Bohol

From Hong Kong, we took a flight directly to Cebu, which is the main hub for the Visayas island group. We haven’t met a person to this day, even the most adventurous and curious of our friends, who told us that Manila was an unmissable stop, so we decided to skip it entirely. From Cebu, you can travel on to other destinations via plane, boat, or, of course, car/bus.

We took a ferry to Bohol, one of the bigger holiday islands in the area, where most of the action happens in a kind of “annex island”, called Panglao. Our guesthouse was located in a little village a bit outside of the main tourist zone, which we enjoyed very much.

The first night was a bit rough because all dogs and roosters of the area seemed to have gathered in front of our window, but the next day we asked to be switched to a different room and it was beautifully quiet.

We had four full days, which is enough to explore the island’s main draws, and to get some relax time in as well. We spent one day exploring the Chocolate Hills and the Tarsier Sanctuary on Bohol island, the rest was dedicated to beaches and sunsets. You can certainly do more activities, including all sorts of day tours and diving, but hey, you need to acclimate a little. 🙂

We liked Bohol a lot, it was the perfect start to our stay in the Philippines. We enjoyed staying in Danao Beach as it gave us a bit of an insight into local life. Alona Beach is already very developed and completely taken over by tourists and the corresponding restaurants and bars. There is a lot of development and construction going on, so we think that in the coming years, tourism might increase even more. Here’s to hoping that this will happen in a sustainable way.

The beaches

Alona Beach

This is the main tourist area of the island. The beach was disappointing – too narrow, too crowded, with bars and restaurants literally glued to it (but they’re not even on the beach, just right behind it). There are some nice looking bars and restaurants, but we wouldn’t recommend to spend a full beach day here.

Danao Beach

The best beach for sunsets! We haven’t come here during the day, but it is probably quite nice and relaxing, though there is a lot of boat traffic, so swimming might not be great. There is one resort where you can have a drink and/or dinner with your feet in the sand, and a dive shop/bar which is very popular for sunset.

Dumuluan Beach

Our favourite by far! Once you make it through the parking lot and restaurant area, you are literally entering paradise. You pay a small entrance fee to the Dumuluan Beach Resort (around 50 cent per person, plus 50 cent for a scooter, more for bigger vehicles). The Bohol Beach Club looks like the most paradisiac place to stay, unfortunately a little too early for us to allow for this kind of splurge. There is a picnic area and a kiosk with a quite substantial choice of mostly Filipino food and snacks.

Activities

Chocolate Hills

This curious phenomenon of hills as far you can see is one of the main attractions on the island. They are brown(ish) in the dry season, which gave them their name. From Panglao’s beaches, it takes about 90 minutes to get there by scooter (and yes, your butt will hurt in the evening), but the ride is quite pleasant. Once arrived, there isn’t all that much to do. You pay a small fee of about 1€ per person and then you walk up some stairs to the view point. Then you’re done unless you want to leave your money in the restaurant or souvenir shop. 😉

For us, this was nice to see but not overwhelmingly exciting. On your way to or from the hills, you could stop in Loboc, which is known for its floating restaurants.

There’s also a few adventure parks, often with questionable animal shows in the area, but we stayed as far away from that as possible.

Tarsier Sanctuary

Tarsiers are tiny little primates, around the size of a fist, and they are the island’s mascot.

The Tarsier Conservation Centre close to the Chocolate Hills is known to treat tarsiers in a way that is very intrusive to their natural life style. They are nocturnal and extremely sensitive, to the point of becoming suicidal. Being touched by humans and being moved during daylight is very disturbing for them. Tarsiers are also territorial, so you shouldn’t cram to many in one confined area. The Tarsier Sanctuary in Cordella has a different approach. At our time of visit, they had 8 tarsiers living in natural conditions. In the morning, the guides go out to spot the tarsiers (just like when you go whale watching 😉 ). As they are nocturnal, they won’t move during the day. When we were there, the guides knew the whereabouts of 5 tarsiers. Visitors are supposed to be quiet and don’t come closer than 1m to the tarsier. They are guided through the centre in small groups. You can take excellent pictures, and the guides will be happy to help you. It costs about 1€/person to enter the centre, and the visit is quite quick (15 minutes or so). Our guide was really nice and helpful, but we still felt a bit rushed. Another group was right behind us – that’s a bit of a pity, as it was not that busy and they could have just let a few minutes between the two groups. However, this is for now the only place where you are sure to see a tarsier without harming them, so if you want to see one – and who wouldn’t – this is the place to go.

Food

Homecooked Meals

Driving around the island with our scooter, we spotted that some houses had a few pots and pans sitting on their veranda or on their kiosks. On our second day, we were hungry and curious enough to stop at a random house close to Dauin and sneeked a peek into the three pots. Score! One pan full of veggies, one with noodles, and one with meat. (It was already around 3pm, and a man stopping to buy cigarettes asked us if it wasn’t rather time for an afternoon snack than for lunch; had this been a working day for us, we would wholeheartedly agree.)

This first homemade meal will probably stay in our memory forever, it was definitely one of the most delicious things we ate so far in the Philippines. Ever since, we had usually at least one of those meals per day, sometimes in very small places with just three pots, sometimes in bigger places that are almost restaurants. We paid between 1 and 5€ for the both of us, depending on the location of the place (tourist area or not) and of course, the quantity. Besides being delicious, it’s also nice to choose exactly what you want, depending on your appetite at that moment. Don’t be shy to look into the pots and to ask questions. It already happened a few times that we had to drive away because there were no veggie options (left) – no issue here.

Shaka

Nice vegetarian/vegan restaurant/cafe in Alona Beach, with international dishes. We had a mango and red bean curry, the burgers also sounded delicious, as well as the breakfast bowls. 5-8€/person

Buzz Cafe

One of the many places directly on the beach, serving local and international dishes with organic ingredients. Good veggie options. We only had a drink and a snack.

Irene

Small restaurant in Alona Beach, serving local cuisine. Veggie options but make sure to specify that you don’t want meat. Julia ordered what she thought was a meat-free dish but it had a few small pieces of pork in it, so better double check when you order (that goes for all restaurants where the ingredients are not all written out in the menu). Around 4€/person.

Linaw Resort

This is part of the resort on Danao Beach. Very nice setting, especially the tables that are on the sand. Serves international and local cuisine. Veggie options, but most are Western cuisine. Food is very good, but would also be nice for a drink at sunset. 7€/person

Kiosk at Dumuluan Beach

We were quite surprised that this place by beautiful Dumuluan Beach (you pass by it when entering from the parking lot) served really nice food for a really good price. Nice veggie options, but again, definitely emphasise that you don’ want any meat. Around 4€/person

Sari-sari

Besides the obvious stands selling fruits and vegetables, you see a lot of houses that seem to have little kiosks in them (sari-sari). Next to our guesthouse, there were probably four of them in less than 2 minutes walking distance. As our guesthouse had a communal kitchen, we bought some eggs, bread and coffee in the morning and made our own breakfast. Super convenient and cheap (around 80 cents for 3 eggs, 2 sachets of instant coffee, and 2 bread rolls).

Where to stay

We stayed in Pahiluna Guesthouse in Danao Beach (around 30€/night). We liked Danao Beach because, while having a few hotels/guesthouses, it is an actual village that doesn’t just consist of restaurants and shops made for tourists. Danao Beach (see above) is just a few minutes walking away, but it’s definitely best to have a scooter (we would recommend that for anywhere on the island though, unless you really never want to leave a radius of 1km or so). We had a nice room with a comfortable bed, air conditioning worked really well and was super quiet. Would definitely recommend to ask for a room in the main house. The first night we stayed in a little bungalow across the street from the main house and while the comfort of the room is similar, it was very loud there (dogs and roosters). So unless you don’t mind that, invest those 5 or so euros per night for a quieter room. The owners are a lovely little family, who help out with anything you may need. They offer continental breakfast for around 3€ (or included in your roomrate). Scooter rental is around 8€/day. The communal kitchen is great, kitchen ware and condiments are available, as well as a large fridge.

If you plan to spend most of your time at the beach and don’t want to move around too much, try to find accomodation at Dumuluan Beach. If you want to have beach, restaurants, bars, and dive shops all in one place, Alona Beach is for you – as said above, just be aware that this is very much a tourist town and the beach is not the nicest.

Getting here

We took the ferry from Cebu to Tagbilaran (around 2h, 9€/person with Oceanjet).

To note is that both the ferry prices and procedures are a little random. You start with buying the ticket (obviously), and then, in no particular order, go through security, pay the terminal fee, and maybe check your luggage. In Cebu, we could keep our backpacks, but on our onward trip to Siquijor we had to check them (for a fee), despite the size of the boat being the exact same. The trip to Siquijor was more expensive despite being shorter.

From Tagbilaran, the guesthouse sent a car for the +/- 30min. ride to Panglao (10€; on the way back we took a tricycle, costs around 6€ and, at least on that early Saturday morning, wasn’t any slower than the car). Ferries come also from Dumaguete and Siquijor. There is an airport in Tagbilaran as well as in Panglao (who knows why there need to be two within 30km). The one in Panglao will soon open to international flights. We only ever noticed a couple of flights coming in in the morning during our stay (probably from Manila). Hopefully there won’t be dozens of daily flights coming in soon, as that will definitely get noisy.

---

Siquijor

As soon as we stepped on this little island, we fell in love with it. The tricycle ride to our hotel took us through a lush forest with wonderful views of the sea. The north of the island is so quiet, a few guesthouses, but no agglomerations of restaurants and bars. Only a few roosters and dogs, and the sea. It only takes a scooter to comfortably visit the island. You can travel around the entire island in one day without any problem. But do stay more than one day and enjoy the different corners of Siquijor: the quiet north, the busy south. The waterfalls and the beaches. We stayed four full days in Siquijor. Even less is enough to tick off the main attractions, but we could have easily stayed longer, enchanted by the easygoing vibe of the island, the secludedness of our hotel, and the delightful snorkelling. There are some more touristic zones, especially around San Juan, but compared to Panglao, everything is much more laid back.

Activities

Tubod Marine Sanctuary

You arrive there, unpack or rent your snorkel, drop your stuff, jump into the water and you are good to go. Only few metres after the beach, you find a paradise of coral and fish. You can make your way to the floating platform to sunbathe before coming back to the beach or just snorkle circles around this beautiful wonderland. Be careful with the coral – at low tide it gets quite challenging to swim around without touching it, so better to come at high tide. You have an entrance fee depending on your activity (snorkelling about 1€) and you can rent snorkelling gear (mask, tube and fins come to around 2€).

Paliton Beach

A wonderful little beach a few kilometres west of Tubod. Crystal clear water, but lots of algae. Coconuts are sold there, which is important to us, of course. 🙂 We heard people say that it can be very crowded. We were there in the afternoon and there were only a few other people.

Cambugahay Falls

You can bathe in these waterfalls close to Lazi – you can even jump in from the edge or, for the most adventurous, use the liana. There are a few people selling food, in case all the liana jumping makes you hungry. It’s not the place to sit down with a book or anything, but nice to see and definitely nice water to bathe in.

Balete Tree

So, there is a tree, and they built a restaurant and souvenir shop next to it. You need to pay for parking and entrance fee, but you can also see the tree for free from across the street. The only reason to pay for the entrance would be to access the fish spa, which for some reason is also there. But yes, the tree is very nice and very old.

Larena Triad Coffee

This could be under the food section as well, but we didn’t eat there. The view is amazing, and we were there on a rainy day!

Food

We had our dinners in our hotel, as we enjoyed the food and loved to sit on our little veranda in the evening.

Baha Bar

This a bit of a trendy tourist place, but the food is excellent. Both Filipino and Western cuisine. They grow their own vegetables and raise some of their meat. We wanted to go back for dinner but they were full, so reservations are recommended.

Carenderia De Seanlhyan

One of the “pots and pans” restaurants – delicious noodles and veggie dishes, as well as meat dishes. Also had a very tasty pastry filled with fresh coconut.

Where to stay

Major coup de coeur for our little family-run hotel, La Villa Alta! Five bungalows are nestled into the cliffs, just a few kilometres north of Larena (about 15 min by tricycle or scooter).

Here, you will find no luxury: bungalows of different sizes with different views (sea or garden), cold water showers (very common in Siqujor), a simple bedroom with fan, and a veranda. The garden is tended to with a lot of attention, there are a kitty and dog that belong to the property (as opposed to the dozens who run around anyway), and stairs lead you to a little private beach (good for snorkelling; if you need to rent equipment you can walk or drive to Kiwi Resort).

There is a restaurant where you can eat anytime during the day (last order at 8). All food we tried was excellent, homestyle fare. We paid 15€/night, breakfast is around 3€/person, lunch or dinner maybe a couple of euros more. You can rent a scooter from them, and if there is none available, they will call another provider for you. We loved the setting of this hotel so much. Just know that if you stay in this part of the island, you are about a 30-45min scooter ride away from the main tourist area around San Juan.

We spent our last night in just that area, as we had a very early boat ride the next day (stay tuned!), and we also enjoyed it. In Tagbalayon Lodge, you are less than 5 min. away from Tubod Marine Sanctuary (and from the Coco Grove Resort, which is where we took the onward boat), a walk or short scooter/tricycle ride away from restaurants and bars, and close by Paliton beach. The rooms have little terrasses, private bathrooms (cold shower) and very comfy beds. The owners are the same as the ones of Carenderia De Seanlhyan (see above), so check in there.

If your budget allows, it could be nice to try the Coco Grove Resort. We just organised our onward trip with them, and they were very welcoming and helpful. We saw that they have little sunbed huts for their guests at Tubod Beach – that’s probably one of the best reasons to stay there, as there is very little shadow. 😉

Getting here

We took a ferry from Bohol to Larena (there is also a port in Siquijor Town), which takes about 1.5h. It cost around 15€/person, including all fees (e.g. we were asked to check our backpacks, whereas from Cebu to Bohol, it wasn’t obligatory, see above). We then took a tricyle to our hotel just north of Larena. Tricycle drivers have a list of prices, so ask to see it before you get in the vehicle. Our trip cost around 3.50€. You can also take a ferry from Dumaguete to Siquijor.