BOHOL ISLAND, PHILIPPINES

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My first out of town assignment was in Bohol. Bohol is an incredibly beautiful place for travellers. It’s a place where you can really see and feel the living paradise. This amiable province is a host to a lot of local and foreign tourists. Many people especially foreigners visit Bohol because it offers a lot of places to travel to, leisure and adventure.



Travelling to Bohol from Cebu City takes approximately two hours. In my case I ride via fastcraft vessels – OceanJet – in particular. It is the most popular vessel going to Bohol along with other shipping lines such as Weesam Express, Starcraft and 2GO.



At Tagbilaran Port, the main port of Bohol, you are greeted with smile by the citizens and tourist assistant personnels, enough to start your new day in this hospitable city. Many tourism and hospitality companies already awaits at the entrance of the port offering their services to the visitors. They have service vehicles to take their clients to their destinations.



The most popular tourist spot in Bohol is the Chocolate Hills. They say your Bohol adventure will never be complete without visiting this magnificent natural geologic formation. My first glance at the Chocolate Hills was in 2006, when I was in high school attending regional competition held in the same province. It was indeed a very spectacular scenario. The chocolate hills is composed of hundreds of hills that look like scoops of chocolate ice cream during summer and turn green during rainy days. Apparently, when the 7.2 magnitude earthquake strucked the province in 2013, several formations have been damaged and deformed.



Another popular locations that is widely visited are the Baclayon Church – the oldest stone church in the Philippines; Snake Prony – the longest and biggest snake in captivity in Bohol located in Albur; the Loboc River and Floating Restaurants in Loboc; the Man-Made Forest; the white-sand beaches of Anda; the St. Joseph Church in downtown city, Bohol Museum and many more! The annual festival held in the province is called Sandugo Festival.





The only thing I don’t appreciate much is their city roads. Downtown Tagbilaran is full of roundabout roads and complex streets that are sometimes confusing especially when I stroll around visiting our clients. Some portions of the roads are not even finished and very dusty. Their public hospital is crowded and looks unsanitary. There is also a very limited number of hotels, shopping malls, restaurants and recreational centers around the city.

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