It’s on the island of Bohol, and more particularly the Panglao island right next to it, that we end our trip in the Philippines.
Reuniting with friends
From Siquijor, we take the boat to Tagbilaran where we meet with Maider’s friend, Marie (they went to business school together) and her boyfriend Paul, who are traveling in Asia for 3 months before going to work in New Zealand during a year.
We rented an apartment on Airbnb in Panglao, just a minute away from White Beach. The Airbnb is awesome. There is even a swimming pool.
And we have a view on the ocean.
This is as close as vacation as it gets. Maider and Marie are super happy to reunite and the 4 of us get along great.
We go spend the afternoon at the beach. It is nice but again a lot of Filipinos everywhere. It is election day today, which means it is also a holiday because people are off work to be able to vote.
The next day is our first full day on the island, and we will spend the morning at the swimming pool before going out in the afternoon for a kayak tour in the mangrove and watch the fireflies.
We went out for lunch before leaving for our activity, and when we return we notice that our apartment is flooded. A pipe blew in the upstairs bathroom, and water is pouring down the stairs and everywhere in the living room. Luckily all our stuff was on high ground, out of reach of the water (especially our electronic devices). Good thing we had to come back by the apartment before leaving for the afternoon, otherwise it could have been way worse. Our host moves us to the next door apartment that is empty, the time that they fix the leak. We hope we will be able to move back in tomorrow.
Kayak ride in the mangrove
After this unexpected little adventure, a minivan comes to pick us up and drives us to the start of the kayak journey.
When we arrive we learn that it will only be the 4 of us for the tour. Awesome ! We put on our life-jackets and jump in our kayaks for an hour and a half tour on the river.
The landscape is amazing.
Being able to paddle in the middle of this lush vegetation and these huge trees is incredible.
And it is even better because we are all alone.
The weather is stunning, which makes for even more beautiful colors.
We get back to the base camp after an hour and a half where a snack is waiting for us.
Before getting back on our kayaks to go see even older mangroves and of course watch the fireflies by night.
These mangroves are even more impressive than the ones we saw earlier. The place is magical. We feel like we are in the middle of a fantasy land.
Then we are lucky to experience a beautiful sunset on the water. The colors of the sky are once again incredible.
Around 7 pm it starts to get dark, and we see the first fireflies waking up in the trees. We paddle to the bottom of the trees to watch them in silence. Until 9 pm we paddle from tree to tree to see the fireflies. Our guide will even catch a few to show us up close. It is magical. Watching them is like watching lights from a Christmas tree. It is truly enchanting.
Unfortunately taking pictures was really hard and we only have a few. These can give you an idea but it is nothing like what we saw with our own eyes.
We end our activity with an excellent dinner served at the base camp before returning to our Airbnb. We spent an amazing afternoon and evening the 4 of us together.
Early morning to go visit the Chocolate Hills
The next morning we wake up at 4 am to go visit the famous Chocolate Hills on Bohol island. These are thousands of rolling hills covered with grass that is either green or brown (hence the name chocolate hills).
Located 40 miles from Panglao, we want to get there before all the groups arrive. Indeed, this is a very touristic site and you know us, we want to avoid the crowds as much as possible.
We arrive at 6 am, and the place is almost empty for our biggest delight. Two hours later it will be hundreds of people who will come here to take THE picture of the Chocolate Hills.
The view at the top is impressive.
Not entirely sure that it was worth waking up at 4 am and driving an hour and a half by motorbike. But the landscape remains magnificent.
Especially under these conditions. With an amazing blue sky. We will stay a while here admiring the view before getting back on our motorbike to go to the tarsier sanctuary.
Meeting the tarsiers
Maider dreamed of meeting these tiny primates, that are as rare as they are fragile.
We will see 5 in total. And they are way smaller than what we imagined. They look so fragile too.
We try to get close to these fascinating creatures, making the less noise possible in order not to scare them.
We stay a little while watching them. When they open wide their eyes it is super impressive.
We end our visits for the day at 11 am, when a lot of people are simply starting theirs. We decide to go back to Panglao and spend the afternoon relaxing by the pool.
Late afternoon we make our way to the other side of Panglao, where we can see the sunset. Unfortunately some boats are blocking the view, but we still spend a great evening.
When we come back we can finally get back to our first villa, but we notice that the water has done more damage than expected and the power outlets are not working (only the lights work). So that means no AC… Which is complicated with the heat. We can not move back to the other villa because guests are arriving tomorrow. So our host and his handyman get working. Thankfully we all laugh and everything quickly goes back to normal.
Last relaxing day
For our last day together we will do absolutely nothing.
Morning at the pool for the ladies, and watching the NBA playoffs for the guys.
Then afternoon at the beach.
Without forgetting that our entire day will be spent to the beat of the local karaoke on loud speaker…
For our last evening together we will go celebrate at Panglao’s main beach : Alona. We also meet up with Younes, a French guy we had met in Port Barton a few days ago.
We will drink and dance into the night before getting back to our Airbnb to catch some sleep. Marie and Paul have an early morning ferry ride to Siquijor, while we get back to Cebu in the afternoon before catching a flight to Manila the next day.
The Philippines end on a happy note. We loved our stay here. We walked on the most beautiful beaches we had ever seen, saw incredible corals, and hundreds of different types of fish. The Filipinos are incredibly nice (and all spoke incredibly well English), in short these felt like amazing vacations.
Our journey around the world is almost over. We will stay 3 days in Singapore before spending a week in Dubai and finally going back to France. We try to make the most out of our last days, and try not to think about the end of the trip too much.