was wrong – No problem. Crises averted!
We had a couple nice meals, used the hotel gym and pool and flew north the next morning.
We flew to Cauayan and then planned to make our way to Batad – supposedly one of the most beautiful rice paddy areas in the country- which one could only get to on foot – no road. We struggled for a while seeing if there was a way to rent a car or hire a driver – and debating which made the most sense. Unsure, we took a ride to where the road to Batad ended.
It ended up being much further than we expected but once we hiked in – we were not disappointed. The scenery was stunning. We had a simple but good meal on the porch of our guest house overlooking the rice fields. The owner was lovely with her dogs and three year old son toddling around. We were saddened to hear that the famous waterfall there was shut down as a couple tourists that day had fallen to their deaths. That should have made us more nervous for the next day.
The next morning a guide picked us up and took us on a hike through the rice fields. Every inch was stunning – but the hike was crazy unsafe – hiking on the edge of drop offs and climbing up walls with tiny protruding steps.
The main town is at the bottom of the valley. We decided to have lunch there. After our lunch, we saw outside the church someone had set up a volleyball net. After hiking the crazy steep hike back up to our boarding house, and a little rest, Dan talked Morton into going back down in hope of finding a volleyball game. They went down and played for a couple hours. They had a great time getting to know some of the locals. Dan was dying on the climb back but Morton apparently ran up. Nice to be 15!
Early the next morning Yaehel, the owner of the guest house drove us to Sagada- our next stop (again much further than we expected) – roads are extremely curved and steep – with lots of dogs and Tuktuks getting in the way.
We pulled into a cute guest house, serving food on their packed patio and in their small “living room/lobby”. I tried to ask the owners about organizing tours in the area but was told I had to go downtown to “register”. We started walking downtown but quickly realized that although not a long walk, the crazy windy road with no where out of the road to walk was not a safe place to walk. We waved over a tuktuk taxi to take us into town to the tourist center. We registered ourselves (not sure if this is a leftover from Covid times, or if it’s making sure they don’t loose tourists on hikes). After registering we were told to wander down the street and there are many places to talk to about tours. The first one we found couldn’t help us out, but at a second one we set things up for the following day. We spent the next hour or two wandering around the town. Dan got a haircut and we bought some snacks at a holiday fair. We spent the evening in the guest house lobby – sitting by the fire, ordering dinner and playing cards.
The next morning the guide picked us up and took us on what ended up being a pretty crazy and fun underground cave hike/spelunking adventure. On the way into the caves, and later after this adventure, there are stacked and hung coffins – as the local people traditionally leave their dead relatives.
Kids were exhausted and wanted to chill out for the afternoon. The old folks took a short hike to a pretty local waterfall for a dip.
Due to a miscommunication between me and Google Maps, the trip back to Cauayan Airport was much longer than I had planned, so our Batad Pension owner offered to pick us up at 2 in the morning to bring us back to the airport. Definitely one of the more frightening experiences of our lives (all except Celia who smartly slept through it). The owner had driven 4-5 hours to get us, slept for an hour or so in her car in the parking lot, then drove us the six hours in pitch black on crazy windy streets with dogs often sleeping in the middle of the roads. Dan and I tried to take over the driving but she kept insisting she was fine (which she clearly was not). We arrived way too early to the airport, which was not yet open, but at least we arrived alive. We found a little something not too yummy to eat at a roadside restaurant/food stand, before waiting at the outdoor waiting area for the airport to open.
We were VERY happy we were staying another night at the Fairmont Hotel. We needed a nice hotel after such an exhausting trip! We spent sometime at the pool before heading out to another nice restaurant at the fancy outdoor mall next to the hotel. It was New Year’s Eve, but only Celia lasted beyond 9pm.
Again, the next morning we had to head out very early to the airport. We had to take two flights – the first to Cebu and the second to Camiguin Island, which is an island formed from one volcano eruption after another – the island has one of the most densely populated volcanic areas.
Our hotel was high in the mountains, feeling like a lovely tree house.
The next day we spent exploring the island, seeing a large waterfall, snorkeling around what had been an old cemetery, which after a volcanic eruption become underwater, checking out some old sites (a church, a tower, and some what I’d call warm springs).
The following day we rented scooters and headed out on a guided hike.
Almost nothing do the Philippinos allow you to do on your own – you must register and have a guide. Our friends tried to hike on their own and were stopped. In any case, it was good to have a guide. The hike was straight up the volcano. The path wasn’t marked, only by seeing that possibly one other person had hiked this path, was it slightly clear which was to go. The hike seemed crazy unsafe and steep. Definitely not the “not too hard or long” hike we had requested. Kids decided to turn around mid mountain. Dan and I continued close to the top when I suddenly felt very ill. We thought it was heatstroke – but ended up being the flu.
The next two days we visited a couple near by islands for some snorkeling and resting on the beach. The first island was just a white sandbar off Camiguin. So beautiful. We were concerned on the boat over about the intense sun but once we got to the island we were able to rent an umbrella from the lifeguard.
Our last day on Camiguin, we packed our bags early and went to check out an island off the south east coast. This ended up being the best snorkeling of our entire trip. Dan and I swam along with a large sea turtle for about half an hour before it ditched us and went on it’s way. It was an amazing way to end our Camiguin stay.
That afternoon we flew back to Cebu, then back to Manila. We got in late and stayed at a hotel next to airport. Dan’s friend Eric met him at the hotel billiards bar, Celia ordered room service, Morton played some video games, and I, sick with the flu, went right to bed and at four AM we headed back to the airport to fly home to Beijing. Great trip!
