Day 150: Bohol

Asia » Philippines » Bohol » Panglao
February 16th 2010

Published: February 19th 2010

Our original plan was to go to Bohol for a few days, and hit up at least one more spot before catching our flight to Palawan on the 18th. But somehow we ended up staying for 8 days, and we ran out of time to go anywhere else. Some places are just hard to leave.

After flying to Cebu city from Davao, we took a taxi to the ports and booked a ferry to Tagbilaran, the port city of Bohol. The ferry ride started out going pretty fast, but then the sound changed and we slowed down a LOT. It was soon announced that we were operating on only 1 engine. The ride was supposed to take 2 hours, but at this rate it probably would take 2 or 3 times as long. But luckily it only took 10 minutes for them to fix it, and we were back to full speed again. Could have been much worse. From Tagbilaran we took a taxi to Alona beach on Panglao island.

Our first day at alona beach we just rented some snorkel gear and laid on the beach. We had to swim quite a ways out before things got interesting, but it was worth it. At first the bottom is pretty flat, with sand or some kind of sea grass, but maybe 100 yards out it begins to slope down, and then there is a straight down CLIFF that goes to 50 meters deep. The coral is pretty awesome along the cliff, so we swam along it for a while. I got some okay pictures on my waterproof camera, but it was much better in person. The beach is really nice to lay on also - really white sand. I caved in to one of the massage ladies and got a pretty sweet massage on the beach for about 4 dollars.

Another day we rented a motorbike to give ourselves a tour of the Chocolate Hills, which are one of the main attractions on bohol. 30 minutes in to the drive, the motorbike felt a little weird so I pulled off the road. Sure enough, we had a flat tire. Luckily a guy on a motorbike stopped and helped us get to a tire shop down the road. There was only one guy at the tire shop to start, but as he started to fix our tire we amassed a crowd of no less than 8 people fixing the tire. I think we were the most interesting thing going on in the area. There were actually a ton of holes in the tire but they managed to fix them all, for only 50 pesos.

We hit the road again but decided to stop in Loboc for lunch. Loboc is right on Loboc river, and there are a bunch of places that offer "river cruise" buffets for 300 pesos. You eat on a boat, which then goes on a 1 hour cruise on the river. I actually thought the food was pretty good, but steph would probably say otherwise. But I think we both agree that the river cruise part was really nice. The boat ended at a small waterfall where locals were washing their clothes before turning around.

By the time we made it to the Chocolate hills, the sun was getting low in the sky. The chocolate hills are something like 1268 hills, which are supposed to look like hershey's kisses. The lighting made them really dramatic. Too bad it also meant we'd be driving back in the dark... the Hills were way further from Panglao than we thought.

On the way back, just before dark, we made it to Loboc again and decided to stop and see some Tarsiers. Tarsiers are tiny little endangered creatures that some people think are monkeys, but I think they're actually related to lemurs. They are nocturnal and have huge eyes. Since it was almost dark, most of them were awake and active. Most of the time it seems like they just hang out on one branch, but every once in a while they turn their heads 180 degrees, and then jump a few feet to another branch. Cute little guys.

The last leg of our journey was the least fun. I was getting hit at least once a second by a bug in the face, it was pretty much dark, and our butts hurt from being on the motorbike so long. But we did make it back okay so it all worked out. It took us a few days before we were in the mood to rent a motorbike again to go to the nearby Bikini Beach (which is not as good as it sounds).

Over the course of our 8 days we ended up staying at 4 different places in Alona beach, which is the most popular area on Panglao island. The reason for all the moves was that our typical strategy of walking in with no reservations doesn't work so well in the Philippines during the busy week of valentines day AND chinese new year. It actually wasn't too big of a hassle except for one day, where we had to walk around for what seemed like 3 hours to find a place.

Our last day in Alona we went scuba diving off of Balicasag island. It was amazing. On the boatride there, our divemaster shouted "whale shark!" and the captain stopped the boat. We couldn't see anything, but the dive master pointed, and was jumping up and down excitedly. We didn't see it until it swam directly under the boat. It was HUGE! Head was 5 or 6 feet wide, body probably 30 feet long. We all started to frantically put on masks and fins to jump in the water, but the whale shark must have dove down because our dive master lost track of him. He said he's only seen 5 in his life, and this was the biggest one, so I guess we were pretty lucky.

Both of our dives at Balicasag were awesome. Balicasag is surrounded by a reef that drops off like a cliff all around the island, and the wall is completely covered with coral. It was more alive than any reef I've seen. So many different types of coral and schools of fish. Some of the highlights were seeing a sea turtle, a small shark, some sucker fish (the kind that normally latch on to sharks or boats) swimming around, and swimming through a huge school of these blue fish. Definitely some of the best diving I've ever done.

Here's some pictures from Bohol: