Light house, Croc Farm, and Kamarikutan coffee house in Palawan

KamarikutanCoffeeHousePalawanOctober8,2007

Palawan trip. Third day (farewell palawan!)
BancaoBancao Lighthouse
(photo:stairs to the beach, lighthouse, wall, eman atop the lighthouse)




















Early the next day we decided to go to the lighthouse in barangay BancaoBancao. It's about 20mins ride by tricycle and the last part passes through some rough road overgrown with chest-high weeds. Apparently this is not a popular tourist spot - ... which is great! There was even a decrepit resort with big slides and pools. I found out later that it was closed a few years ago because, apparently, a child of one of its patrons died there. The BancaoBancao light house has been inoperative for the last few years now.
(photo:lighthouse solar power collector, balay inato restaurant tables, restaurant/hotel front)











Balay Inato (chicken inasal fast food resto)
An open-air fast-food style restaurant was all we had time for. The chicken inasal served in this restaurant was half cooked. Malas yata ako sa chicken inasal because that was strike 2 na. I won't even bother talking about strike 1. This restaurant has recently constructed rooms-for-rent fronting the dining tables. Its horribly apparent that no one will enjoy staying in those rooms because of the loud blaring music emanating from loudspeakers all over the place.
(photo: crocodile pen, baby croc petting session, largest crocodile found in palawan)













Crocodile Farm
After lunch we hastily made our way to the crocodile farm which is about 45minutes away. There were not too many crocodiles around because of recent events causing high death rates. Notice the HUGE crocodile skeleton above. Just imagine being assaulted by one of these monsters! A waist high croc that's more than twice (2x) the average height!!! WOW, gives me shivers! Alas we did not have much time to go around as we had to check in the airport for our flight back to Manila.
(photo:waiting for our coffee, pond, allan relaxing)













"Kamarikutan": coffee house
After we checked in our bags, we did manage to slip out and go to this beautiful coffee house called the Kamarikutan. The name roughly translates to "Wilderness Coffee Gallery" and is open from 8AM till 11PM and serves very good coffee (starbucks price nga lang!). The natural vegetation in its large garden creates a nice "wilderness" ambiance. The art on display is probably for sale because visitors are not allowed to take any pictures of it. Kamarikutan is on Rizal Avenue and is only about 100 meters from the main entrance to the airport.


If you need a good guide/ride around palawan I recommend ours! His name is Bogs (+639194638590)

Underground River, Mitra's Ranch and Baker's Hill in Palawan

UndergroundRiverPalawanOctober7,2007

Palawan trip, Second day
St. Paul Underground River
The transport service of Topstar Travel Agency picked us up at about 7am. After a bumpy and winding but thoroughly enjoyable 3hr ride we reached the Sabang or port that is the jump off point for the underground river.
(photo: sabang where you board bangka to underground river, transport to site)












This amazing 15km long underground river is estimated to be 16 to 20 Million years old! It has been recently added to UNESCO's World Heritage site which attests to its deep natural and cultural value.
(photo:tour bangka, registration area and life vests)










Regular tourists like me are only allowed to go about 1.5 kilometers into the cave, special researchers may be granted an 8km exploration permit. However, only the few (and the wealthy?) are granted the full 15km permit. So far, only the large documentary stations like Discovery and NatGeo have been granted full access according to our guide. The St.Paul Underground River is now called the Puerto Princessa Subterranean River National Park.
(photo: underground river tour group, tip of 1.5km tour, cave fauna)












After our boat ride on the river, we headed back to Sabang to take our lunch. There are a few souvenir shops where one can get tshirts in case you got wet in the river.
(photo: sabang-walk on beach to lunch area, sabang beach, walk back to departure point)












The lunch area is a few minutes walk away from the sabang and along the beach. It was a simple meal of fresh buko, pipino, bbq and shell fish but there was plenty of it!
(photo: beautiful sabang beach, crab eating habbits, view point stop over)












On the way back don't forget to stop by the Buenavista Viewdeck (view point) where you can have a good vantage point of Ulugan Bay.
(photo: sta.monica heights main road, view from mitra's ranch, mitra's ranch house)











MITRA'S RANCH and BAKER'S HILL
Our tour guide was somehow in a hurry! We arrived back in Puerto Princessa before 4pm so we still had some time to kill. I called up our tricycle driver/guide Bogs and he brought us to Sta.Monica Heights where both Mitra's Ranch and the famous Baker's Hill is located. What you should actually do is buy food in Baker's Hill FIRST and then proceed to Mitra's Ranch where you can eat on his porch overlooking honda bay. Instead we proceeded to the ranch first where we enjoyed the scenery before proceeding to Baker's hill because we feared that the ranch would close first.
(photo:baker's hill mascot, eating area, cartoon figures)











Having stuffed ourselves full of the local patisserie, we decided to forgo dinner and just bought some beers ,isaw and balut. I was surprised to find out that balut is more expensive here in puerto princessa than manila. 12pesos! (sampu lang sa amin eh)
(photo:eman fooling around with the statues, plaza water fountain at 6pm)





















Some interesting rock formations found in the underground river are the jurassic triceratops, puso ng saging and the Peking duck.
(photo: interesting rock formations - triceratops, puso ng saging, Peking duck)

Puerto Princessa and Honda Bay in Palawan

SnakeIslandPalawanOctober6,2007

Palawan Trip, First day

PUERTO PRINCESSA
Palawan is a truly amazing place to go to not just because of its beautiful beaches but especially because of the diversity of marine life that seems to be ubiquitous in that area. I remember going on a 5 day live aboard dive on the Tubbataha Reefs and TO THIS DAY the memory of the hoards of marine life that mobbed us, as well as their extreme diversity stays fresh in my mind.
But thats for another blog... now its just the landlubber's adventure...
(photo: left to right, cebu pacific check in counter, PuertoPrincessa airport, welcome band)













The plane fare to Palawan costs anywhere from 3.2k to 5k depending on airline promotions. We were able to get a moderately cheap fare since this was October and not the peak season yet. When we arrived at the Puerto Princessa Airport in Palawan, we went to this row of tricycles and was lucky enough to get an all-in-one guide/tricycle driver. He agreed to both drive us around and be our guide for 300pesos a day. He was very friendly and informative so we decided to raise this to 400 inclusive of tip na.

(photo: Audissie pension room 1.2k for 2pax/night)











Upon his suggestion, we went to the TOPSTAR TRAVEL AGENCY and booked a trip to the underground river. It costed 1.2k per head inclusive of (heavy)buffet lunch by the beach. We then proceeded to our hotel called Audissie Pension House (don't ask about the name...) in the city and checked in. Afterwhich we immediately left for the amazing Honda Bay!
(photo:left to right-honda bay wharf with bogs in center, bangka transport, tindahan ni manang)










HONDA BAY
The name "Honda Bay" is not in any way connected to the japanese car maker. I can't remember the story or history now so if someone knows it please tell me.

The tricycle ride to Honda Bay Wharf took a mere 30 to 35minutes so we arrived at about 10:30am. Walang masyadong tao sa pier kasi hindi naman peak season. They have now organized boat rentals on the wharf. My friend said the going rate used to be around 800pesos per boat for the round trip beach hopping. However, we now ended up paying twice that for the same trip.

Before going onboard the bangka I suggest you buy some hopia and water from the nearby sari sari stores. The drinks on the various islands are quite expensive. We didn't bother stopping at Pandan Island but proceeded straight to the bigger Snake Island just in time for lunch.
(photo:weird looking room-like boat, pandan island)















It took about 20minutes to get to Snake Island from the wharf. On the island, we swam on the beach while waiting for our lunch to cook. You can buy fish from the lone establishment and they will cook it for you, rice included. Beware because though the fish is fresh its a bit pricey.
(photo: left to right- snake island dock, swimming area, long stretch of beach)












Little did I know when I stepped into the water that I would see something so amazing it left me breathless. While swimming around, our bankero brought my attention to a school of fish. What I saw was hundreds of these HUGE jacks about 3 to 5kilos each forming a huge wall! It was so amazing that I had to shout and motion for everyone to come and share this wonderful sight with me quickly. The wall of jacks kept going around us sometimes forming a huge ball into which I sometimes playfully penetrated with excitement.
Wow!.. only in palawan could this even be possible...
(photo: fishermen abode on snake island, walking on the beach with eman and allan)












After all the exercise we were really famished and feasted on fresh crabs and fish which was cooked and ready when we came ashore. Having eaten so much so fast we decided to walk around the long stretch of sand.

On the way back to the wharf we passed by an island full of bats aptly called Bat Island then made a brief stop at this floating house marking the Pambato Coral Reef. The corals that can be seen in this area are beautiful and diverse! Possible more beatiful than those in Anilao, Batangas! With hundreds of coral fishes as well as big trigger fish.
(photo:leaving snake island, Pambato Coral Reef guardhouse - pay 50/head)












This coral reef is located just in front of LuLi Island (Lubog-Litaw Island: An island that comes and goes with the tide).

(photo: Ka Louie's entrance, allanbarredo checking equipment, Ka Louie's front)












KA LOUIE'S
We finished early so we decided to go to Ka Louie's (a little after 5pm) just to make sure we get a table since we had no reservations. The place had great ambience but too many mosquitoes lang which ruined the culinary experience for me. They make you remove your slippers but the floor was not clean so you end up getting dirty feet.