Cebu and Bohol

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The flight to Cebu was good fun with the attendants keeping everyone happy with in flight Karaoke competitions....kind of like Name That Tune with them taking turns singing over the PA system...mostly Philippine Pop so we didn't win the free key-ring goddmammit!!. Someone said they sometimes play basketball!!...save that pleasure for a future trip.

Cebu's the usual grime and bustle of Manilla but on a smaller scale, lots of decaying old buildings gone to seed a long long time ago and years of monixide fumes dusting everything in sight (and shite). In the bit of travelling we've done we've quickly realised that Filippino towns and cities look a lot better if you just focus on the people going about their day to day, a fair amount of smiling faces and waves and a lot of looks like you've just come from another planet (but am well used to that after Japan).
We were there to catch the Super Cat Ferry to Bohol and we're surprised at how much the terminal's changed since we were last here for christams 2001. It used to be a row of delapidated warehouses where you'd hang around for hours then get unceremoniously shoved into a small boiling waiting room packed to the rafters. There was a blind Mariachi band doing the rounds and keeping everyones spirits up. Now it's a slick terminal with seats! and aircon!! and the ferry ran on time!!!...the blind mariachi band has been replaced by a disabled childrens band doing pop numbers on a little stage under disco lighting...did a mean Corrs cover.

Took a tricycle out to Alona beach from the Ferry at Bohol and got chased by the mother of all tropical storms. The nice beach there gave us half a day of sunshine before the heavens opened again and this time it felt like it was gonna stay.
Should mention that since we were in Port Barton in Palawan we've been playing tag with the exotic sounding 'Typhoon Frank'..huge bugger should've moved off to harrass Taiwan and Japan by now but still lurking over the Philippines.
After another full day of rain decided to cut our losses and head inland for some hiking, biking and other wet weather possibilities. Indulged ourselves with a hired car and driver and set off to see some of the amazing 15th Century coral churches dotted arouns the Island. We loved the churches we'd seen in Siquijor last time we came to The Philippines...the epitome of atmospheric with crumbling grandure and frightening examples of Catholic kitch...doll like stautes in rotting old purple robes...violent dipictions Christ's suffering and all set of by moldy pews, green fungus on the walls and swallows darting through the rafters...saw a group of bats sleeping in the dome above the alter in Loboc and got a sneak view from the Belfry of an 16th century Jesuit church in Alberqueque...no ones alowed up there but the preist was out and a helpful guy from the convent next door sneaked us up there...great view of the coast and outlying islands.
One of the highlights of Bohol is it's population of Tarsiers...said to be the worlds smallest monkey but actually a kind of Lemur...to us it looks like a cross between a Gremlin and Gollum...tiny body, huge orange eyes that could stare down a tree and long boney hands. We were looking forward to getting to the Nature Reserve which does a lot of work protecting them and their habitat but our driver had other ideas and yes...wanted to take us to see one in a box...this time in a cafe in town...A lot of the riverside cafes seem to be getting the idea of catching them for the tourist even though it's illigal...When we refused and told him to drive us to the Reserve he had a sulk and wouldn't do it. I made a mental note to tell him to go f**k himself then decided to use our hired driver time to full effect and got him to drive us to the far off Chocolate Hills.

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Photos

Cebu Pacific Flight
Inflight entertainment "name that tune"

Comments

[Ali]

Great Photo
I love the photo of the Jepney in the Mud - do you have any photos of the Tarsiers... I'm intrigued :)

[anonymous]

here's the Tarsier picture !
Hi, just added the Tarsier picture ... !