Advertisement
Published: January 28th 2010
The bus took an hour for Marbel from GenSan and cost me 50 pesos,I fell asleep in the bus then woke up at the bus terminal, I asked the security people where to take the bus to Surallah another small town, he pointed me to the buses out back, I hopped on, this bus is a chicken bus but a bit more comfy than the ones in Latin America, about 30 minutes and 22 pesos later I am at the Surallah bus station, someone pointed me to the jeepneys that will take me to Lake Sebu for 30 pesos a 45 minute ride.
At the end of the ride, I took a motorbike to Punta Isla resort near the lake, I can see a lot of fish pen on both side of the road, I take this must be the lake, nice scenery of lush vegetation.
At the reception desk of Punta Isla I was told dorm rooms cost 500 pesos! I balked and asked them why it's so expensive, they told me here they mean dorms as rooms without toilets inside and that there are 2 queen size beds in the room good for 4 people, I told them
Punta Isla Resort, Lake Sebu
young tiboli girl performing a seductive dancein the backpacker's lingo what a "dorm room" means, as I try to get them to lower the price, I told them I'll pay for one bed and if anyone wants to join me in the room they are more than welcome to. I told them I write a travelblog and will certainly write good things about the place as it is trully scenic, lush with plants and trees some are quite unique and they have nice cabins to chill and right next to the lake, and will certainly recommend to fellow backpackers as a worthy stop but they have to cater to us first, if they say dorm they have to have dorm beds to boot. The guy Edison one of the management staff listens intently as he pages through my old LP(there it says 70 pesos for a dorm).
They promise to give it some thought as this year they are doing some renovations and additions so maybe they can allot even one dorm room for backpackers on a budget. Anyway while having this discussion a lovely girl was dancing while her mother was banging this gong thing in their native Tiboli costumes( these are the people who
live in this area), she is winking at me seductively I was a bit surprised, feeling my unease, Edison whispered she is performing a famous dance of seduction! I muttered why not a grown up girl to dance it rather than a kid??? I gave her a coin afterwards as she was quite entertaining.
I ordered lunch for only 170 pesos I have a kilo of fresh grilled tilapia served on a banana leaf, 4 medium sized pieces showed up on my table and was forced to finish it, Gluttony is the word of the day as I enjoy the bounties of Lake Sebu washed down with 2 San Miguel beers. Took a walk and saw more natives performing dances, quite unique and entertaining. Decided to go for a walk along the road to get to the Tiboli museum, along the way kids said hi to me and a couple of baby horses feeding along the way. The museum feeis a meager 5 pesos, nothing much really interesting for me just to kill time, don't get me wrong they have gongs and crafts and things, just not my cup of tea, there were also 3 resident monkeys chained to
the tree. I stopped by the ladies selling beadworks just outside the Punta Isla compound, and I asked them to custom made me an anklet with Tiboli pattern and I will pick it up later, they agreed fro 20 pesos. Chilled in my room for most of the eve, loud music blaring from the floating restaurant/karaoke bar, had a wonderful dinner of rice and adobong kangkong.
The room I am in has a perfect location to see the lake in the morning, but it was noisy as well, the staff gathers around back and chit chat and I can hear them as the walls are very thin. needless to say I woke up early and had breakfast, Punta Isla has very good menu as well my only complain is they cater mostly to groups, your choice of meal for single person is very much limited and the waiter wont let me order for one person those meals that are for groups, ridiculous! My omelette was salty but I finisged it as I was quite hungry. I decided to be active today and see the seven falls, I hired a dude to ride me around in a motorbike, Jemar
my driver is very nice, cost is 300 pesos for the day. First up the waterfalls, there are seven but onlt 2 or 3 are accessible at the moment, you can do the zipline and it goes across the falls #2 but as it is Monday, no crowd it's shut. Jemar and I walked down to waterfall #1 then there is a small trail to get to waterfall#2 so I did that while Jemar drives up to the end of the trail to pick me up. The walk is pleasant, trail going through a bamboo forest.
The 2nd waterfall is grander and I walked up on a slippy trail until I had a good view of the falls looking down from the viewpoint, then walked down closer to it, there were a group of people there too couple of gringos as well. From there we drove to a brass making shop to observe how the local craftsman make the mold etc. boring really. Then we drove a bit further out to a small village, the ride is nice the trail goes through lush vegetation and we ended up at Lamdulay weaving center, it's for free so I went up
the house to observe how they weave the "tinalak" a type of fabric made of abaca fibers with designs unique to Tiboli people. Lamdulay is an old lady who is in charge and teaches young girls how to weave, she is a National artist declared by the government, the art is dying and only a few take up on this skill as young girls would rather be in cities. There is a dude who gave me a brief history of the weaving art, designs and all and showed me the source of abaca as I have never seen it, it's a variety of banana tree I think, but totally different, their fibers are tougher hence able to be used for this purpose. I saw some of the designs for sale as well, they are quite nice but as am still travelling I can buy them yet, about 1 meter length is 500 pesos, just over $10, not bad, considering the pain to make this material, I think if you are industrious you can make 1 meter a day of this cloth.
From there we went up the municipal hall on top of a hill, view is nice but nothing
really interesting around so we went back down and stopped at Mountain Log resort where I walked the grounds and went up this rickety tower for some good views of the fish pens and the fields on the other side near a mole hill. Lots of tilapia and another fish pens here, the main business, in town and along the road people are selling tilapias, and for a good price, freshly caught. i was tired by now so went back to Punta Isla and checked out, had a good lunch of grilled catfish, again good for 4 people, I put the rest in a doggy bag and gave it to Jemar who also dropped me off at the waiting area for jeeps or vans headed to Surallah. We wait for a few more passengers then we left, I fell asleep right away and woke up at the bus station in Surallah, another van is waiting for us going to Marbel this time, this one took ages to leave, the driver wants the van to be full and we waited for 30 minutes. barely an hour later we are in Marbel and found a Yellow bus headed to Davao City straight,
it's a/c and had comfy seats for 70 pesos. The driver will only charge me up to GenSan which is 70 pesos, I dont know why. It started raining as we approach GenSan and there was an accident on the road, a truck is lying on its side on the other side of the lane and traffic mongers abound hence the traffic.
At the bus terminal in GenSan we found out why we were not charged all the way for Davao, we have to change buses! Anyway it was quick and 5 minutes later we are off. the drive was pleasant but its raining hard, the driver was speeding like a demon once we reach the straight highway and in no time we are back in Davao, no rain here arriving at 8pm, took the jeep for the hotel and sorted myself out and chill, great weekend travel, had a great time in South Cotabato.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.074s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 14; qc: 30; dbt: 0.0471s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
prince ian damasco
non-member comment
wakawak
very nice views