Bohol and the chocolate Hills

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I took the 730 boat from Dumaguete to Tagbilaran on Bohol, then after taking a habal-habal to the jeepney station I caught a jeepney to Nuts Huts. Not sure where I wanted to get off I was hoping the guy I paid would let me know but he fell asleep so after passing the sign I told the lady next to me and the bus stopped not too far down the road. It was then a 20 min walk from the road through the forest and down about 50 steps. After checking in it was off down another 50 or so steps to the dorm room. Wow these steps were going to kill me!
After getting lunch from the street side stall I took the bus to the chocolate hills where the moment I stepped off the bus there was a massive down pour. So I spent half an hour sat under the roof of a shop at the bottom. I then took a habal-habal up to the lookout. From the lookout area you could walk up a lot more steps to a view over the chocolate hills.
The Chocolate hills are a strange landscape of hills basically the same shape and size. There are over a thousand of them spread throughout Bohol. They believe they are from millions of years old coral from when Bohol was once under sea having been broken down by rivers and streams over hundreds of thousands of years.
After walking back down to the main road I caught the bus to the simply butterfly centre. Bohol has one of the most diverse populations of butterflies in the world and the butterfly centre has a small collection of these and loads of information about them.
Going back to Nuts Huts on the bus I met three others that were also staying there, its a small town!
After having such comfort in Dumaguete the beds in Nuts Huts felt seriously uncomfortable, the mattresses were nearly non existent, but no complaining after walking up and down the steps I was too tired to really care. There wasn't really anything to do at night so we all just sat around, ate dinner and chatted, the restaurant area closed at ten so that meant bed time for everyone.
Getting up early I first headed for the Tasier centre in Corella, this meant taking the bus to Loboc then a jeepney from there. Whilst in Loboc I discovered the most delicious, unhealthy snack! It was like trecal sponge but it had coconut in it too, so good, and freshly hot too. The tasiers are so cute, they are tiny, about the size of a hand and their eyes never move from you. I saw four in total two of which were mother and baby. Each night they jump over the fence and go in search of food but they always go back to the centre. Each tasier needs a hector of land, just to have enough food to survive, they eat mainly insects. At the centre you can't touch them so they stay partly wild but they have lots of visitors. After the tour i took the jeepney back to Loboc and from there took a jeepney to Loay.
I wanted to visit the Mangroves but couldn't remember where they were, it took me about five minutes of talking with the locals to find out where to go as they didn't know anything about mangroves locally. Because of this I was expecting a tiny mangrove area, but when I got to Loay the whole coast area is mangroves. I found a resort and after talking to the owner I took a habal-habal to where there was a boardwalk but it was closed apparently because of crabs but who knows. I then met some locals who took me for a walk into the mangroves. The water is so hot, its where the fresh water meets the sea water, but it is really beautiful.
On the way back to Nuts Huts I stopped off in Loboc for a very late lunch and another coconut, trecal thing. Mmm.
For my last full day in the Philippines I took the short walk down the road after the hard walk up the steps to the zipwire. Then I walked up some more steps. It wasn't so much about doing the zipwire, it goes over the valley which has amazing views, so I thought why not. In the afternoon I went for a swim down to the waterfalls then walked back. The river is right at the bottom of Nuts Huts and it was really nice and refreshing after such a hot day.
Verdict on the Philippines: amazing country (another) will have to come back one day and see the rest. The people are great, way too many olds western men with young Philippino girls though. The diving is amazing, the drivers are crazy and they are more religious than Muslims in Indonesia during Ramadam.

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