Puerto Princesa, Honda Bay, and the Subterranean River

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I left the hostel for the airport in Kota Kinabalu last tuesday not even realising there was a typhoon in the vicinity of Luzon, Philippines, the place I was headed to. We boarded the plane about 15 minutes late and as we were in the air the pilot mentioned that there was a typhoon north of Clarke Airfield but all should be okay. A couple of hours later we were coming into land with landing gear down and all, and then the pilot pulled out blaming the strong winds and wet weather. We circled the airport for over an hour waiting for the conditions to improve before attempting another landing which was also aborted. So to everyones disappointment we flew the 2 hours back to Kota Kinabalu. Once back at the airport in KK it took a few hours to sort out our flight for the next day, a hotel room, and to void our departure stamp from Malaysia. Airasia put me up in a hotel room sharing with a nice guy Amin from Pakistan who actually did a short interview with me for his website. Next day we left Kota Kinabalu at the same time but the pilot had us all worried again after 30 minutes when he said that there were strong winds over Clark Airfield and if we couldn't land we would have to return to KK again. Thankfully we landed on schedule and my pickup was waiting to collect me for the short ride to my hotel in Angeles City.

Angeles City is an infamous girl bar area full of single foreign men, working girls and not much else. I spent 2 nights here, the first going out and checking out a couple of bars and having a few drinks, and the second in my room watching old basketball games seeing they have a cable station dedicated to just basketball (Basketball is the main sport in the Philippines).

Friday morning I took a trike (motorbike with sidecar to transport passengers) to Dau bus station before boarding a bus to Manila. On the way we passed many houses underwater with people sitting on their roof waiting to be rescued. It seemed to me that the people that live in the low lying areas affected by the floods tended to be the people with less money which made me feel quite sad. Once in Manila I took a short taxi ride (the driver tried to rip me off) to the domestic airport where I waited a couple of hours before boarding my flight to Palawan, an island one hour south of Manila.

Arriving in Puerto Princesa in the late afternoon I checked out a few hotels before settling on one a couple of kms from the centre for $14 a night with aircon, cable tv, but no breakfast. That night I went to the bar next door and had a very nice large pizza and a few beers before going back to my room to watch a basketball game. Next day I took it easy and had a short look around town before heading to the same bar again in the evening.

On Sunday I went on an island hopping tour on Honda Bay which is about a 30 minute drive from Puerto Princesa. After collecting 7 Philippino tourists on the way we arrived at a small port where we hopped on a small boat and headed off to a floating pontoon to do some snorkeling. I thought the coral was ok but not great, but there were a good variety of fish. I even managed to get bitten by a fish which stung a little, and I still have the teeth marks in my leg to prove it. After that we went to snake island for lunch, a little beach volleyball, and some more snorkeling. There were some good sized fish here right near the shore and everyone had fun feeding them with some bread. Our last stop was another island where you could relax at a small bar, play some pool, hire a jetski or banana boat, and of course do some more snorkeling. They also had an inflatable clear rubber ball which contained small balls inside so kids can play. I'm not sure how well it worked because I did see a young girl crying and holding her hands against her ears while they were inflating it with a loud airgun of some sort. I also quite liked the snorkeling here. There were a lot of fish within some sort of sea grass and also some coral a little further out with a good variety of fish which included a couple of good sized clown fish. Unfortunately the weather wasn't great with patches of sun, rain, and quite overcast for long periods. Besides the weather I really enjoyed the day and hanging out with Philippino tourists.

Monday I took off on another tour to the world famous Subterranean River just out of Sabang. I was joined by six others in the minivan where we drove almost an hour before briefly stopping at the aptly named "Halfway rest stop" to have a coffee before continuing about 30 minutes passed some very nice scenery before reaching a spot where you could climb up a small karst hill and zipline back down. I decided I would pay the extra $10 to have a little fun and after about 20 minutes we were at the top watching a few other tourists go down the zipline. Unfortunately when it was my go it was pouring rain with a fairly strong wind so it was a little hard to fully enjoy the 350 metre long ride. After here we drove another 15 minutes before reaching Sabang where we had a very nice lunch in a restaurant along the beach. Again we had fairly heavy rain when we were about to board the boat to go to the cave so we all bought cheap plastic ponchos for the ride. The boat ride took about 20 minutes in some rough seas before dropping us off on a nice little beach not far from the caves entrance. We then hopped in a small boat for the 3 km return trip into the cave. It was quite a nice trip through the cave with the boatman pointing out some interesting things. There were quite a few bats in the cave and seeing that the roof was not that far above us for a lot of the journey, you could get a good look at them. I was impressed with the cave and the river but I wasn't overwhelmed, maybe because of the other caves I have been in recently. From there we hopped back into the other boat again for the trip back to Sabang and the hour and a half drive back to Puerto Princesa.

The last couple of days I have been hanging around Puerto Princesa and having a look at couple of the local sites as well as watching a lot of basketball on TV. It is unfortunate that the weather is not very good at the moment with a lot of showers in the afternoon, hopefully it will improve a little.

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Comments

[cathy]

coffee flavoured cigarettes
hahahaha, it seems coffee taste is everywhere. I enjoyed reading your blog, thank you for sharing.