Philippines

All three above Puerto Galera

Floating bar Puerto Galera

Two above - Boracay - beach in front of our room

View from our room

Tania outside room Boracay

All above Boracay

Gratuitous girls for Bill!

Filipino house

Scallop feast - who ate all the scallops!

Not all our rooms are luxurious!

Rice Paddies

Our room at Takatuka

The cave at Takatuka!

Sunrise from our room in Bais

Bais- our 'hotel' is the one with high pitched roof

View from room at Bais

Dolphin watching Bais

Basking!!- Is that a dolphin!!

Sorry for the delay since the last blog-very busy doing not much here!

Most of the past month we have spent on various beaches with a lot of rain as it is definitely monsoon season now in Philippines, so photos all much the same. After Palawan we took a flight back to Manila and then made our way to Puerto Galera which is basically a dive resort. Unfortunately it was full of older men with young filipino girls and the bars were basically go go bars which I quite enjoyed and was out every night but did not appeal to Tania! Only point of note here was that a boat travelling across the same stretch of water that we were planning to travel across the day after, back to Batangas, went down killing twelve people on board. Although it was reported widely here I only saw a quick mention on BBC news probably because it was full of filipinos on a w/e break rather than westerners. The area was still patrolled by coast guards with floating debris when we went through the following day-you can imagine how we felt. After returning to Manila we flew to Boracay and found a great place right on the beach which was basically a private house owned by an English couple. We had ten days there, five before the English couple left to return to England for the English summer. I think they must have known something because after they left the weather changed and we had five days of solid wind and rain!! Boracay was beautiful however and one of the nicest islands we have been with lovely beach, all you can eat buffets with oysters, clams, roast pork, various stews etc for 3 quid. Good nightlife also-see gratuitous photos of filipino girls just for Bill! Since Boracay we have been island hopping trying to avoid the rainy weather which now seems to have got into a pattern of sunny mornings and rainy afternoons. We met a nice filipino girl in Iloilo who invited us back to her house to meet family and see the rice paddys. We were made a nice traditional lunch and after being driven around the area we found a lady selling a shellfish which was a cross between scallops and mussels at the side of the road- 40 pence a kilo!! We had four kilos between us but apparently one man earlier had eaten that on his own! They were very nice! After three days in the rain on Guimaras island the weather improved slightly and we spent two days at a very bizarre Swiss run resort called Takatuka in Sipalay on Negros. There were about seven rooms all done in different styles-one like a flinstones cave all psychedelic colours. Our room was called Madmix! and looked like it had been designed by Mole for his brother Mick! It had water coming from an upside down wc for the shower, light switches were hidden as a trigger of a drill or such like. The windows were all out of level with incredible colour everywhere. The owners were very nice and although the beach wasn't as good as described in Lonely Planet we had a nice time. After this we spent 3 days in a place called Bais which was very relaxing. Again it was a private house but this time filipino owned-more like a b and b. Our room was on stilts overlooking the bay and we were able to watch the sunrise every morning from our bed! We went for a boat trip to watch the dolphins on one day and had home cooked food- all very cheap as well. It was hard to tear ourselves away but we moved on to another dive resort-Moalboal where we have just left today. This was also nice with a pool and reef just in front of our bungalow. Now in Cebu and staying one night before leaving for Malapascua island in the north and then to Manila and our next flight to Bangkok.