The bell rang at 6:45, we walked into the staff room, dropped our books, put on our backpacks and took the elevator down to greet our awaiting taxi. Nate, Chuck, Sarah, Chris and I all fit into one taxi so we were able to split the cost nicely. I think Chris was a bit anxious about getting to the airport in time but I had no worries about it. We got to the airport in about an hour with lots of time to spare - especially considering our flight got delayed an hour! We grabbed dinner and met up with Kyle who was also on our flight. We quickly learned that the airline we would be using (or maybe flights in the Philippines in general) are usually not on time.
I actually really enjoyed using trikes as our mode of transportation throughout the trip and you really didn't see much else. There were a lot of motorcycles, and you would see the odd car or SUV but it wasn't common.
Getting to Emerald Playa was a mix of excitement and disappointment. The pictures online definitely were a bit misleading. The place was supposed to be a resort style place with a pool etc. But it seems like they sold they hotel/pool portion to another company. So it was really just a field of twelve cabanas next to a public park that had a beach front. I will say though that Rose, the owner, was the sweetest, most accomodating women. Obviously she told us we could ask her if we had any questions and that she would help us organize anything if we needed it. I asked her what hours she was available for us and she said 24/7 - What?! She literally has her bed set up next to the check in desk! And she seriously helped us so much! She helped us organize trips, called us trikes whenever we wanted to go into town, answered our ridiculous questions - How do they power the lights on the trees in the middle of the ocean? Why is there a hut in the middle of the ocean? When we needed to figure out how to get to Port Barton (the next leg of our trip), she sent one of her workers into town to get prices and schedules for the bus and taxis for us. Such an amazing woman!
We arrived, got settled into our cabana and headed for the water.
As you can see, we had plenty of space when we finally got on the plane.
And all you could see were Nate and Chuck's Santa hats.
One thing that I loved about Cebu Pacific, was that they played Christmas music when we boarded and landed - so awesome! Also, all of the customs people we encountered were soo friendly - something that you don't get in Korea. Everyone wished us a Merry Christmas which was wonderful. Unfortunately we had a long layover in Cebu. I kind of wished we would have left the airport and explored a bit but we were all tired. We landed in Cebu at 2 or 3am and our flight to Palawan wasn't until 12 or 1 in the afternoon that day. So we had time to kill. We found a cafe/restaurant and sat in there for several hours. We met a guy named Sebastian from France who hung out with us as he waited for his next flight. We all ate breakfast (the best bacon and toast I have tasted in a long time. Good bread is hard to find in Korea) and played games and helped the boys drink the whiskey they decided to open up. We played the game where you put a name or character on your forehead and you ask the other questions to figure out who you are. The staff kept staring at us and finally one of them came over and told us how cool they thought it was that we were playing that game because apparently it's super popular in the Philippines. They told us the name of the game, but none of us could remember it unfortunately.
After several hours we went out into the common waiting areas and everyone took a nap (I stayed up to watch our charging phones). Elliot showed up later on and we all hung out and then ate lunch before our next flight.
Chuck, myself and Nate outside for some new scenery
Chris, unimpressed and Sarah, sleeping
Landing in Palawan was so exciting! The real adventure was beginning! (Side note, a lot of the time when we had our different flights, we walked outside to the plane and entered from the back door of the plane which I found odd but efficient. They also played scavenger hunt games during the flights for prizes which was fun.)
We hadn't planned how to get to our first destination, Bahay Kubo at Emerald Playa, so we went to the information desk to get their advice. They suggested that we take a trike which would cost about 150 pesos. (And just to get a better idea, 40 pesos = $1). We found the trike drivers and of course they wanted to charge more than what we were originally told. The first driver told us 150p, then he disappeared and another told us he'd take us for 200p, another told us 300p. I stuck my guns at 200p though and we were off!
Getting to Emerald Playa was a mix of excitement and disappointment. The pictures online definitely were a bit misleading. The place was supposed to be a resort style place with a pool etc. But it seems like they sold they hotel/pool portion to another company. So it was really just a field of twelve cabanas next to a public park that had a beach front. I will say though that Rose, the owner, was the sweetest, most accomodating women. Obviously she told us we could ask her if we had any questions and that she would help us organize anything if we needed it. I asked her what hours she was available for us and she said 24/7 - What?! She literally has her bed set up next to the check in desk! And she seriously helped us so much! She helped us organize trips, called us trikes whenever we wanted to go into town, answered our ridiculous questions - How do they power the lights on the trees in the middle of the ocean? Why is there a hut in the middle of the ocean? When we needed to figure out how to get to Port Barton (the next leg of our trip), she sent one of her workers into town to get prices and schedules for the bus and taxis for us. Such an amazing woman!
With Rose!
We arrived, got settled into our cabana and headed for the water.
We were told we could eat all of our meals at the "restaurant" at Emerald Playa but it was more of a wooden hut on the beach with not many appetizing options. Instead we went to the hotel next door (Microtel) and ate at their restaurant every night. They had delicious food! This was our Christmas dinner, we went all out and had a three course meal.
Unfortunately Rose got a call while we were waiting for our tour van to show up that our tour was cancelled. The Coast Guard cancelled the tour as the wind was too strong that day. We were definitely disappointed as there wasn't another day we could do the tour. So instead we decided to do the Honda Bay Island hopping tour. We were picked up a half hour later and headed to Honda Bay. We met a German couple in the van who were nice, they also were supposed to go to the Underground River. Once we got to Honda Bay we had to wait a little while for a boat as they were extra busy that day due to the cancellation of the other tour. But we did find a van that had both an American and Canadian flag!
From Cowrie Island we went to Luli Island - which was more of a sandbar. But they did have a diving board in the ocean which was cool. I did not use it, but Chris did! I mostly sat in the sun on this island. Sarah and I tried to sun tan, but it was so windy that we were just getting pelted by sand. It was such a windy day. While we left Chris ended up falling into the water and getting completely soaked in her dress. We felt bad but it was also super funny. When we got back onto the boat to go back to the mainland, the German guy helped Chris by pouring the water out of her flats. He poured the water out, put her flats back down - "oh there's still more" and repeated. It was a funny situation to watch.
We were supposed to go to one more island but the wind was just getting too strong so we headed back. Since our original tour got cancelled the money we paid was supposed to get transferred to this tour. But when we got to Emerald Playa the organizer wanted us to pay an extra 40 each for an environmental fee that they "forgot" to tell us about. I refused to pay so the lady left empty handed. We were still a bit confused about the payment though as there should have been some sort of balance refunded or still owing on our part. Rose helped us of course. She called and figured out that we still owed 100p each. Which again I didn't think we should have had to pay since we didn't go to three islands and for other reasons I can't remember anymore. Rose called them back and they decided to just call it even. :)
Once again we ate at the Microtel restuarant. The waiter knew our drink orders at this point and thought it was so odd and funny that it was just us three girls travelling together - a common theme for our trip. The idea of us not having boyfriends was bizarre to them and the fact that "everyone else" were couples. We got a picture with him since that would be our last dinner there. Didn't catch his name though which is too bad.
Merry Christmas!
Later that night, Chris 'broke' our window ;)
We did try and see if Microtel had any rooms left as we considered changing our accommodations, they didn't have space, so we stuck it out with Emerald Playa which we ended up liking :)
Our accommodations came with free breakfast, so the next morning we awoke to a delicious breakfast. I expected to have breakfast in the open cabana next to ours but they had another group set up in there, so we ate breakfast in the common area. The only upsetting thing for my is that the scrambled eggs were cooked in butter which I'm not a fan of but ate them anyways. For breakfast we got eggs, toast, fresh fruit and coffee. I ate so many fresh mangoes on this trip and I miss them so much!
Afterwards I did Sarah's hair and we got ready to go into town.
We decided that we wanted to do the Underground River tour as this is a popular and cool looking attraction in Puerto Princesa. So Rose got a trike to take us to get a permit to get, then he took us to a travel agency place to set up a tour for it. Afterwards we decided to check out a market Sarah and Chris saw on our way to Emerald Playa the day before. Before the trike driver left I asked him if he knew of any good nearby Spas - he suggested one at the back of the market which we checked out. First we bought souvenirs at the market.
Once we were done shopping, we checked out the Spa which was super nice! They were able to accomodate us right away, and all of us at the same time. Chris got a manicure (that lasted two hours!) and Sarah and I got back massages. While this wasn't the first massage I have ever gotten, this was the first massage where I was straddled! There were points during the massage where the lady got up on the table and straddled me to massage me better. This was a new experience for me but Sarah told me it's normal. A half hour back massage was 250p - so cheap! We wanted to come back on New Years Eve, but they were closed.
We did ask the ladies for a recommendation for lunch. They suggested a few places and we decided on a place called Lotus Garden. Such a pretty place! It's a hotel as well and we liked it so much that we decided to book our last night there. I really think it's incredible and fun to go on a vacation and just do things based off of the locals recommendations. Doing that really worked out so well for us the whole trip! It's a good thing I'm not shy to talk to new people!
Us at lunch at Lotus Garden
I had delicious Thai Curry
After lunch we went to find an ATM and as we were using it, the same trike driver who drove us to the restaurant found us and took us back to Emerald Playa. I'm pretty sure he was scoping the streets to find us!
On the way to the restaurant, we ran into a Russian couple who was also staying at Emerald Playa. They wanted us to have drinks with them, and they were clearly already drunk, and we were starving so we opted out of that. Although like I told the girls, those are situations where good stories come from! Of course we eventually headed back to our place and went back into the warm ocean for a few hours. That night we decided to try traditional Filipino food. So yummy! I wish I remembered what these dishes were called but alas I do not.
We were up bright and early the next day as we were supposed to go to the Underground River. We had our breakfast at 6:45am in the outside cabana (yay!)
On the way to Honda Bay we stopped at a little side of the road "rental shop" to get snorkelling gear and shoes since there would be sea urchins in the water - Wow biggest scam! They also told us to buy bread because then a lot of fish would come. "Fish will only come if there is bread." We knew the bread thing was ridiculous so we didn't buy that. But, the shoes were not needed at all, we went to sandy beaches with no signs of sea urchins, and there were no fish around at all or anywhere close to even do snorkelling. So that was a bit disappointing. The swimming was still nice though.
The first island we went to was called Cowrie Island. We swam, had lunch (chicken, rice, salad, bananas - which are much sweeter and more yellow in the Philippines).
We were supposed to go to one more island but the wind was just getting too strong so we headed back. Since our original tour got cancelled the money we paid was supposed to get transferred to this tour. But when we got to Emerald Playa the organizer wanted us to pay an extra 40 each for an environmental fee that they "forgot" to tell us about. I refused to pay so the lady left empty handed. We were still a bit confused about the payment though as there should have been some sort of balance refunded or still owing on our part. Rose helped us of course. She called and figured out that we still owed 100p each. Which again I didn't think we should have had to pay since we didn't go to three islands and for other reasons I can't remember anymore. Rose called them back and they decided to just call it even. :)
Once again we ate at the Microtel restuarant. The waiter knew our drink orders at this point and thought it was so odd and funny that it was just us three girls travelling together - a common theme for our trip. The idea of us not having boyfriends was bizarre to them and the fact that "everyone else" were couples. We got a picture with him since that would be our last dinner there. Didn't catch his name though which is too bad.
Our last dinner at Microtel
Us with the waiter
We all got incredibly burnt that day :( We also had our air conditioner on that nigh and I was freezing! The next morning, I found out we all froze, but everyone was too lazy and being too considerate of the others to turn off the AC even though we all wanted it off!
So those were our first few days that we spent in Puerto Princesa. The next day we would be heading to Port Barton to spend a few days there. It was a great trip so far and it only got better!
Stay tuned for a post on Port Barton and my last weekend here back in Korea!
<3
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