Bohol and Panglao

By plane we went from El Nido to Cebu in only 1 hour and ten minutes. From there we took a cab to the pier and took a ferry to Bohol Island. The traffic in Cebu City was just as bad as in Manila which is no surprise, because it's the second largest city in the Philippines. And, same as in and around Manila, there is more chance of dengue. So we skipped Cebu and went to an island with a kind of small side-island called Panglao. Two bridges keep them together. So we stayed in a resort on Panglao close to Alona Beach, supposedly the most beautiful beach of the island. And therefore indeed very crowded. We went there one evening for dinner and one time for the dive shop, but most of the time we tried to avoid it. Instead we hired a motorcycle and went to Bohol. First stop: tarsier sanctuary. I didn't know what it was until I saw a picture. This is one of the 'it's so fluffy I'm gonna die!'-category. Bot bigger than your fist it lives at night, hence the enormous eyes. They live in trees, hence the weird fingers. I actually don't really know why they have a tail. Oh yes I do, because they are related to monkeys. So we arrived at the sanctuary and first thing you see are signs that tells you to be quiet. They can get traumatised when scared and then kill themselves, so better be careful there. A guide showed us where they were. Oh my god. These little E.T.'s are the cutest. They were awake, but barely moving. You could tell by their eyes they were sleepy. So cute. I'll try to upload (the internet sucks on the Philippines) the video I made of one so you can enjoy their cuteness as well.

Next stop is a waterfall. We read that the waterfalls around here are beautiful so we picked one on the road and just went there. To be honest, it was not so impressive. It was only fun to see how locals enjoyed themselves in the weekend by the river. Speaking of fun, on the way we saw a sign with 'Eco Park', so we wanted to check that out. I don't know what made this park eco, but we had fun! We went on a zipline that flew over the Loboc river. That's quite a popular river because of the greenish water and jungle around it, but the only way to see it, we thought, was to have a lunch on a slow boat with other Chinese tourists and loud karaoke music. No thanks. But the ziplining gave us a whole different perspective on the river. We could see the waterfalls and surrounding jungle from above, it was really nice. And the Christmas music at the cashier we just accepted.

Last stop: the Chocolate Hill Mountains. For locals their biggest pride of the island, a geological mystery, a natural wonder, a source of income. One local walked up to us and asked us where we were from and said: "Oh where you come from you don't have nature, you don't have time always hurry. Here you can relax." A little shortsighted but we let him be. It is true that their nature is wonderful. The Chocolate Hills are stunning. We went up to one hill for the view, so did many other Chinese tourists, and we saw many perfectly round shaped hills. The higher the better the view. I'd love to see it from an airplane or so.

That was our first day. The second day we had plans to go diving at Balicasag, an island with a protected marine park. We had two amazing dives. We saw a lot of turtles, A LOT. It was crazy, they were everywhere. Big, small, huge, all sizes. The corals attracted many fishes and it was very lively. Too bad there weren't any sharks. From what I learned sharks mean that the corals are healthy and balanced. Nonetheless, it was beautiful. And I found a new hobby: taking pictures of all the different nudibranches (zeenaaktslakken). They are so weird. They have all kind of colours, some even fluorescent, and they have hornes and/or spikes too. But they are small, like the size of a.. snail. So you need to look careful. So far I've seen maybe a dozen of the 3000 different kinds.

Lucky as we were, we found a perfect pub next door. They had not only great Belgian beer, but also great beers from local breweries! And the best pizza. You can imagine we spent a lot of time there trying different local craft beers after a long day of amazement. Cheers to our lucky asses!