Monday, January 20, 2025

 Cebu to Tubigon, The Philippines 

Naturally I didn’t need an alarm and checked out a day early from my hotel to catch the slow, and I mean really slow ferry from Cebu City to Tubigon-


In the ferry comfort room-



Passing by one of the 7641 islands that make up the Philippines-



Upon arriving on Bohol, we had to put our bags on a tarp so a dog could sniff for pork.  African Swine Disease is feared and so you can’t bring pork products from one island to another.  
The port is a bit away from the town so 6 of us crawled into a trike.  The nice man took me to a home that rents bikes but they weren’t there so he took me to another place and voilà.  She didn’t ask for a drivers licence or passport or anything.  I think she was thinking - just give me the cash!  It worked for her and it definitely worked for me.  The bike is a Cadillac compared to my first one-



It costs $15/day and I can leave it at the airport!
  It’s a very nice bike.


Along the way-




My first stop was at the Chocolate Hills.
  They are karst mounds that cover over 14,000 hectares in the centre of the island of Bohol.  2 to 5 million years ago the site was a platform of coral reefs but the coral eventually died and became sediment.  They are 30-400 meters above sea level.  The sediment was eventually raised above sea level, fractured and rain eventually dissolved the limestone to form the conical shapes.  They’re called the chocolate hills because in the dry season they are brown while the rest of the land remains green-








It was quite the circus watching some of these young women, actually the way they behaved they were more like little girls, get pictures taken of themselves.
  You have to line up to get a picture with the sign-



and you think they would notice the queue growing but no, they had to get a picture straight on, to the left, to the right and from the back.
  I was waiting for them to stand on their head or take off their clothes.  It was embarrassing.


There is an even higher platform where you can go for a better view and a worker will take your picture but when he told me to give him the peace sign and the heart sign, I said no and left.  I just don’t understand that bullshit-



Quading in the mud is also an available nearby activity-



My next stop was to see some tarsiers.  They are quite a peculiar animal.  They’re the smallest primate in the world weighing 80-160 grams or 3-6 ounces!  They’re nocturnal, territorial, mammals, solitary, 5-6 inches in height and live 15-24 years.  Their eyes are bigger than their brain, they cannot move them but can rotate their heads 180 degrees to each side.  They can jump 3-5 meters, their pregnancies last 6 months and they eat crickets and cultured worms. Luckily staff were taking pictures-



because all the ones I took are very dark but you can see the gigantic eyes-




More rice-




I decided to stay near the Loboc River-



and splurged $44 on a bungalow.
  When I arrived I learned THERE IS NO AC.  Hopefully the fans keep me cool enough-




The garden-



A cute butterfly-



A manmade forest-



It rained while I was heading to Loboc and it was wonderful.
  First, it was warm and when you’re only going 30-40 km/ hour you just can’t get cold.  Riding in the rain at home is hell.


As I was driving by Saint Peter the Apostle Parish Church in Loboc I heard the most wonderful singing so I turned around and went in.  It was the funeral of a 58 year old woman who had leukaemia-



The parish was established in 1602 and the present coral stone building was completed in 1734-



Each church in the Philippines has a watchtower built during Spanish times as a lookout-



I decided to stay at Loboc because of the river-




The hotel is beside the river but in a very residential area. I did a tour down the street and ran into the French couple I met in Siquijor.  The view from their hotel-




Tomorrow I’m off to the island of Panglao and Alona Beach for my last days!

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