I completed almost 2 months of travel, and while I loved every minute of it, traveling can be very exhausting. It's nice to sleep in a bed more than one night, to have your own space, to have clean clothes, to eat familiar foods. So arriving in the Philippines was a nice way to end my adventure, a way to relax and regroup. The Philippines is a really big place with lots of cool stuff to see, but I really wanted to be lazy, so we headed to Boracay, a tourist paradise with the most ridiculous beach and perfectly clear blue water. Boracay is a tiny island, so to get there you have to fly through Caticlan and take a boat over. I flew from Manila in a tiny propeller plane. The Caticlan airport has a tiny tiny runway, so when the plane landed they had to slam on the brakes in order to stop in time. I have never been afraid of flying, but this was pretty scary.
After taking the boat and two tricycles (a motorbike with a side car attached for passengers) we arrived at our hotel. It was a cute little place down a dirt path from the beach, each little bungalow with its own veranda out front.
There were some typhoons that had just passed over, and so it rained a lot. There were two rainy days, but most of the time it was sunny all day and then rained during the night. The path to my hotel flooded and they made this impromptu bridge to help cross.
The first day we relaxed on the beach and feasted. There were people selling all sorts of stuff, and Helen decided that it would be helpful to have 3 pairs of sunglasses.
That night we were a little more ambitious and went for a sunset cruise on a sailboat. We got to sit on the nets on either side of the boat.
There was amazing food on the island, pretty much anything you could dream of. I had Moroccan, Greek, American, all sorts of stuff. There was even a place called the Hobbit House where all of the servers had to be under a certain height. Not very pc, but still entertaining.
Most of the good restaurants were in a strip called d'mall. Classy, huh?
People made these sandcastles everyday, and for a few dollars they would write your name. The guy wrote our names and then proceeded to have a photo shoot with me in every different position around the castle.
There was a Filipino soap opera filming on the island the week I was there, and this had many people very excited as they crowded around to watch their favorite stars on the beach.
Boracay also had a really good night life with lots of chill bars serving good cheap drinks. One of the local beers is called Red Horse, and although it only costs about $1.50 it is 'extra strong' and a good value. Every night there were fire dance shows on the beach. They were really talented and did part of their dance in the water. Most of the dancers were lady boys, and the majority of the music came from the dream girls soundtrack.
Helen left me to head to China after a few days, and so once again I found myself alone. Before my trip started I was really nervous to travel alone, but it turned out to be pretty fun and exciting. It's so easy to meet people on the backpacker trail, and they are usually like minded people with interesting stories. I had met a Canadian couple in Siem Reap, and got to meet up with them again in Boracay. They also left early, but through them I met even more cool people who I hung out with the rest of the time. I really loved being able to get to know so many new people, but it was hard to have to constantly say goodbye to new friends.
There were a ton of vendors on the beach selling both fresh and salt water pearls. It took some bargaining to get good prices, and my friend Miriam had a team of about 6 vendors finding her the perfect pearls and the perfect price.
After taking the boat and two tricycles (a motorbike with a side car attached for passengers) we arrived at our hotel. It was a cute little place down a dirt path from the beach, each little bungalow with its own veranda out front.
There were some typhoons that had just passed over, and so it rained a lot. There were two rainy days, but most of the time it was sunny all day and then rained during the night. The path to my hotel flooded and they made this impromptu bridge to help cross.
The first day we relaxed on the beach and feasted. There were people selling all sorts of stuff, and Helen decided that it would be helpful to have 3 pairs of sunglasses.
That night we were a little more ambitious and went for a sunset cruise on a sailboat. We got to sit on the nets on either side of the boat.
There was amazing food on the island, pretty much anything you could dream of. I had Moroccan, Greek, American, all sorts of stuff. There was even a place called the Hobbit House where all of the servers had to be under a certain height. Not very pc, but still entertaining.
Most of the good restaurants were in a strip called d'mall. Classy, huh?
People made these sandcastles everyday, and for a few dollars they would write your name. The guy wrote our names and then proceeded to have a photo shoot with me in every different position around the castle.
There was a Filipino soap opera filming on the island the week I was there, and this had many people very excited as they crowded around to watch their favorite stars on the beach.
Boracay also had a really good night life with lots of chill bars serving good cheap drinks. One of the local beers is called Red Horse, and although it only costs about $1.50 it is 'extra strong' and a good value. Every night there were fire dance shows on the beach. They were really talented and did part of their dance in the water. Most of the dancers were lady boys, and the majority of the music came from the dream girls soundtrack.
Helen left me to head to China after a few days, and so once again I found myself alone. Before my trip started I was really nervous to travel alone, but it turned out to be pretty fun and exciting. It's so easy to meet people on the backpacker trail, and they are usually like minded people with interesting stories. I had met a Canadian couple in Siem Reap, and got to meet up with them again in Boracay. They also left early, but through them I met even more cool people who I hung out with the rest of the time. I really loved being able to get to know so many new people, but it was hard to have to constantly say goodbye to new friends.
There were a ton of vendors on the beach selling both fresh and salt water pearls. It took some bargaining to get good prices, and my friend Miriam had a team of about 6 vendors finding her the perfect pearls and the perfect price.
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