Visit from Anusha

I left you last as I was traveling back to Manila to meet up with my friend Anusha.  As I did when Christy visited, I'm going to take you all on my trip as Robby was in the field doing much of the same thing:  

Going out on the boat,

collecting more fish,

then dissecting fish,

and then dissecting more fish.

He was in heaven!

I should also add that another run to Bolinao to fill all of the scuba tanks was in order so he did another full day of driving and filling with Brian while I was away.

Anyway back to Anusha.  Originally we were trying to plan a trip with Anusha and our friend Talal for the four of us to travel somewhere in the Philippines.  Unfortunately, due to the compressor situation and the MOA/permitting situation Robby was really behind schedule and could not afford to take any time away from his field work.  Since this was the closest Anusha and I have been living to one another in three years (she has been living in India) we decided we were going to still do a trip and so the two of us went exploring in the Visayas region of the Philippines (the middle cluster of islands, Luzon is at the top and Mindinao is in the south).

Anusha flew in late in the evening on Monday for a quick night in Manila and then we flew out to Bohol the next morning.

This is where Bohol is located, just below the island of Cebu.

Siquijor is an even smaller island just below Bohol that we visited as well.

We arrived in Bohol with the plan to take a ferry to Siquijor island, as ferries are the only way to get to Siquijor.  I had looked in my Lonely Planet book, as well as online, and found that there was at least one ferry each day that went to Siquijor.  Some companies did Mon/Wed/Fri, others Tue/Thur, and the times in the book and online varied so we decided to ask when we arrived.  The tourism center at the airport showed me the same time tables that I had seen online so Anusha and I headed to the pier to buy our tickets, the ferry was to be leaving at 5pm.  To make a long story short, we found out that no ferries would actually be leaving that day, the next ferry was not until the following morning, and we could not buy tickets for it in advance so we had to wake up early to come back to buy the ticket to ensure we got a seat.  So typical, the book, internet and tourism center all had incorrect information and the ferry schedule was not even printed correctly on the ticket booths, so you literally had to speak with someone in person to get an answer.  There was no telephone either.  At this point this sort of thing felt normal to me, of course you have to talk in person to someone to get something accomplished, and having lived in India for the past three years it didn't phase Anusha either, so we just switched plans around.

We spent the night in Tagbilaran, the port city, and did a firefly tour.  Unfortunately we couldn't really capture the fireflies on film, but they were beautiful!  We each were in our own kayak with a guide paddling, we were on a very calm river with a full moon, and as we paddled down the river there would be random trees that were shimmering.  It was as if a thousand tiny Christmas-tree lights were up in the trees, twinkling and sort of hovering right above the leaves.  I'd never seen anything like it!

The next morning we set off to Siquijor!

This was my first time taking a ferry, it felt very similar to waiting for a flight.

 Anusha and I figured out a way to sit up top once the boat got underway, being able to see the water and feel the breeze was much nicer than being inside!

The port when we arrived in Siquijor was absolutely stunning!

Crystal clear water and cute little homes along the coastline.

Our resort had sent a trike to pick us up so we hopped in and headed to the resort.

The place we stayed did not have a beach, but instead sat up on cliffs overlooking the water.

We had lunch in this little hut sitting on top of an outcropping.

We noticed that it was low tide and were told we could walk down the beach to a dive shop and snorkel at the Marine Protected Area that was right off of the beach.

They had stairs down to the water so we decided to go for a walk and a snorkel.

Well, it may have been low tide but walking was a terrible idea.  There were sea urchins everywhere and slippery rocks.  I had shoes that could handle it, but Anusha was barefoot and a little miserable.  She attempted to go out further to swim down the beach instead but it stayed shallow for a long way (very typical of the islands here I've learned) so I ended up going on ahead to the dive shop.  It turned out they were closing and due to the low tide they said it would be too difficult to snorkel the MPA with the urchins so we turned around and took the road back to our resort.

We got back in time for a beautiful sunset!

The next morning we hired a tricycle to take us around the island.

 Siquijor has a coastal road that goes around the edge of the entire island.  A lot of people rent motorbikes and set out to do the drive on their own.  The road is about 50 miles in length if you were to go around the entire island, so it can easily be done in a day with time to stop off and see different sites along the way.  Neither Anusha or I had ever driven a motorbike so we decided to hire a tricycle driver to take us around instead.

The coastal road was beautiful.

We stopped quite a few times just to take photos of the view.

Doing whatever we had to in order to get the best shot!

We also discovered my iPhone takes pretty decent panoramic shots!

We made our way first to a 400 year old tree.

And of course took a vertical panoramic to capture its sheer size.

At the base of the tree was a pool filled with cleaner fish.

They nibbled at your toes picking off dead skin and whatever else.  It tickled sooo much!

Our next stop was a church, it was made out of coral just as the one Robby and I had seen in Legazpi.  So beautiful!

 After the church, we asked to skip the rest of the buildings and just be taken to the more natural sites.  We decided that rather than going around the whole island, we would go halfway and then take the road up into the interior of the island to cut back to our resort.  The interior road went through the hills/mountains and offered some gorgeous views.  Before heading to the interior though we stopped off at some local waterfalls.

The falls were small, but cascaded from one pool and then down another set of falls into another pool.

The surrounding trees and clear water made for an unreal setting and we decided to hang out for awhile to swim and relax.

We met a local who offered to take photos of us which commenced a very long photo shoot. 

It was the perfect spot for one!

After swimming around and taking some photos, the local offered to show us where we could jump off the falls.

So we climbed on up and jumped in!

Many times!

Then we went down to the next pool and series of waterfalls and played on the rope swing!

Weeee!

Eventually we decided we had to leave and head back to our trike.

And then we drove up into the hilly interior of the island.

We passed another cock fighting breeder, it's a big thing across the entire Philippines!

Eventually we stopped at a nature park at the top of the hills, the park wasn't much of anything except a big tower you could climb for a great view.

The panoramic that Anusha was taking in the last photo (view from the top of the tower)!

We then drove on until it opened up and you could see clearly 360 degrees just from the road.

Siquijor is absolutely gorgeous!

Anusha's panoramic shots only kind of do it justice.  From up there you could see Mindinao to the south and all the way to Cebu in the north!

That finished up our day so we took the trike back down to the coastal road.

Stopping to take in a beautiful sunset on the way home. 

That about did it for our time in Siquijor.  We spent the evening eating some delicious food and talking about what Anusha is going to do for grad school.  She has a lot of great options, but the most important thing is that she's headed back to live in the US while she's in school!  Yay!

The next morning we decided to go back to the dive shop, taking the road this time, and go snorkeling out in the MPA.  It was a gorgeous MPA, there were a lot of huge fish and many of Robby's species.  I'm already lobbying for his next sites to be in Siquijor! (Editors Note: this won't take a lot of convincing.)

With that, we headed back to the port and took the ferry back to Bohol.

Once back in Bohol we took a combination of trikes and jeepneys out of the port city of Tagbilaran and up more towards the interior of the island near a town called Loboc.

We were staying at a place called Nuts Huts and had spoken to them about the best way to get to the resort.  They told us to take the boatman from Loboc town, up the Loboc River to Nuts Huts.  However, when we arrived in Loboc town and got out of our jeepney, we were told by the locals that the boatman was done for the day.  It was 6:30pm.  Evidently, he stops working at 6pm.  We looked around for a tricycle to hire to take us to Nuts Huts by road and there were none to be seen, the first time that has ever happened since I arrived in the Philippines!  Apparently, in Loboc everyone just has a motorbike.  So we had to hire two motorbike drivers to take us, and our bags, up to Nuts Huts.  The gentleman who flagged down the motorbikes for us made sure to explain to our drivers to take it slow and be very careful with us.  It was the first time I'd ever been on a motorcycle, I'd sort of sworn them off as falling off is probably certain death, but motorbikes were the only mode of transportation we had an option to use so motorbike it was!

It turns out Nuts Huts is very, very isolated.  We went up into the mountains and then turned off on this dirt track and traveled down this dirt road for about 10 minutes.  Then our drivers stopped, pointed to some stairs that descended down into darkness and told us that would take us to Nuts Huts.  Talk about a ridiculous ride for a first time on a motorcycle!  On some winding dirt track in the mountains to some tucked away destination,  I loved it!

Anusha and I took our bags and started down the stairs.  It was pitch black and the stairs just kept going and going and going.  Eventually we made it to the reception area and restaurant.  They offered to show us our rooms but we decided we'd better eat dinner first before climbing who knows how many stairs to find our room.  I got some photos later on in our trip, but I'll give them to you now so you can get a feel for what that night was like when we arrived.

These were the stairs we came down to arrive at reception, in the complete dark of night.  No lights except our cell phones.

Here is the reception/restaurant.  Turns out it is located in the middle of the stairs.

We then had to descend all of these to get to where the rooms were located.

I've forgotten now, but it was somewhere between 200-300 stairs.

After you made it down the stairs, you then had a long walk along the river to your hut.

After our long descent we finally arrived!

It was like a tree fort, 

with room for two beds and a bathroom.

The next morning we woke up with the plan to walk down the river to a waterfall and then hire a motorbike to take us to the Chocolate Hills, the attraction that Bohol is known for.  That morning I woke up to several humongous ants crawling on my bug net.

Cannot tell you how grateful I am that net was around me!

After that abrupt wake-up we climbed up to the restaurant.

We had totally missed out on the view having arrived at night!

Our resort was situated in the mountains with the Loboc River running down below.  It turned out the river was a strange, but pretty, green color.

We also got a look at who else was staying at Nuts Huts with us.  Such a fun idea!

After breakfast we made our way back down to the river and were told the trail to the falls was on the other side.

After some very confusing discussions we got the boatman to paddle us across and then made the short trek to the falls.  Unfortunately, the falls were not near as nice as the ones we had visited in  Siquijor, and the green river water sort of freaked us out, so we didn't get in and decided to walk back to the resort.  When we arrived on the river bank opposite of Nuts Huts we discovered that the boatman was gone.  There was a family showering and doing laundry right next to us along the river and one of the boys offered to swim across, get the kayak to put our clothes and shoes in, and then paddled them back across so they wouldn't get wet.  Everyone is so nice here! Anusha and I then jumped in and swam across.

It was quiet and relaxing for awhile, but then these huge boats came along one after another.

Wouldn't you know it, they were karaoke boats!  So here we are, tucked away in a resort that is 20 minutes from town off a winding dirt road through the mountains, and here comes karaoke boat after karaoke boat, blasting terrible music into this secluded spot.  Of course.  How could I think for a second I'd escaped karaoke or loud music?  Filipino's have a love for both which I will never understand, or come close to appreciating.  Oh well.  With that we decided to shower and get ready for our day in the Chocolate Hills. 

Having had such a fun ride the night before, we talked to Nuts Huts about renting a motorbike for the day.

They told us they had a driver they've been using for ten years that has a bike big enough to fit two and was trustworthy/had a good driving record so we decided to use him.  

Zipping around on the motorcycle through the mountains on our way to the Chocolate Hills gave me the same thrill as the last time I was on my snowboard.  I was in heaven!

I absolutely loved it!  I also love that Anusha went for an action panoramic, which didn't quite work out.

Before heading to the Chocolate Hills, we stopped off at some more waterfalls.

This place had a couple of huts perched up on rocks looking over the falls.

Nice place to come and picnic or just hang out.

The falls were also really nice, we were able to get in and swim underneath them back into a little alcove.

After some swimming we got back on the motorbike and headed to the Chocolate Hills adventure park.

We had seen some video of the adventure park at the airport while asking the tourism center about the ferry schedule.  Our impression was that it was a high ropes course overlooking the Chocolate Hills.  We thought that sounded like a fun way to see the hills so we paid to do the high ropes course and then the bike.

Turns out the place was a giant tourist trap.  The high ropes course was in the trees with no view.

We then had to climb up a couple hundred stairs (what is with the stairs here?) to get to the bike.

The bike went across a wide expanse that looked over the Chocolate Hills, so that was nice!

They wouldn't let us bring our camera to take photos while on the bike, of course

So we took photos of their photos showing us riding across.

The bikes were attached to two wires so you didn't have to balance, you just had to pedal and you zipped across the wire to the other side.  As you went you could see a ways in every direction and hill after hill after hill.  

The Chocolate Hills is an area of about 20 square miles. 

Across which there are somewhere between 1200 and 1800 almost identical dome shaped hills.  

Geologists can't agree on how they were formed,

but they make for a really cool landscape!

Especially this time of year as the grass on top of them is dead so it has dried up and turned brown.

After leaving the adventure park, our driver took us to a non-touristy spot to enjoy the view.

We hiked up one of the hills and had a 360 degree view of the hundreds of hills surrounding us.

We had yet another mini photo shoot.

This one complete with a jumping shot!

It's just what we do!

We also noticed from up here that many of the hills had crosses on the top.

Our driver didn't know why but perhaps the locals feel their uniqueness is something sacred or evidence of a higher power.  I'm not really sure, but they were certainly worth a trip to see!

As the sun was starting to set we hopped back on the bike and took off for Nuts Huts.

Evidently the buses and jeepney stop running after sunset, and we needed to get back to the port city of Tagbilaran as we had an early flight the next morning.  Our motorbike driver told us he could fit us, my big backpack and Anusha's suitcase on his bike and take us no problem.  I would never doubt a Filipino's ability to pack things onto a tricycle, but I was a little skeptical of the motorbike alone being able to hold all of that.  He knew what he was doing though, and he tied a bag on either side of the bike and then Anusha just had to sit on top of them and sort of straddle them for the ride back to Tagbilaran.  She said it was actually more comfortable as she couldn't feel the bike vibrating underneath her so much.  I was impressed yet again by what can be done with such tiny vehicles!

Along the way our driver stopped for dinner at a place where street vendors cook up BBQ.

They had every part of a pig and chicken skewered up for you to choose from. 

You just picked the type of meat/intestines you wanted, they'd slather it in their homemade BBQ sauce and grill it.

It was easily the best BBQ I've ever had in my life!

The area was lined with these vendors and was along the water so I'm sure it was a pretty spot during the daytime.

There were no utensils and we were eating sticky BBQ covered meat, so our driver showed us how to eat it and stay clean.  You just stick your hand in a plastic bag and eat that way.  Duh!

We were also given rice and calamansi (a small citrus fruit) to eat with our meat.

The rice came packaged in these neat little bamboo casings.

After a delicious meal we headed to Tagbilaran and then left early the next morning.  I left Anusha in the airport as she flew on to India and I went home to Manila to meet up with Robby.

Miss you Anusha!  So happy you were able to visit and I'll see you in the US this fall!!

Robby was back in Manila because the MOA had been approved!  The legal department at UP had given it the ok, with no changes required somehow (thankfully), so now it just needed to be signed by the Chancellor and then taken to BFAR so he could apply for the permit.  Remember, this two months in the making MOA was all just so he could submit the necessary paperwork for a permit from BFAR.  He also had a couple of Fulbright events in the city that week so the timing worked out really well.

He had been invited to the US Embassy by the ambassador for a cocktail party and send off for the Filipino Fulbrighters heading to the US.

It was invite only so he got all dressed up and went solo while I stayed home and, you guess it, dissected fish!

The days between Fulbright events we spent dissecting fish together and when he was busy I did it alone.  He also had to go to the final presentations of Fulbrighters that had finished their 9 months and were heading back to the US.  Between these events and dissecting we found out that the Chancellor was actually out of the country and would not be returning until the following week, thus the MOA could actually not be signed and given to BFAR, of course.  Fortunately, Robby's advisor told him to go ahead and collect as the signatures were immanent and approval had been granted by the legal department.  She also said that we could have 10 more scuba tanks so that when we did our runs to Bolinao we could fill up twice as many and thus go less often.  Hooray!  With all of that set, we headed back out to the field to begin inside MPA collections!

On that note, I'll wrap things up and leave you with this fun fact.  When I arrived back in Manila the night before picking up Anusha at the airport, I unpacked and went to do some sink laundry (not enough time to take it to a laundromat and have it done).  While I was washing I found that pair of underwear after pair of underwear all had the exact same hole in them.  The ratmouse had chewed a hole in the crotch of every pair of my underwear!!!  I had been leaving my dirty clothes in a pile on the floor and for some reason it decided to have a feast.  Unbelievable.

Ratmouse 6, Robby and D 0.