This third and final leg of our vacation returned us to the Philippines, and covered the period of May 26th through June 2nd. Click here for the picture gallery.
On the 26th we flew from Bangkok to Manila, transferred our luggage (ALL of our luggage) from the international terminal to the domestic terminal – and caught our flight to Cebu City. Transferring our luggage was nothing short of a nightmare. Multiple security checkpoints, heavy luggage and tired travelers made for a very grumpy combination. It was close to midnight before we finally arrived at our destination in Cebu.
This leg of the trip was split 50/50 between friends and family. After being picked up from the airport by our family and getting a good night’s sleep, my Uncle and I had a good breakfast of coffee and San Miguel beer in the gazebo, overlooking the city of Cebu. During our time here we:
Island hopping with our friends. We spent the afternoon and early evening visiting a couple of very small islands between Cebu and the island of Bohol. We were transported in a catamaran style boat, the water was lovely. You could see for several meters to the bottom of the water, made you feel as if you could almost stand up in it, which would have been a very bad idea. The good Dr. actually swam with some fish, which was kind of cool. You could feed the fish with bread and feel them nibbling on exposed skin. Thank goodness Greenpeace wasn’t around to save the endangered great white whale.
Our friends and us drove south from Cebu. We drove south to watch the Whale Sharks. A couple of our party actually got in the water and swam with them. Remember Joy from part 1 who had a camel nibble on her butt, and then fell on her butt while climbing Mt. Pinatubo? On this day she was in the path of the whale shark while he was eating shrimp, so he nibbled her butt too. Poor Joy, she just couldn’t catch a break. While I didn’t leave the boat, it was a wonderful experience, and I’m glad I participated with the group. From here, we went on to visit Tumalog Falls. During the Whale shark event, the temperature was very warm, downright hot. As you entered the area of the falls, the temperature dipped, and it was downright comfortable. To get to the falls, you either have to walk or pay a motorcycle to drop you off. I elected to ride the motorcycle (which I haven’t done in like…30+ years) to get to the falls. That was an experience. After this little ride, I think all these super cycles in the US may be over rated, as all these were simple 150cc cycles. The falls are beautiful, and better than I expected.
From here we continued south to visit our family south of Cebu, it was a grand event to celebrate our Auntie’s Birthday. There was food, beer, liquor, more food, more beer, dancing, fun people, and to top it off we had more beer. At our accommodations, we swam in the pool and just relaxed.
Following our trip to the south, our family made a trip north, to Bogo City. It was here we ate a great restaurant called Capitancillo’s. The food was good, and it was reasonably priced. It was a great drive, much more pleasant of a drive than going south. There was less traffic, and it was just a more pleasant trip. The city was less congested than Cebu. On the way back to Cebu, we ran across a rodeo. I had no idea there were cowboys in the Philippines; one more perception shattered.
On the second of June, we started the long journey back home. First we flew to Manila, than to Japan. Our flight leaving Manila was delayed over an hour and a half due to political reasons. They had to hold the flight leaving Japan for our group. Arriving in Atlanta we had a nice, four hour layover. We decided to have dinner at TGIFs. If found it interesting that they (TGIF) provided us with a metal fork; but would only give us a plastic knife. TSA – really!! See part four for more on this! I take pride in being able to finish a hamburger; but after eating properly proportioned food, I was unable to finish this plate of food. We finally arrived home around 1130 in the evening.
It was good to get home – but boy was it a fun vacation!!
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