Sisophon

Day 291 – Road trip

There was no relaxing on our first day in Phnom Penh and we were up early to get on a minibus out of town.  Jane and Michael’s housemates Ash, Morris and Clarissa, along with Ash’s friend Nichole and extras Rob and Matt were all heading to a 30th birthday party in Sisophon and so we tagged along for the road trip.  It was at least an 8 hour drive but this flew by reasonably quickly with the amount of banter back and forth and sometimes across the minivan, in dispersed with naps and Sudoku.  We also broke up the day with a stop at Gecko, a yummy restaurant in Battambang for some lime mint shakes and Mexican; a blow up pool purchase for the birthday boy Warrick, a fellow NGO employee and of course, to find a slab of beer.  The boys managed to find “Australia Beer, brewed under supervision of the Australian Brewing Company” – beer and an organisation the half a dozen Aussies in the car had never heard of!

Lunch at Gecko.

Matt and Michael and the minibus driver with the so called Australia Beer.

By the time we had arrived in Sisophon is was dark and pouring with rain.  The guys hadn’t booked accommodation, assuming it would be easy, but being a small town with a fair few expats in town for this party, there wasn’t enough room at the preferred Inn, leaving Jane, Michael and Morris (the Khmer speakers) to go for a drive and find some more options.

It was late by the time bedding was sorted, but that didn’t matter as we headed off to “Warrick’s place” to crash the party.  The Australia Beer was pretty awful, so when the collection went around to go out and purchase more beer we were in!  It was a short night in the end, on account of a long day and us not knowing anyone at the party!

Ho Chi Minh City

Day 287 – Vietnam history 101

We touched down at a bout 1am, slightly late but glad that we had actually made it.  The pre-authorisations for visas that I had arranged online seemed to work fine and we had our visas and were through immigration pretty quickly.  We had expected the ensuing arguments with taxi drivers, keen to bump up the price given the late hour, so after quite a bit of negotiation we made it into town to our hotel.  The night manager was asleep on the couch when we got there, but a light tap on the door got his attention and we finally made it to bed.

Our first stop in the morning, after a sleep in of course, was the Fine Arts Museum.  The ground floor was supposed to contain contemporary art by Vietnamese artists, but only a couple of the galleries were open.  The second floor contained what would better be described as Communist Party memorabilia than art, heroic figures waving red flags, Ho Chi Minh communing with the people, that sort of thing.  The third floor was more interesting with older Vietnamese art including carvings, pottery and silverwork.

The art gallery building was quite impressive in itself, it was rather run down however.

After locating its new location we sat down at Quan An Ngon for a bite to eat.  This is a huge French era colonial mansion with tables in the huge courtyard and lofty ground floor spaces indoors.  The coordinating chef has chosen the best of Ho Chi Minh City’s street vendors, jazzed them up a bit, and given them a spot lining the courtyard.  You get a menu listing all the options available, full table service and a beautiful setting, plus a great selection of delicious traditional food.  Amongst other things we had banana and snail noodle soup, bamboo noodle soup, prawn cakes and fresh vegetable spring rolls… Yum.

That afternoon we headed for the Reunification Palace.  Originally this was the South Vietnamese Presidential Palace, but since North Vietnamese tanks rolled through the front fence and started doing doughnuts on the lawn in April 1975 it has just been a big vacant building.  It does however retain much of the original furniture and fittings from its heydays in the 1960s. 

On 30 April 1975 a Viet Cong officer ran up several flights of stairs to unfurl a Viet Cong flag from the top balcony, claiming victory.

  
Meanwhile in a reception room like the above (not sure if it was this one or one of the other two on the same floor) “General Minh, who had become head of the South Vietnamese state only 43 hours before, waited with his improvised cabinet.  ‘I have been waiting since early this morning to transfer power to you’, Minh said to the VC officer who entered the room. ‘There is no question of your transferring power’, replied the officer.  ‘You cannot give up what you do not have.'” (LP Vietnam).

An empty cabinet?

The president’s desk in the underground complex beneath the palace.  Next door was a bedroom for him to sleep in if it wasn’t safe to head back upstairs.  There was also a huge array of communications rooms (now very much outdated), battle planning rooms, that sort of thing.

In the evening we sat on the street at one of the bars in the backpacker district and watched the nightlife go by.  I especially liked that for locals walking around in a matching pyjama set seemed to be acceptable attire for the evening, or any time of day for that matter, and that pet dogs and cats are firmly tied up inside restaurants and bars.

Day 288 – Vietnam history 102

Today we went for the easy option and joined a tour group to visit the Cu Chi tunnels on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh.

Fighting our way out of the city through millions of motorcycles.

Our tour guide introduced himself in Vietnamese, conceded straight away that his name was too difficult for most foreigners to pronounce and instead suggested we simply call him “Number 1” and he in turn would refer to us as “My family” (handy later when we were getting lost amongst the other tour groups with their guides yelling “My group this way!”).  The first stop on our tour was at Handicapped Handicrafts, set up immediately after the war to provide employment opportunities for the injured and disabled, they pump out a huge array of goods, primarily focusing on lacquerware.

The Cu Chi Tunnels were originally a network of hundreds of kilometres of tiny tunnels belonging to the Viet Cong and stretching from the Cambodian border right into South Vietnamese Saigon.  Their existence was well known by the South Vietnamese and American forces, and they tried to bomb them out of existence, flood them, sent attack dogs down them and some unlucky soldiers too, but all to no avail.

Nowadays not much remains of the tunnels but a section of the tunnels has been recreated/preserved to form what would be best described as a theme park.  Many of the installations that would have originally been underground, weapons factories, barracks, etc. have been recreated above ground to better serve the needs of claustrophobic tourists.  Even the section of tunnel available to tourist has been widened, though its still quite small.  The complex also contains trap demonstrations, a destroyed US tank, a firing range, not to mention the usual gift shops and restaurants.

Learning how to disappear.

Number 1 demonstrating one of the fairly nasty traps employed by the Viet Cong.

Animated models making bombs in one of the ‘bunkers’.

Neither of us had ever fired a gun, and whilst the vibe of doing it here was certainly a little strange, we figured it would be quite some time until we had another opportunity to fire an AK47.  We both missed the massive target by miles, not really a problem seeing as neither of us has any aspirations whatsoever to be shooting at real things.  It was much louder than I thought it would be, but the gun didn’t kick as much as I expected.

Erin heading underground.

The tunnels are only about a metre high (and these are the enlarged tourist versions), I can see how the Vietnamese who are generally quite slight would have a substantial advantage over any American who was unlucky enough to find himself down there.

The tour bus dropped us back in Ho Chi Minh at the War Remnants Museum.  Originally this place was known as the Museum of Chinese and American War Crimes, and while many of the tales here were well documented in the West at the time, the American War (as it’s known in Vietnam) was a long way before our time.  The displays were distinctly one sided, but I guess there is the adage about winners of wars getting to write history, at least here in Vietnam.

There was an extensive list of disturbing displays, the stories behind which I certainly couldn’t do justice to here.  Plus I guess most people reading this who are in their forties or older are probably more than familiar with many of them.  I think the display with the most impact related to ongoing birth-deformities caused by the extensive use of the defoliant Agent Orange.  There was also an excellent display on the top floor dedicated to Vietnamese and foreign photo-journalists, with some incredibly moving pictures and some of the stories behind their creation.

It’s sad to think how the war shaped Vietnam and how it still affects it today with so many disabled people, terrible memories, unexploded ordinance and land mines.  I also wonder if our children will be visiting a similar museum in Bagdad in years to come.

On the flipside it was interesting to hear an American couple talking about their visit to Vietnam.  They had been a little hesitant when planning the trip, but had arrived to find not the slightest animosity.  Of course smaller numbers of Australian and New Zealand troops also served alongside the Americans, two of my Uncles included.

Some street decorations we encountered whilst wandering around downtown HCMC.

For dinner we went to Huong Lai, a beautiful restaurant in the loft of a French-era shophouse staffed by former street children, the food again delicious.

Day 289 – Retail therapy, for Erin anyway

On our first day in Ho Chi Minh City Erin had spotted a dress she liked in a dressmaker’s window and had commissioned one in her size (for about a third of the cost of an off the rack equivalent in Australia).  So our first job for today was to go collect it, unfortunately it wasn’t quite ready the first time we dropped in, and didn’t quite fit the second time. 

So while we were waiting for the alterations to be made we headed for Ben Thahn market.  After a cheap and cheery breakfast of noodles at one of the many stalls in the food section we started trying to systematically cover the market.  Of course frequent distractions meant we failed miserably and did many laps round to get the things we were after, like some sparkly things for Erin, fabric for her Mum, a new wallet for me and some pressies for others.

Erin deep in negotiations stocking up on quilting fabric for Margaret.

In some parts of the market the ladies running the stalls were outright aggressive, grabbing at your sleeve, shouting and trying to steer you into their shop.  Whereas some of the other stalls had taken the opposite approach, the ladies were helpful but not pushy, stock was not in huge stacks but clearly displayed, and prices were all marked with big ‘no bargaining’ signs hanging about the place.  The latter were undoubtedly slightly more expensive (assuming you had the energy and expertise to bargain with the aggressive ladies), but needless to say the calm stores were doing a roaring trade while the shouting ladies had tourists sprinting the opposite direction!

Our lunch on the first day was so nice that we decided to head back to the same place for a late lunch today before finally getting Erin’s finished dress.

On our way back to the hotel fireworks began in celebration of Reunification Day, but we were too stuffed to go check them out properly.

 

Day 290 – Catching up

This morning we checked out and hopped on our bus to Phnom Penh across the border in Cambodia.  With Cambodia being especially renowned for its high level of corruption and with us needing to acquire Cambodian visas at the border I was sure we were going to be shaken down, but we crossed without a hitch.  Well almost. 

We changed some money with a woman who was trying to handle about three transactions at once (it’s illegal to take Vietnamese Dong out of Vietnam), and money was flying back and forth so fast I was concerned there was some sort of scam going on.  On the contrary once we had cleared customs the woman came barging onto the bus and started yelling at us in a mix of Vietnamese and English.  We eventually managed to gather that she thought we had scammed her (for about US$8), when none of her countrymen on the bus came to her aid she stormed off in a huff.  We didn’t have her eight dollars, so I guess she stuffed up one of the other transactions she was trying to conduct at the same time.  And I guess it wasn’t her idea of a scam either because she was demanding we give her back the Cambodian Riel we had bought off her, but we had only bought US dollars, so that would have been quite impossible.

Our detour to Cambodia was primarily to drop in on friends Jane and Michael who are working on various development projects based in Phnom Penh.  We also found out a few weeks before arriving that a couple of our other friends, Andrew and Rowena, are doing likewise.  So Michael met us off the bus and we dropped our stuff at their house before hailing a tuktuk, collecting Jane and heading to the Russian Market  for a delicious late lunch of spring rolls over rice noodles and avocado shakes.  Meanwhile a tropical storm rolled in and several creeks started flowing through the market flushing a few rats out of their holes!

After relaxing for a few hours it was time for another meal.  Along with Jane and Michael’s house mates we formed a bicycle gang and rode through the rain in our coloured ponchos to an Indonesian restaurant in one of the backstreets nearby.  There we met Andrew and Rowena, caught up on news, dined in style again and finally headed out for $1.50 jugs of beer at a nearby bar.

Siargao

Day 279 – Crash and burn

The kind lady owner of Mondsee Land Resort who was heading back to Cebu as well gave us a ride to the ferry (at 6am!), helped us buy tickets, waited to make sure we got  on board and then arranged a transfer to the airport for us at the other end.  The plane left at around the boarding time again so it’s great that she had done all that for us so we had plenty of time to spare.

Once we had made it to Siargao Island (pronounced “Shar-gow”, one of the most famous surfing destinations in the Philippines), we were shuffled into one of the waiting minivans to “Cloud 9” where all the backpacker resorts are.  On the way we chatted to Jetjet, a local surfing champion (Winner 2009 of the Billabong comp held here each year, we were told at least 4 times)!  He also offered lessons when the waves were small, so I let his marketing work on me and we agreed to meet up later in the afternoon.

My first lesson on actual waves (unlike the puddle at Baler) was tougher than I thought it would be!  I got nowhere near standing up and couldn’t even get my feet in the right position.  I had decided that my arms were too short for my legs, but agreed to give it another go in the morning.  I spent part of that night trying to work out some standing up techniques as the technique I was shown by Jetjet didn’t even work on land!  Matt had a surf too, but described his experience as “largely crash and burn” so it was unsuccessful day all round!

  
The view from our room.

Day 280 – Surf, eat, nap, eat, surf, eat, sleep!

Up bright and sparky at 5.30am for my next lesson, I was determined to give my new technique of getting to one knee first a go, instead of the Twister move Jetjet wanted me to do.  I saw a lot of the other girls using it and it was marginally more successful as I stood up briefly once or twice.  I thought Jetjet would be happy, but instead he cracked it!  He said I would never be a good surfer if I did it like that!!  He insisted I go back to his technique and keep trying.  My mind was saying that he obviously knows something about surfing but then he’s 5 and a half feet and ripped, easy to say when you’re not 5’9” and frustratingly unfit!  Matt was much more successful this morning and looked really good in the clean breaking aqua waves.  I would even go so far as to say he looked cool… which is unusual for him!

Between the morning and afternoon sessions we had something to eat and a nap and then it was time to ask the all knowing Google, YouTube…oh and Matt for some help.  I showed Matt the three step move I was told to do by Jetjet and he showed me the one fluid motion I was eventually aiming for.  Turns out that skipping the steps and heading straight for the end product was the only way for me to get up!  That afternoon, there was much less wave eating and a few more successful wave rides, just briefly.  

The relaxation hut at our accommodation Ocean 101.

Matt enjoying said hut.

 

Day 281 – Pain in the …face?

This morning I woke up in agony.  I had been fighting a slight sinus infection after diving so many days in a row, but it wasn’t bothering me or my balance – until now!  The pain in my cheeks and teeth and the attached headache was so bad there would be no surfing this morning.  I sent Matt off to deliver the message to Jetjet on his way to the waves and went back to bed.

Matt on the other hand was feeling more comfortable on bigger waves and swapped to a board more like the one he has at home.  After breakfast, more reading and napping for both of us, Matt went back for the afternoon set.  I went out a bit later to take some photos, but he was already coming back in complaining the waves were crappy this afternoon.

 
A pier has been built out over the reef so it is easier to get in and out of the water and also provides for a viewing platform for when comps are on.

However, the boardwalk needed a little repairing.  Only a day after we arrived they began these repairs, but that left us balancing on planks of wood spanning up to a 3 or 4 metre gap with surf board under arm instead!

Day 282 – Crowd 9

The day off and early night must have worked for me as this morning (and with a little push from Jetjet) I was catching and getting up much more consistently, even if unstylishly.  After Matt’s sleep in he came down to take some pictures of my efforts:

Up but not stylishly!

 

As I was still feeling unwell, we hired a bike and drove into Dapa, the bigger town about 30km away, to get some drugs for my sinuses and a haircut for Matt.  The best we could get were some decongestants, but that teamed up with some painkillers seemed to be enough to get me back on a surf board.

As we still had a bit of extra time on the way back from Dapa, we decided to head back a different way to the way we came.  Actually, more like Matt’s eyes lit up at the fork in the road just outside Dapa, (the way we came vs. dirt) and I couldn’t say no.  He assured me that the dirt road went back to Cloud 9 and that it followed the coast the long way.  I learn this lesson time and time again, but that’s what I get for being married to an explorer.

So we ended up in Pilar, on the other side of the island and at a dead end with no choice but to reverse the route back to the fork in the road.  We also made it there at about the time we were supposed to have the bike back to the guy we borrowed it from and so as if the dirt roads weren’t scary enough, I had to keep telling Matt to slow down all the way back (mostly by pinching him when I could see the speedo tick over 60!).  The guy didn’t seem too fussed about us being late (Filipino time must still exist in small towns, just not airlines) and we even had time for a short nap before the afternoon session of surfing, which had been getting later with the tides.  The waves here are all reef breaks and at low tide there is only about a foot of water under the waves – not good for learning! 

This afternoon was great for both of us and I was especially happy that I could get up now and ride for a decent amount of time… I just needed to work on my direction a bit as I ran into a few people!  Cloud 9 had turned into a bit more like “Crowd 9” with the amount of people out today and it was getting frustrating now that I had graduated to the big kid’s wave and was actually catching waves to have the local heroes cut in front leaving me with no choice but to bail.  The instructors were frustrated as well and would yell out to them to get out the way if it was a wave they thought would be good for us and they seemed to respect that.  Matt on the other hand didn’t have anyone to yell at them for him and was quite frustrated with one particular guy that seemed to be on every wave he went for. 

That night we chatted again with the little group of seven we had seemed to have formed in the restaurant attached to the resort.  The other five had decided to do the “Island Hopping” tour organised by the hotel in the morning.  We initially weren’t keen, especially now I was getting somewhere with the surfing, but agreed very late in the evening that a morning off surfing would be good, especially for my aching muscles.

 

Day 283 – Island Hopping

We were up just after 6, ready for our 7am departure on the island hopping tour.  The main aim of the day was a change of scenery and some sun, as well as some snorkelling at one of the islands.  The 7am departure was more like 8.30 or 9 by the time the boat man arrived, we waited for our take-away lunch to be cooked and scavenged some snorkels (given they weren’t provided by the tour!).

Playing games while waiting for the boatman.

Our first destination was Guyam Island.  About 100m across, the highlights were the crystal clear aqua water and a huge dead sea snake on the beach.  Matt and Manu, our new Indian Swedish friend did a lap of the island with the snorkels but only saw some fish.  After a bit of time swimming, we signalled the boatman and were off to Naked Island.

Guyam Island

Naked Island is just that.  A sandbar in the middle of nowhere with no trees!  The book suggested is may also be a nudist island if you so wished as it would only be the boatman watching you.  Yeah sure!

Last but not least was Daku, a much bigger island that was actually inhabited.  The beach here was quite nice even though the sand was coarse and we spent the afternoon in one of the beach shelters eating lunch, reading, chatting, and listening to the French girl Natalie’s songs on the ukulele, including her favourite (and Matt’s absolute least favourite) Poker Face acoustic style.  A very pleasant day with some excellent tan lines to match.

Natalie and her ukulele gathering some local interest (the old lady watching over her right shoulder, who earlier was picking up shells off the beach to try and sell to us).

The view from our beach hut.

Matt trying to capture the reflection in my sunnies without getting himself in the shot!

The beach huts.

A local inhabitant.

We made it back to Cloud 9 in time for the afternoon session.  Matt opted to hit the bar while I opted to take advantage of the last hour of daylight.  I shouldn’t have bothered as after a day in the sun I was way too exhausted and so didn’t go very well!

Day 284 - Get up, stand up

This morning’s session was much quieter than it gets in the afternoon, well and truly worth getting up early for.  Again I was catching almost everything, but still needed to work on my direction a bit more.  I was getting the hang of how to use weight to steer though.  Baby steps!  Matt had a good morning too, although the board he had borrowed was missing the middle fin so may have done better if they bothered to fix it like they said they would.

The instructors sang this a lot as they stood in a line almost neck high helping us catch waves.

After two hours in the water, it was back to 101 Ocean Resort to continue with our daily routine – eat, nap, eat, read and then back to the surf.  My instructor Jetjet had asked me to pay up to today this morning as there was a big cock fight that afternoon that his cock “Red Chicken” was entered into.  Glad to see my hard earned bucks are going to good use!  He invited us to come, but I politely declined.

I headed down to the pier at 5pm for the afternoon session, but Jetjet was nowhere to be found.  Normally he spots me before I spot him and comes in from the surf.  I asked around his mates and everyone said he was still at the cockfight!  Should have known!  So turns out I was stood up. 

I watched Matt for a hour or so from the viewing platform.  A 12 year old local girl MayMay sparked up a conversation with me and as well as her life story, she told me all about the surf spots in the area, knew all the pleasantries in about 6 languages (I guess from quizzing foreigners!) and the only thing she wanted in life was her own surf board.  She had pointed out her 17 year old brother to me carving it up in the surf.  Turns out he is sponsored and has at least seven boards, was given a mobile phone and is treated to all kinds of things not many kids around here get.  He had been loaning her a board and teaching her to the point where she came 4th in last year’s junior’s competition.  She had admired one of my bracelets from Peru earlier on in discussions and so I took it off and gave it to her for good luck in this year’s competition, about two weeks away.  Then she said she can’t go in it this year as she had a fight with her brother and he won’t lend her the board!  Poor little thing!  She was only down at the pier because her mum wanted her to sell Biko to the tourists.  Given we had been chatting for about 2 hours and I had answered all of her questions she gave me some (I had no money as I was supposed to be surfing!).  It is basically sweet sticky rice mixed with coconut – tasty! 

Eating biko was all the signal needed for a bunch (at least 10!) of other Filipino tourists standing on the platform to come up to me and start asking questions, firstly about whether I like their food and their country (yes and yes!) and then about all kinds of other things ending in photographs and hugs with all of them and the ladies not being able to get over the fact I was twice their height!  I had to jog back to 101 to catch the second quarter of the footy playing by satellite.  Go dogs!

Day 285 – Watch out Rip Curl Pro

This morning’s session was my best yet.  The waves were clean, I was catching everything, even turning into the right hand break!  Everything was finally clicking.  I graduated to catching my own waves where Jetjet would just tell me which waves to paddle for and not push me into them.  It was a nice feeling after feeling so pathetic on the first day.  Am still not sure how I will go once it’s back to the freezing cold waters of Victoria, but it’s a least worth trying now.  I had hoped that Matt would come down with the camera again, but he slept in… so no evidence.  Damn!

Jetjet was having a good day too.  I asked him first thing “Is Red Chicken still alive??” as there was no point saying “Where were you yesterday?”  Given I knew where he was!  He jumped up and down and told me enthusiastically “Yes!  Red Chicken is the Champion!”  He apologised for not meeting me at the pier.  Because Red Chicken kept winning, he had to stay around for the next fight.  He told me he also won 1,000 pesos ($25AUD), but at 500 pesos an hour from me, failed to see the logic in my cheeky suggestion that he should just teach more to make the same money.  I think he was more after the glory, given the local Mayor was there and shook his hand!

A happy Jetjet.

Given my mammoth morning session of about 2 and a half hours (it’s tiring stuff!), and Matt’s lack of enthusiasm for fighting for the one wave, we spent the rest of the day being lazy.  We chatted with a couple of Aussies, one who was a diver there exploring the area looking to set up a dive resort and shop.  He didn’t seem impressed that the local fisherman still get away with illegal dynamite fishing (understandably for a diver!) and was having meetings with the Mayor (at the cockfight actually…) to try and get something done about it.  He said the Mayor was a reasonable guy and seems to understand what further tourism will do for this mostly untouched island.  A shame for future surfers and divers looking to get off the track a bit.

We had a few beers at the bar across the road, but I was determined to get in one more 6am session in the morning before we left in the morning and so I bailed early. Matt says I didn’t miss much, although Jetjet showed up looking to shout a round!

Day 286 – Amazing Race

Although not as good as the morning before (my paddle muscles were DEAD) I managed to get an hour in before the bus arrived to take us back to the airport and onto Cebu.  Once in Cebu we hit the mall with a few others from the flight to kill time, get lunch and passport photos made for our Vietnam visas.

Siargao Airport.  We laughed at the fire crew who, at the appropriate moment right before a plane comes in, stop playing cards, don oversized jackets and helmets, pile onto the fire truck and drive out onto the tarmac only to have the plane land without bursting into flames so they can go back to their cards.  Matt and I thought they must be pretty disappointed all the time!

Bored with the mall we decided to head back to the airport early.  A lucky decision.  We were there about 4pm for our 6.20pm flight to Manila and told that the flight was delayed at least three hours.  This would have us missing our connection from Manila to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam at 11.20pm.  After working out whether it was better to change the HCMC flight, which we couldn’t or have us miss the connection (leaving us stuck in Manila two days til the next flight, an unpleasant thought) we decided to demand a refund and find another flight.  While Matt did the demanding, I ran around to all the other agencies, Amazing Race style, trying to work out the best and cheapest method to get to Manila asap given we were now going to be out-of-pocket.

I got us the last two tickets on an 8.10pm flight with Philippines Air (tricky given there were others running around doing this too) although when asking the lady if the flight was definitely going to be on time and definitely going to arrive in Manila at 9.30pm (giving us about 20 minutes to check in to the next flight) she ended up doing us one better and getting us on the already closed, boarded and about to taxi 5.15pm flight!  So we had plenty of time to make the connection to Vietnam and were on our way.  On assessment at Manila airport we wouldn’t have made the short connection time anyway as the domestic and international terminal are miles apart and the shuttles frustratingly infrequent.

Bohol

Day 273 – Nuts Huts

This morning we finally posted some postcards that we had been hanging onto for weeks, months even! Very slack. We finally accepted a lift back to the airport from one of the four or five trike drivers that hung out at the hotel entrance asking us if we needed a trike every time we left the building. The guy turned out to be super friendly and had hand written business cards that he gave us so that we could call him next time we were in Puerto Princesa!

Our flight left early, as expected, and the flight hostess proudly announced that we had touched down in Cebu 30 minutes ahead of schedule. We are beginning to think this is a ploy to improve the airlines’ terrible on time record. We got a taxi straight to the docks and were on a ferry without having to wait very long.

I decided to wait until the ferry had pulled out of the dock before telling Erin that ferries were the worst possible form of transport available in the Philippines and that the Australian Government recommend only taking them if its the only option! A ferry holding 5,000 passengers recently sank with no survivors. Scary!

Coming out of the ferry terminal in Tagbilaran we tried to negotiate a ride to the bus terminal, but ended up getting a ride the whole way to our destination instead. Nuts Huts are a collection of wooden cabins strung along the Loboc River in the mountainous jungle interior of Bohol Island. The trike dropped us at the end of the entrance road, 700m long and basically just a rough bush track, we were beginning to wonder if we were lost when we finally got to the entrance. From there hundreds of stairs lead down toward the river, with a beautiful open air restaurant / relaxing area halfway down.

The top set of stairs, the bottom set was just as long. Aside from improving our stair climbing fitness, it also made sure we were sharp in the morning, forgetting something and having to go back to our hut to get it was a major downer!

Out Nuts Hut.

From the restaurant you could look out over the river and the jungle. The sunsets each night were beautiful and when the sun went down the tree just off the balcony was a meeting place for fireflies. Plus they had a good collection of old National Geographic magazines that kept me entertained for hours on end!

Day 274 – Tiny Ewoks

This morning we set out for the Tarsier Sanctuary. These strange creatures are the worlds smallest primates, they are only about 10cm tall but their eyes are massive, 150 times larger than human eyes proportionally speaking. Their closest living relatives are lemurs, but in many ways they resemble tiny monkeys, or my Mum thought perhaps little Ewoks.

To get to the sanctuary we finally used one of the Philippines’ many Jeepneys, basically stretched jeeps with bench seating in the back. They are cheap and they go practically everywhere, many are ornately decorated, but they can get crowded and hot.

When we got to the sanctuary we were pleased to discover that there were only a few other people there. It seems that as the sanctuary only allows a couple of people into the tarsier viewing area at a time the place has stayed off the organised tour route, at least for big groups anyway. There are however many places elsewhere in Bohol with caged tarsiers for tourist viewing. This in combination with capture for the pet trade, deforestation and predation by domestic and feral animals have left the wild tarsier population threatened. To make matters worse caged and pet tarsiers generally die quickly in captivity as their keepers are not able to feed them the live insects they need.

The sanctuary is interesting because although the tarsiers are in a fenced enclosure they are essentially wild. Because they can jump further than their major predators they can clear the fences at night to go out and hunt, then return to the enclosure during the day to sleep and be peered at by curious tourists.

As each tarsier has its own bit of turf in the enclosure the guides generally know where to find them. So once we had waited for the two people in front of us to leave the enclosure (which is a couple of hectares in size) our guide ushered us through the gate and right up to where one of the little critters was sleeping. They were surprising nonplussed about people and just sat in their tree wide eyed while we stood similarly wide-eyed checking them out.

Tarsiers’ eyes are fixed in their skull, so they can pivot their head 180 degrees in either direction like an owl, this just adds to how strange they look.

I tried to get a photo of Erin with one, but this was difficult because they are so tiny and you’re not allowed to get too close. If you look really carefully there is a tarsier about a third of the way up from the bottom of the photo at the far left hand side.

After the tarsier sanctuary we headed back to Nuts Huts and spent the afternoon exploring the surrounds. We swam across the river to the walking path on the other side and walked up through a little village and on to a small waterfall. As we passed through the village most of the people were out on a covered platform in the river, playing guitar and singing. The waterfall wasn’t anything special, but we enjoyed our swim back downstream to Nuts Huts.

Big spider near the waterfall (which we never properly saw).

Day 275 – They’re nice but you can’t eat them

Today’s primary objective was to visit the Chocolate Hills. Along with the tarsiers the Bohol Tourist Board heavily plugs the Chocolate Hills, a collection of oddly shaped hills which turn brown in the dry season, supposedly resembling chocolate drops.

Getting off the bus we had to convince several motorcycle drivers that we were quite content walking the last 15 minutes up to the view point.

There were hundreds of tourists at the viewing point, mostly Filipinos, so I guess all the advertising is working.

In dry season they look more chocolatey apparently.

Rainstorm coming in over the ‘Chocolate Hills Complex’, basically a ring of souvenir shops built on a saddle between two of the hills.

For lunch we headed to the Butterfly Sanctuary in Bilar. After a nice meal looking out over the gardens we were given a tour around the gardens by an enthusiastic young guide.

Special freaky half female, half male butterflies in a display case at the restaurant.

Our final stop for the day was to Logarita Pool, a man made pool fed by a natural spring on the edge of the rice paddies. Our tricycle driver dropped us there (at the end of a road several kilometres out of town) and then disappeared, leaving us wondering if we’d have to walk back to the highway. Instead when it was time to leave we paid for a ride with a local guy on his motorcycle, a bit scary!

One of the locals helped me wet the ‘water slide’, the steep concrete chute you can see at the back left of the photo, so we could have a couple of goes. It was pretty vicious on the behind!

Day 276 – Waiting for the bus

As we got to the end of the Nuts Huts access track it started pouring down, so we scurried into the little shelter by the side of the road where a few of the locals were already sitting out the rain. We were busy chatting to the locals and trying to stay dry, so when the first bus drove past we didn’t have time to get out and signal it. An hour later the rain had finally eased and we made in onto the next bus.

The local kids constructing what I guess you’d call mud bombs. They all jumped out of the trees as we walked the bush path to Nuts Huts yelling “Bomb! Bomb!”

Our plan had been to go to the mall in Tagbilaran (the main town on Bohol) to get some cash and burn DVDs before heading out to Panglao Island to have lunch at an organic farm, the Bohol Bee Farm. But with having missed the bus we were a little behind schedule for lunch and there turned out to be a coffee shop of the Bohol Bee Farm at the mall, so we ate there instead.

By the time we had eaten lunch, looked around the shops, burned DVDs and posted them it was time to get the bus back to Nuts Huts before it got dark, not much of a day in the end but at least we finally got a couple of months worth of photos backed up.

Day 277 - Hung

After extensive research yesterday while the DVDs were burning I’d decided that it was going to be extremely difficult to get from Bohol to Siargao by ferry, and pretty hard to justify given the cheap airfares on offer. So instead of a couple of days getting on and off ferries we opted for a couple of days at the touristy beach resort of Alona.

So after dropping back through the mall to book some flights we got a trike out to Alona and wandered around until we found a nice place to stay. Back from the beach but with a nice pool and friendly staff, plus a hefty off season discount, we opted for the strangely named Mondsee Land Resort. As we went to check in we realised that we had left our document pouches (including passports) in the safe back at Nuts Hut, doh!

We decided to worry about that tomorrow and instead headed out for dinner before returning home to listen to Radio Australia and the Australian Federal Election call. By the time we went to bed at well after midnight Australian time the result was clear, hung.

Day 278 – Retrieval exercise

My job for the day was to retrieve our passports etc. Not thrilled with the idea of getting all the way there and back again by public transport (an all day exercise more or less) I wandered down the street and finally took up an offer to hire a motorcycle (after being pestered for weeks!). Weeks as a passenger had given me rough idea of the road ‘rules’ and I didn’t have to ride through any big cities, so the trip wasn’t too intimidating, and only took me about 3 hours in the end.

Mid afternoon we headed down to the beach to a restaurant serving meat pies, yum (for me anyway, Erin opted for a pizza). The rest of the day we spent lazing around the pool, life’s tough sometimes.