The Philippines: A Journey of Ups and Downs

An Introduction to the Philippines

The Philippines is a growing tourist destination known for its stunning beaches, water activities and scenic views. Visiting the Philippines is becoming increasingly popular as word gets out about these terrific sites.

We went here for a couple of weeks and visited Cebu City, Bohol Island, Puerto Princesa (in transit), El Nido and Manila in that time.

Read on to hear a little about these places from our first hand experiences including why Bohol is so incredible and the boat tour from hell in awful El Nido.

Visiting the Philippines

I spent a month in SE Asia with my girlfriend recently. We were very excited for visiting the Philippines. A country that features often in people’s “best countries in the world” lists.

We picked the Philippines over Malaysia as it felt more of a romantic destination (although we managed to squeeze in Malaysia too).

In fact Malaysia was where we would stop for the night in transit from Bali. With just a few hours between flights we were unable to go to Kuala Lumpur city centre, as it lies 60km north of the airport.

With hotel options near the airport limited, we spent the night sleeping on a McDonald’s bench inside the airport before flying onwards to Cebu.

That’s right folks, travel isn’t always as glamorous as the floaty dress crowd on Instagram would have you believe.

Local Life in Cebu

Still weary, we arrived in Cebu City and took an hour-long taxi to our hotel.

First impressions were eye-opening having spent two weeks in gringo-centric Bali. Cebu had a very local feel to it. We were no longer in a tourism Mecca, but a much more authentic Southeast Asian city.

Guess that’s one way to score some brownie points with the hipsters who love to dunk on Bali or Dubai for being “inauthentic”.

In the evening we found a restaurant called Ribshack, it was absolutely rammed full of locals. Clearly an ultra popular spot. Almost any traveller will tell you that’s a sign of a good place, and in we went.

After a few minutes trying to figure out what they were selling, we both ordered pork with rice but found the food pretty disappointing to be honest. And the worst was still to come. More on that soon.

Halo Hunting – One of the Most Popular Desserts for Travellers Visiting the Philippines

After dinner we went searching for a dessert. Not any old dessert though. We were looking for the Philippines’ popular treat halo-halo.

This colourful concoction is made with a variety of ingredients. Shaved ice, evaporated milk, fruits, jellies and much more are included.

Whilst a big deal in the Philippines, halo-halo gained fame amongst western audiences after the popular travel YouTuber Drew Binsky shared a video on it.

We were determined to find this on our first night and the hunt began.

It didn’t take long to find a place that supposedly had it. But they told us it wasn’t available and we went to look elsewhere.

Stop number two proved just as fruitless. Before we struck lucky at the third attempt and got stuck into the local delicacy.

Would say it tasted nice. Not amazing, just nice. Would (and did) have it again, but would only give it a 6.5/10. Certainly worth trying whilst visiting the Philippines however.

A Turn for the Worse

Shortly afterwards, my stomach decided it didn’t like the local food. Within minutes I started to feel awful and we quickly dashed back to the hotel.

Plans for a few beers evaporated which each second that passed.

After two weeks on Indonesia’s most famous tourist island without experiencing the notorious “Bali belly”, the Philippines looked set to defeat me.

As soon as we came back I collapsed onto the bed, too weak to talk.

Food poisoning was the first thing that came to mind. I lay there and waited for the inevitable emergency toilet trip.

But thankfully it never came.

After around two hours the pains slowly subsided. Suddenly I was alive once again. Fortunately “Cebu Stomach” seemed a lot more short term than its southern cousin.

Beers were off the table unfortunately. But we still had to plan for the following day. We wished to do a walking tour, yet none seemed available. Which meant plan B: a DIY tour of Cebu City where I would be the guide.

Cue a crash course in the history of Cebu in an attempt to impress my girlfriend.

After all, no woman wants a man who doesn’t know his Yap-San Diego Ancestral House from his Fort San Pedro.

A Tour of Cebu City: Budget Edition

Stop number one was Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral.

If you’ve never seen a cathedral before then you might find it interesting. But otherwise, it’s not really worth coming all this way for.

Soon afterwards we headed to the much more enjoyable Fort San Pedro. For just 30 pesos ($0.50) each we were able to enter the fort where a merry band played live music to raise money for the blind.

Upstairs you can walk around the ramparts and enjoy the views. It doesn’t take long to explore the fort, yet it is still one of the better things to see in Cebu.

Next up were the Heritage of Cebu Monument and neighbouring Yap-San Diego Ancestral House. The latter being a cool-looking building said to be the first ever Chinese house built outside of China. Both nice to see, but within five minutes you’ve seen all you need to.

We decided against trips to the popular Cebu Taoist Temple and Sirao Garden due to their distant locations from where we were based combined with time and budget constraints.

This was the end of my shoddy tour guide impersonation, meaning it was time to head back to the hotel.

The Final Boss for Foodies: A Key Factor in Food Bloggers Visiting the Philippines

Along the way back, we came across many street food stalls. Without a local, we had little knowledge of what they were selling, and quickly moved on.

There was however one recognisable street food on display. That was the notorious Filipino delicacy of balut.

What is balut?

If you’re squeamish then scroll to the top of this blog post and click on the “X” in the top-right corner. Perhaps “top 10 cute coffee shops in Milan” is more the type of blog post for you.

If not, then read on.

Balut is fermented duck egg. It’s a real life duck embryo that’s been incubated for 2-3 weeks before making its way to your stomach. Yum!

Balut is said to originate from Chinese migration to the Philippines. And the Chinese certainly aren’t shy when it comes to culinary adventures.

If you’re feeling braver than we were (not hard), you can find balut without difficulty just about anywhere in the country.

Some daring foodies from across the globe have been visiting the Philippines for the sole purpose of trying this symbol of culinary culture clash.

After all, legal implications aside, you won’t be seeing balut pop up in Western Europe anytime soon.

Disappointing news for anyone hoping the McBalut would be popping up in a certain fast food chain in the near future.

Fancy sampling the partially-formed duck however and it won’t break the bank at all. Expect to pay a mere $0.40 for the pleasure.

Mind you, they could’ve offered $40 and I still wouldn’t have fancied this.

Yes, I’m afraid if you’re looking for a good food blog then you’re in the wrong place.

Western Stomach 0 Eastern Food 2

In the evening we headed to the popular Filipino fast food restaurant Jollibee. Surely the food here wouldn’t cause any issues. Right???

Wrong.

After dinner my body went through exactly the same process as the previous day.

Stomach pains that became worse with each passing second, a nasty dose of nausea and a rapid dash back to the hotel with plans for the evening scrapped once again.

Fortunately the recovery was almost identical. Two hours of lying down after which I eventually began to feel human again. Although I was so weak I couldn’t talk for the first hour or so.

Never worked out what this mysterious illness was. But the common denominator on both nights was rice. Let’s just say rice was off the menu for the rest of our time in the Philippines.

At least we were in good form again by the evening and ready to plan for what would be the highlight whilst visiting the Philippines: Bohol.

Bohol and the Taxi Mafia: The Enemies of Travellers in Many Countries, not Just Whilst Visiting the Philippines

After waiting a while we took a boat from Cebu to Bohol. It took a while going through various bureaucratic hurdles to make sure our tickets were good to go, but eventually we were off.

Two hours later and the ferry arrived in unspectacular Tagbilaran City. Don’t worry, Bohol is much more exciting than this uneventful settlement suggests.

Without popular ride share apps such as Uber or Grab, we were forced to haggle for a tuk tuk.

The vultures circled outside the ferry terminal waiting for unsuspecting tourists to walk into their traps.

In almost every country, the same problem exists. Step outside an airport, station or ferry terminal and you’ll be greeted by a bunch of taxi drivers looking to extort 2x, 3x, sometimes even 20x the price from naive tourists.

Sure enough it was no different here, and we had to deal with a number of tuk tuk drivers making up ludicrous prices on the spot. In our case the lowest quote was 300 pesos ($5) which was 3x the going rate.

It’s important to stand your ground in these situations. Even if you think it’s only a small amount of (extra) money on top, drivers will continue to charge higher prices if you accept them.

Why is this bad?

Because this prices locals out. If locals earn an average of $5 a day and you pay $5 for a $1.50 taxi, drivers will begin to normalise higher prices and locals won’t be able to afford transport any longer.

Paying more also rewards dishonest tactics so please research how much a taxi should cost before you arrive in a new place, and ask locals what the fair rate should be if you don’t know.

We soon walked out of the ferry terminal and tried our luck by walking further into the city to find transport.

Sure enough, five minutes of walking slashed the price from 300 pesos to 100. Finally we found a tuk tuk that wasn’t trying to pull any dirty tricks and went straight to the hostel.

Tagbilaran City

The main entry point for tourists into Bohol is nothing to write home about.

It’s pretty dull and has little to do.

After arriving at our hotel, we dropped our clothes at an elderly lady’s laundry shack which conveniently stood directly opposite where we stayed.

Then crossed the road again and couldn’t resist the fried chicken lying in wait.

“They sell chicken necks here!” I exclaimed, in surprise.

This time it was my girlfriend’s turn to be surprised, albeit as a reaction to my own surprise.

My girlfriend comes from Paraguay, a country where eating chicken necks and feet are the norm. Being British we don’t see anything other than a chicken’s breast, legs, or wings make it to the dinner table.

This is what makes travel so fascinating. I guarantee that you, reading this right now, do something you believe is “normal” without a second thought. Yet someone thousands of miles away would find it totally bizarre.

Your normal is their bizarre, your rude is their polite, your positive is their negative.

It’s exciting to step forth into foreign lands and discover these quirks and differences across the world.

Not Quite the Ibiza of the Philippines

We decided to end the evening with a couple of drinks – after a long time searching for a bar. Turns out Tagbilaran isn’t Ibiza. You aren’t going to find alcohol on every corner here.

We eventually found a place called Atmospheres which let us in despite my breach of the dress code. Turns out you aren’t meant to wear shorts here, but they turned a blind eye to my sins and let us enter regardless.

It was okay for a couple of drinks, but hardly the bar of our dreams. Half the facility had been taken over by a private function and the other half had a ratio of around 4 bar staff for every punter.

We decided against a long night and retreated to prepare for the highlight of the Philippines.

The (Only?) Good Taxi Driver

The sun rose on a new day and it was time to find a reliable tuk tuk driver to take us to two destinations for a reasonable price: the famous tarsier sanctuary and iconic Chocolate Hills of Bohol.

Inevitably the first couple of drivers we approached seemed to have mistaken the cost of a few hour’s transport in the Philippines for the price of a penthouse in the Burj Khalifa.

But soon we lucked out.

Having approached another driver in the centre of the city we were wondering how quickly we could sell our penthouse to pay the taxi fare.

Then a pleasant surprise.

We were braced for the worst and received the greatest shock of all.

We were quoted an honest and fair price!

The Place that Made Visiting The Philippines Worthwhile

Without hesitation we accepted this driver’s offer to take us to and from the tarsier sanctuary for 550 pesos ($9). Although we were unsure about the Chocolate Hills due to our low budget with a 3,000 peso quote ($50) and debated catching the bus for that one instead. Spoiler: we ended up catching the bus for around 180 pesos ($6) each in the end.

And on we went, to Bohol’s famous tarsier sanctuary. Home to a bunch of primates, the size of a human fist. These shy creatures are vulnerable to extinction. Nowadays they can only be found in a tiny number of places worldwide – all islands within Southeast Asia. More specifically: Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei and the Philippines.

It’s awesome seeing rare and wonderful creatures in their homelands rather than a zoo. Okay, a sanctuary is more of a halfway house between the wild and a zoo. But it was still a spectacular place to visit. One that remains long in the memory despite a mere ten minutes being enough to see it all.

The Chocolate Hills

And back we went to the bus station thanks to our wonderful driver, who seemed understanding that we were getting the bus rather than a private taxi given the cost difference.

After a while frying in the baking-hot bus we were finally off. An hour through the bumpy Bohol countryside and it was time to visit one of the country’s most iconic locations.

After a short snack stop we bought the 100 peso ($2) tickets to see the hills and waited for the short bus ride to take us to the top.

And there it was.

The iconic Chocolate Hills stood before us, so-called for their brown-tinted peaks in the dry season, which we arrived just at the end of. The hills looked more mint than chocolate, yet were still a cool place to experience nonetheless. It rains heavily from June to October, meaning these are not the best times to view the hills.

Hike up to a viewing point for the best views of the hills.

Visiting the Philippines in the Rainy Season…

Now we thought we were lucky with the lack of rain on our trip here.

That luck was to subside as soon as we got the bottom.

Across the road was a bus stop where we were told to wait for the yellow bus back to Tagbilaran City.

Yet the heavens opened and we had to retreat back into the small local restaurant beside the bus stop.

This gave us a very small glimpse of oncoming traffic. Meaning a small window to run back into the heavy rain to flag down the bus when it came.

After a while it came, and I ran out waving to catch its attention.

But onwards it went, leaving us waiting in the pouring rain.

After another half hour or so, another bus came. It wasn’t the yellow bus we were supposed to get, but still said it was heading for Tagbilaran City.

That will do.

Off we went at the first opportunity to get away from Poseidon’s wrath and get back to the city.

Unsurprisingly, the journey was not comfortable. Locals quite happily chilled with their windows wide open meaning we were lashed with raindrops for the majority of the journey.

Finally, we were ready for our next stop whilst visiting the Philippines. It was time to do some planning.

The Journey to Paradise?

We woke up ready to catch the ferry back knowing we’d struggle once again with tuk tuk extortion masters trying to rinse us for every penny.

But we lucked out once again and found the very same guy who took us to the tarsier sanctuary. Like a needle in a haystack we’d managed to find one of the few good guys on the taxi circuit not once, but twice!

And off we went to the ferry terminal before going back to Cebu.

Our journey was long, but at least gave us a few hours to plan where to stay during our next stop: El Nido.

El Nido is one of the most popular spots in the Philippines famed for its stunning beaches and remote islands. It lies at the northern point of Palawan which is one of the key stops for anyone visiting the Philippines.

The Problems Begin

Our first hiccup came at Cebu airport. We looked at budget accommodation in El Nido and found… nothing reasonable.

Yes there were cheap options. But all the reviews were off putting.

We don’t mind if a cheap place is a little simplistic. Poor wifi, rude staff, bland breakfast, ugly views, cold showers. These are the minor inconveniences we tolerate as budget travellers. As such, we would happily book a place even with all these issues at once.

Yet a common theme kept occurring for each place we found. Bugs, bugs and more bugs.

An ant infestation, cockroaches, mosquitos and the threat of disease… all major red flags that rule out a place in an instant.

After hours of frustration and failing to find a place that met our criteria, we went for the least bad option: Cliffside Cottages. It wasn’t a fantastic place to stay (you can tell they aren’t paying me to write this) but did at least live up to its billing as a tolerable option. So much so, that we extended from one night to three upon arrival.

Our plane eventually left Cebu and we landed in Puerto Princesa. From the airport we took a tuk tuk to our accommodation from where we would take a 5am van journey to El Nido.

Hell Nido

We were rudely awakened by loud bangs on our door at 4am. Annoyed, we were reluctant to get out of bed having only arrived around 4 hours previously.

And yes, our van was a whole hour early. Well it’s better than being an hour late… I guess?

Bleary-eyed and frustrated we gathered our belongings in a hurry ready for the bumpy ride to, errrrr “paradise”…

Six tiring and uncomfortable hours later and there we were in this godforsaken haven of desolation and misery.

The fun was just beginning.

A Blog of Honest Opinions

One thing I will never do is shy away from the negatives of travel, alongside the positives. Whilst travel is 95% incredible experiences, it is also 5% bad experiences ranging from minor logistical hiccups to pretty nasty stuff such as the time I almost got mugged in Ecuador.

The same applies to destinations. For every heavenly utopia, you will also discover some rather underwhelming places, to put it lightly.

Content creators will often tell you only half the story, fearing negative feedback will upset their followers and harm their brand. I will only share real life authentic experiences regardless of whether they’re good or bad.

First Impressions of El Nido – An Apparent Highlight of Visiting the Philippines

Our first impressions of Hell Nido (as we ended up calling it) were, as you’ve perhaps guessed, not positive.

For a place with so much tourist hype, it clearly hasn’t caught up with demand yet.

El Nido is surprisingly underdeveloped. As our Booking dot com research had revealed, there are few budget options beyond ramshackle bug burrows.

The shops are generally small and offer little with the exception of the larger Prince Hypermart. More about that place later…

One negative out of our control was the weather. Gloomy for all three days we spent there, alternating from dull and overcast to torrential downpours.

I try to picture the beaches in better weather than we experienced, but they didn’t seem any more impressive than those in other Southeast Asian countries such as Thailand or Vietnam.

The nightlife isn’t terrible but it isn’t great either. There are a few bars near the beach. They’re okay, but nothing to write home about.

After a couple of beers in one such establishment we retreated for a much needed sleep, hopefully without a premature awakening.

The best El Nido had to offer was a cool church.

Starting as we Mean to go on

On our first full day, we wanted to walk to Corong Corong Beach. Naturally, the weather scuppered our plans. After dashing to a shop in an attempt to see out the storms, we eventually retreated back to the hotel without making it to the beach. We figured it wouldn’t be worth seeing with the dark skies and sodden surroundings.

In the afternoon we went hunting for boat tours to see the sights which make El Nido so desirable.

Frustrated with the options found, we eventually booked online although it seemed the website we booked through worked with local companies and we ended up with one which I won’t name, despite the temptation. Spoiler: They were terrible.

We found their office and paid the remainder of the deposit. They gave us instructions on where to meet the following day, and we were set.

Perhaps we should’ve looked at online reviews first and seen this company’s sole review being a scathing one-star essay…

A Bad Feeling…

The morning arrived. I had little sleep having woken and worried about what this tour would bring. For some reason I had a bad feeling…

We walked down to the beach, and after navigating some amateur logistics which did nothing to alleviate my negative feelings, we sat down and waited for the boat.

At this point my girlfriend turned to me and said “I have a very bad feeling about this”. She questioned whether we should get on the boat at all claiming she would quite happily walk away and lose the near-$50 we had spent on this.

I tried my best to reassure her. After all, this was exactly her dream activity. Beaches, water and snorkelling. Apprehensive or not, I felt the need to reassure her that it would be fine and nothing would go wrong…

Bad boyfriend…

And off we went. Predictably the heavens opened within minutes, and the freezing rain constantly lashed across our skin. The ramshackle boat, which appeared to have been built as part of a school technology project, sailed off away from the mainland.

We stopped at our first beach for an hour. The rain hammering down harder than ever. What little shelter there was on the island provided cover, but prevented us from exploring. This wasn’t enjoyable.

A Day of Disaster: Visiting the Philippines Quickly Turned into a Nightmare

After a disappointing first stop we sailed onwards, we found a cave spot which the boat approached during a rare moment without rain.

But then, the engine spluttered and came to a halt. Not everyone seemed to notice as many of the tour group were distracted by the cave.

Many minutes passed, and we didn’t move. One member of staff opened up a hatch in the floor to access the engine and, unsuccessfully, played around with a few things.

The captain made a phone call. Whilst we shared no common language, it was clear what he was doing. I was slightly surprised he had signal here, but he spoke for long enough to convince me he had indeed made contact with another human being.

The crew never told us there was a problem. Instead the boat slowly drifted out towards the sea whilst we waited for movement.

An hour passed, and we were still stuck. The crew eventually made the most of this time by cooking the lunch we had been promised with the tour.

They had all been swimming in the sea, failed to wash their hands, and touched the very food we would soon share with them.

In one man’s case, his hands were jet black having touched oil whilst attempting to fix the engine.

I’m not sure what nutritional value oil provides, but he was keen to add it to the buffet being served up as he touched our food without a second thought.

Not Quite a Michelin Star Meal

Lunch came and my rather-more-sensible girlfriend decided not to touch it having seen numerous hygiene offences committed in the preparation process.

My feeling of hunger overrode that of common sense and I decided to carefully cherrypick a few warmer food items that had (hopefully) been heated enough to boil the bacteria.

After a few mouthfuls I came to my senses and realised I shouldn’t be doing this. It was time to focus on damage limitation and stop eating the food where all hygiene precautions were sacrificed in favour of making the buffet look Instagram-friendly.

Our Nightmare got Worse

The rain came back with a vengeance. Rain turned to hail and before we knew it, dozens of ice-cold hailstones lashed across our backs causing pain with each and every impact.

I wrapped my arms around my girlfriend who struggled in these brutal conditions. I shivered as the temperature plummeted with dozens of painful ice daggers slashing my bare back with every second that passed.

An eternity passed before the arctic inferno began to subside. Lunch was over and the worst of the weather had passed. Yet we were still stranded and freezing cold with little desire to carry on with the tour.

As we continued to wait, the tour group began to quell the boredom by grabbing snorkel masks and exploring what was below the surface.

Fish and… not much else.

One positive however was that the sea was surprisingly warm. A welcome respite after the punishing hail.

We waited and waited and snorkelled some more, before sitting back down in the boat. My girlfriend felt unwell and didn’t want to continue with the tour.

Finally a mirage appeared in the distance. We weren’t hallucinating, surely???

No! It was a boat! And it was headed right towards us.

Saved at Last

After so long we lost track of the time. Maybe two hours, maybe more. But that didn’t matter, we were finally being saved.

After stepping onto the rescue boat, there was only one thing on our minds. “I take it we’re heading straight back now?” Nope. The crew had only one thing on their minds, and that was to continue the tour. Anything to wriggle out of a potential refund I guess…

My girlfriend still felt unwell and was struggling, whilst the rest of the tour group appeared dejected and bemused.

Yet short of hijacking the boat, there was nothing we could do.

Off we went to more beaches, more islands and much more rain. They made sure every island on the itinerary was visited despite the wishes of the paying customers. But they did cut off the snorkelling we had been promised, a key selling point of the tour in the first place. Instead we just had to settle for the impromptu snorkelling session whilst the boat was stranded in the middle of nowhere.

Finally, we made it back. And our nightmare day was over…

Haha, you didn’t really believe that, right?

Travel Builds Resilience

This day has certainly not been what was planned whilst visiting the Philippines. However our nightmare day was not quite over just yet despite overcoming the worst of it.

Upon arrival we marched straight to the tour company’s office, believing they would be opened for another hour. However we got there and it was closed.

My bare feet shredded from the sharp terrain, it was time to head back defeated.

With just a ten minute walk to our guesthouse, nothing else could possibly go wrong there was still time for yet more misery.

The heavens opened once again and more ice-cold torrential rain came down much to my bemusement.

Soaking wet we finally made it back for much-needed showers and rest. As the skies plunged into darkness, befitting of our nightmare in Hell Nido, we decided to relax with a much-needed beer each.

So to the supermarket I went, bringing back a bottle of San Miguel (the Filipino version) each.

At least we’d used up our quota of bad luck for the day and would be able to enjoy these in peace…

Oh.

We cracked open the beers and started drinking without even looking at the bottles.

They tasted vile.

The Bad Day Continues

On the rim of the bottles was some disgusting substance we never quite got to the bottom of. A rusty yellowy-brown colour it smelt of rusty metal.

Instantly, we spat the beers out and marched straight back to Prince Hypermart. We told customer service exactly what happened and they said we could replace the beers with a like-for-like replacement. Fair enough.

Only we inspected the bottles a little more closely this time, and realised they all had this problem.

The staff said we could swap the beers for something else, providing it was the same price. These two beers combined cost around 90 pesos ($3). Fed up, and unable to find any beers for the exact same price, we grabbed a carton of pineapple juice.

And finally our bad day was ov… oh, scratch that once again.

Further Frustrations – Visiting the Philippines Proved to be Challenging

The pineapple juice cost 89 pesos, meaning we were getting something worth less than what we paid in return for the beers. Fair enough, we couldn’t care less about 1 peso.

Yet the supermarket refused to sanction this swap. Whatever we got in return for the beers has to be EXACTLY the same price. The fact they were benefiting (by such a minor amount) made no difference.

And my girlfriend argued passionately against this nonsense as I stared blankly into the distance, utterly defeated, wondering how this day could possibly be as awful as it was.

After a day of taking Ls, she wasn’t prepared to let this one slip.

And finally… finally a win. We got the pineapple juice in return after my girlfriend’s willingness to fight long enough for the customer “service” staff to backtrack.

Off we went back to the hotel, and booked our escape from Hell Nido. It couldn’t come soon enough.

Now for the biggest shock of all on this challenging day…

We made it to bed without another incident, and counted down the hours to our exit from this awful place.

Back in Puerto Princesa

Puerto Princesa is where most people will arrive when visiting the Philippines and heading to the island of Palawan. After a long exhausting journey we made it back here.

We would spend one night here before our final stop in the Philippines: a day in the capital, Manila.

We made it to our hotel in Puerto Princesa with low expectations. After all, we were staying in an Oyo hotel. Anyone familiar with Oyo most likely has a fair few stories to tell. And not positive ones. Sure enough, I’d had some terrible experiences with this brand before, mostly in India. But the budget options were scarce and this one had fairly positive reviews.

We were left pleasantly surprised.

We had an apartment to ourselves for a bargain $15. It was clean, spacious, and the receptionist was very friendly.

The Dodgy Part of Town

As the sun set I went out to grab some beers for us to drink in the apartment. The receptionist said there was a place a 30 second walk from the hotel. However, it came with a catch.

The dogs were very dangerous he said. They have a habit of attacking any unfamiliar characters and tend to be more aggressive after dark. Visiting the Philippines is not particularly dangerous, but stray dogs can be aggressive in much of Asia.

He gave me a large baton to take just in case the dogs came close.

I walked nervously to the mini shop and purchased some beers whilst keeping a very close eye on the dog standing 20 metres away.

Fortunately it didn’t seem interested in me and I returned to the hotel without incident.

On the other side of the hotel was a wall with barbed wire fences and the words “666 GANG” graffitied in big capital letters on the side.

We certainly weren’t in the nice part of town.

We retreated for the night, spent the following day in a shopping mall with little else to see, and headed to the airport ready for Manila.

The Overbooked Flight

Our flight came in the evening, and we made it to the airport with a few hours to spare.

After a while of waiting, there was an announcement.

The flight was overbooked. They wanted passengers to volunteer to surrender their seats in return for a compensation package.

After realising this meant little more than a free rebooked flight and a future ticket to use with Philippine Airlines, we decided against volunteering. After all, we were leaving the Philippines a day later with little desire to return any time soon. The ticket would be of little use to us.

Fortunately others must have volunteered and on the flight we went. Next stop: Manila.

Manila: Visiting the Philippines’ Capital

After a late arrival and using Grab to reach our hotel in Chinatown, we called it a night. Manila Chinatown incidentally, happened to be the oldest in the world. Yes, the world’s oldest Chinatown is not in China.

Just like in Cebu, we were unable to find a walking tour and did our own. Intramuros was the place we explored, and in all honesty there was little to do there.

If we received $1 for every tour guide who pestered us there however, we’d be knocking Elon off the top of the rich list.

As a general rule of thumb we avoid any salesmen who cold approach us in the street selling anything from taxi rides to tour guides. The costs are usually much higher, the people are much more likely to scam you, and there are no reviews to do your research on these characters beforehand.

We then explored a dodgy marketplace which reminded me of near where I was almost mugged in Quito. After cautiously exploring with phone firmly in pocket, we made Chinatown our last stop before the airport.

Manila isn’t the safest city in Southeast Asia, although Makati in the metropolitan area does make the list.

The Adventurous Restaurant

One particular restaurant caught our eye. There were a series of sea creatures in tanks ready to be purchased and cooked for consumption. Small sharks were being sold for 2,900 pesos (around $60). Perhaps the biggest shock of all was the stonefish. This highly venomous creature was also being sold as food. This could be deadly if even the slightest mistake is made whilst cooking. Even the most adventurous of foodies should swerve this one.

That was our final stop before we flew from Manila to Kuala Lumpur. And the airport staff still had time to confiscate my mosquito spray. Wrongly, it turned out. Although I did not know this at the time and therefore didn’t argue against it.

Final Thoughts on Visiting the Philippines

And so our time in the Philippines was over. What did we think?

A little underwhelming in all honesty. Cebu was cool, but not worth coming all this way for. Bohol was spectacular and the one place that made our trip here worthwhile.

El Nido was a disaster. I can try to look at it without the bias. But even in nice weather, I doubt it would’ve been particularly appealing. The beaches and islands are probably quite nice in the sun. However, as mentioned previously, somewhere like Southern Thailand or Ha Long Bay in Vietnam provides a much better alternative.

Puerto Princesa is boring. Little more than a transit stop. And Manila is nothing special.

The one that got away was Boracay. Maybe one day we will come back to explore more. But we certainly aren’t in a hurry.

If you’re considering visiting the Philippines, do so in the dry season. It will appeal more to beach and water lovers than anyone else.

Check out my destinations page for stories from other countries on my adventure to every country in the world.