Monday, October 25, 2010

Coron, Palawan Adventure Day 2

2nd day of adventure - Shipwrecks (Istangen and Lusong Gunboat), Calambuyan Island and Coral Garden

This is a cloudy day :( but it is also an advantage, at least I won't get a sunburn :) We have taken our breakfast on the Coron Village (part of our package deal; breakfast, lunch and snacks except on the first day); I ordered a danggit fish with egg; the danggit is not crispy and I wondered why, I just realized later that danggits here are not like tuyo (dried fish), hahaha! After breakfast, we prepared our suits for our tour and at around 9am the tour guide arrived and fetch us. We went to the seaport(?) and the boat is ready! Yeaah! Shipwreck and island tour!

First stop is in Istangen; Istangen is the name of the ship that sunk during the Japanese war here in the Philippines, we went to a island and I ask the tour guide what are we going to do on its seashore and they told us below that is the Istangen, hahaha!


From what I remember there are lots of sunken ships (during war) around Coron but there are only 2 out of 10 that can be seen while snorkeling and the others can only be seen if you are going on diving. You can see the sunken ship in spite of the rain and the water is clear and green! Snorkeled!


After Istangen, we went to Calambuyan Island; there, we had taken our lunch - tinola, porkchop, enseladang talong and adobong pusit, after taking our lunch we did some snorkeling again;


one of the tour guides assisted us, he swam bringing a lifevest and us clinging to that lifevest, hahaha!

After Calambuyan, we went to Coral Garden, as the name implies, there are lots of corals here, but unfortunately I didn't enjoy it much because it was raining while we are here, waaah! But I can still see the corals here! :D Snorkeling!


There are lots of large corals here!


Last stop for the day - Lusong Gunboat; another ship(? but why "Gunboat", lol) sunk during war time, still it was raining, but not heavy rain (ulanbon in tagalog, hehehe), what I like in this sunken ship is that you can step on it;


but they are not allowing to step to some parts of it because you can get wounded from it (its a metal, right???) :p


Returned to hotel :( took a bath on the hotel and ate dinner on the carinderia where we have taken lunch during our first day - pansit canton for 50php each, one order is actually good for two but it was cooked already so the other one was taken back to the hotel.... burp! Rest well!












Coron, Palawan Adventure Day 1

It is a 4days 3 nights package tour that we got from a travel and tours agency; flight via ZestAir at around 10am; around 45mins from Manila to Busuanga Airport; upon arriving from Busuanga Airport, somebody from another van let us rode with them because I think we were left by our tour guide due to our long(?) stay inside the restrooms (lol); from Busuanga Airport to Coron Town Proper it is around 45mins to 1 hour journey; stayed in one of the hotels - Coron Village Lodge Hotel. After getting to our room, we went out to search for some restaurants and found a carinderia (we were on tight budget here, hehehe) near the Coron Fire Station; ordered some papaitan and monggo - yummy! great taste! Went back to hotel and waited for the tour guide for our Mt. Tapyas climb, souvenir shops, city tour and Maquinit Hot Spring
The tour guide has finally arrived! First we went to a souvenir shop and bought some t-shirts and of course, souvenirs, it was a great thing we went here first because we won't be able to do shopping anymore because of our schedule.

After the souvenir shop we went to Mt. Tapyas. Mt. Tapyas has 724 steps; it is a great challenge while climbing it; I never thought that I will be consuming lots of water while climbing it! Fortunately, there are some kids that are selling Mineral Water and Gatorade; they will go with you while you are climbing. From the top of Mt. Tapyas, you will see the beautiful Coron, the landscape, the whole area, the great sea, wow! what a sight! My T-shirt is so wet due to my perspiration, hahaha! While going down I can feel my legs are trembling, hahaha!

After Mt. Tapyas we went to a shop that sells cashews for a cheap price (newly cooked); and we bought lots of it.

Then, we went to Maquinit Hot Spring, its water comes from a volcano below the sea (and not active anymore). You need to dip to the pool slowly, because it is around 36-40 degrees hot, wow, what a great feeling, its relaxing and the trembling of my legs were gone, wohaaa. Just don't stay there for too long, you will perspire, hehehe. Also, I hope they will remove the dogs on the said area :(

After that, we went back to the hotel and took a bath. We had taken our dinner on the Coron Village; they have their own bar and restaurant; ordered some sinigang na lapu-lapu and diningding; the sinigang is good but the diningding is not. After that, taken some paracetamol, hahaha! Just to be ready for the second day of adventure :D I don't want to be sick for the next adventures, hehehe!

Went back to hotel and sleep but around 2AM there was a brownout, grrrr.... (just be ready for this one, it's common because they have electricity and water crisis) after an hour the electricity is back again, aircon turned on again.... zzzzzz....