Just Hanging Around

They all talked about how this was just a small challenge, something only for newbies and hardly anything to get nervous over as by the time one had barely begun it would soon be finished. It was just some twenty meters down and less than half the distance one had to rappel in Antequera, they assured me. But here I was, walking to and fro across the bailey bridge of Makapiko River, trying to come up with enough nerve to get it up and done with.

Down the river: Bend!

“Don’t let go!” Soaked through but in high spirits, this was our war cry for forty-five minutes or so. Each one sitting on a salbabida, linked only by hands and feet, our fate on the rushing river dependent on this unsevered link and by how much we have learned of the wisdom of the bamboo that grows abundant in the area. This is a water sport made for groups: family, friends and, we find amusingly appropriate, for companies wanting of team building.

Escape into Paradiso, Pandanon

“Looking for the perfect beach?
Pandanon Island is the place to go. White sand and warm turquoise waters await the visitor for a day of fun in the sun.”

Google Pandanon Island and you’ll be greeted with more than five hundred search results. I found the ‘quote’ above in one of them. Ask a fellow Boholano where Pandanon Island is and you’ll most likely get a shrug. Meanwhile, other literatures list this beach as Pandanon Island, Cebu, Philippines.

INCENDIARY: Central Visayas in the eyes of a wonderstruck drifter

With a postman bag, a borrowed Canon 350D, and a rising meander-fever, I set out with some friends for mystic Siquijor where great adventures by the sea, by the hills and by the road awaited.

Little did I know that en route, I would get to experience the magic of the whole of Central Visayas.

Goin’ Nuts Over Nuts Huts

Impossible connecting road from the highway. The steepest staircase, from the entrance down to the reception area and restaurant, then down to the huts by the river. Very basic amenities. The restaurant closes at 10pm. You can’t bring food in your room/hut. That’s Nuts Huts for you.

Castaway in Cawasihan

On our back, looms a deep blue open sea that groans of sharks and barracudas. On our fore, a many-pronged giant mass of green on green-black crouches shrewdly, as though the wild creatures its lushness forebodes of, will come leaping at us any second. We are cast away in mid-sea and we are not about to cry SOS!

Summer Splash

Summer must go on. Rain or shine.