From Catford to Coron
To my dearest readers, welcome back to another long awaited blog installment. This year is a honeymoon special edition, so it’s going to be even better than ever. We’re in the Philippines! It has so much to offer and we’re really hyped for our itinerary. As usual there’s a long list of wildlife we probably won’t see, but plenty that we will. Most excitingly unlikely is the whale shark, biggest fish in the oceans (and, we assume, any other water based environments). There are endemic bird species, tarsiers and monkeys. So far a moray eel has snarled at me and a small pink fish attacked me. So… nature confirmed. Don’t worry, we’ll get on to Coron itself soon.
The Plan
“So, where the hell are you going?” I hear you ask. We have selected 4 islands that we believe to be the perfect mix of vibes, activity and beauty. Coron, Palawan, Bohol and Siquajor. Palawan (and Coron) is all boat tours and shipwrecks. Bohol has some serious nature, a bit more off the beaten path, and Siquijor is a sleepy island with a history of witches and black magic *gasp*! It’s the least touristed of the three – witches tend to have that effect.
“That all sounds well and good, Rowan, but can you tell me a bit more about the Philippines so I have contextual cultural insight into the blog narrative?” I thought you’d never ask:
The Philippines are named after King Philip II of Spain back in 16th century, when they were colonised by the Spanish for a fairly long tenure of 300 years. The Spanish could never quite hold on to all 6000+ islands, though. The Americans came next, holding onto The Philippines for about 40 years after an horrific war resulting in the deaths of over 250,000 Filipinos and some actions by the USA that make other dictators look friendly… If that weren’t enough, the Japanese occupied the Philippines during World War II, and though the US eventually won it back, they then gave (probably a generous term) Philippines their independence in 1946. So they’ve been through a fair bit in recent history, the Filipinos. Just to make it a bit more traumatic, the Philippines are located on the Ring of Fire, so enjoy some seismic activity – there are currently 23 active volcanoes in the country! Lastly, it’s worth mentioning that the Philippines is an extremely biodiverse country, indeed earning the title ‘Megadiverse’. I believe it has the highest rate of endemism, globally, if that’s the kind of stat that tickles your fancy.
Days -2 to -1:
The journey was uneventful but the highlights are listed in the bullet points below so we can get on with the proper blog aka the play by play:
– We departed on the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. Satisfying.
– From Catford to Coron (our first proper stop), the journey took a total of 32 hours and comprised of 3 flights. Not satisfying.
– I ate 6 large Chinese meals in an 18 hour period. Satisfying.
– Waking up above Mongolia to a frozen mountainscape was awe inspiring.
Day 1 – Coron
Ahhh, flying into Coron was an excellent feeling. So verdant and hilly and wondrous. I thought it would be a perfect spot for some buried treasure, pirating or perhaps a hidden Bond villain’s lair a la Goldeneye. That, mingled with the feeling of actually making it there was pure elation. “I’m a bit obsessed already” I confessed to Billie as the wheels hit the tarmac.
Shortly after our blessed first blast of proper heat (Beijing was icy and our arrival to Manila was at night) we were in a van haring it to our hotel. The dogs here don’t have a huge survival instinct – several times on our journey to the hotel did we encounter a dog lying in the road. Too lazy to move, the van swerved round it without slowing down, the wheels passing inches from decapitation. The dog slept on… the van drove on.
We’d just travelled our little socks off, with minimal sleep at all the wrong times for proper acclimatisation of course, so we didn’t plan to do anything other than try to right ourselves. We did have a massage which claimed to be worth 4 hours of sleep (a good lie) and read our books by the pool for an hour or so. I even snapped my first bird of the holiday, at our hotel.
The hotel itself is very nice. The Asia Grand View Hotel indeed has a view worth talking about. It’s a bit of an upmarket option, but this is the first stop of our honeymoon after all! There are sunbirds in the trees next to the hotel restaurant looks out over the bay. Dreamy!
With much gusto we got a tricycle into ‘Coron Town Proper’ (as it’s actually known, including on Google maps) for lunch at a rather well rated spot. This is where things started to go downhill… Billie was self-confessed out of it, and talking a bit of nonsense really. I was happily ordering everything on the menu, the food was incredible.
With Billie already out for the count, it might have been inappropriate to so brazenly order a 2nd beer whilst stuffing myself with pork satay, but that I did. As we left the restaurant, the tiredness wave hit me hard too, and we were staggering dazed to find a tricycle from Coron back to our cushty hotel. I claimed I simply had to nap, which was strongly against the rules we’d set ourselves earlier on the day, which was to stay awake till evening no matter what. Billie convinced me a swim would wake me up; the fact I pulled my pants down in plain view of the main hotel building & restaurant without second thought while getting changed might have been a sign this was a bad idea. After a couple of minutes in the pool I dramatically announced I was going to fall asleep in the pool and drown and there was nothing I could do but nap. So I did, and so did Billie. We managed to stagger out once more for dinner, later, but it was straight back to bed afterwards.
Day 2 – The SUPER ULTIMATE boat tour
The SUPER ULTIMATE boat tour was on Christmas day, which also happens to be our engageaversairy and also what we consider the first PROPER day of our honeymoon, so we wanted it to be pretty special and so paid a few extra quid for it to be private. Worth it! At 8am we were whisked off to the port by our tour guide and ushered onto our boat amid many a Merry Christmas. We had a guide, a captain and a cook on board with us. The cook had his own kitchen on the fairly small boat!
This is a must-do Coron activity. We whizzed along the calm ocean on our very cool boat. Our guide, Carlos, insisted we take cheesy photos on the front of it, almost akin to our wedding photographer’s demands. We abided by this in a bid to befriend him but lost some dignity in the process. Concerningly he took some ‘for the company’ too so god knows where they end up.
Our first stop was Barracuda Lake. Were not sure why it’s called that; we’re fairly sure there aren’t any barracuda in there… It’s a fantastic lake reminiscent of a cenote. 25m deep of 70% fresh 30% salt water, it is surrounded by incredible rock formations that are ridiculously beautiful. We jumped in, we swam and we failed to free dive, but it was lovely.
Back on the boat and to the twin lagoons! This was a full on swim in and my GoPro had died so no proper pics, but again we’re talking incredible rock formations jutting out of azure waters. Gorgeous.
The morning was not yet done – on we went to a snorkel site where we saw loads of healthy coral, tonnes of fish and a moray eel which snarled at me viciously. It was marvellous. However, this may have been the moment we became sunburnt.
Onwards to a public beach on a tiny spit or land where loads of boats were moored up. There was a man on a tiny little canoe going round selling drinks and snacks that our crew called the 7/11 with big grins on their faces. It was only 11am, but it WAS Christmas, our engageaversairy and the first day of our honeymoon, so we had a beer and bought some for the crew too. They were only 50p so don’t exalt our generosity too much folks.
We then tootled on to a private beach (with plenty of other people there so not sure what the distinction is, really) where we were served a most amazing Christmas lunch in the most amazing setting. I’ll let the pictures do the talking:
Onward forth to Kayangan lake! We had to walk up some steps to a viewpoint which was very sexy – sexy enough to be the blog title pic – and then down the stairs to the lake itself. Similar to Baraccuda, we’re talking big cliffs and clear water. We floated around in it for 30 minutes, drinking in the scenery and sun.
Our final stop was Siete Pecados (7 islands) referring to 7 tiny islands (or very, very large rocks) jutting out of the sea and surrounded by coral reefs. Despite some strong currents in places, Carlos navigated us to some amazing snorkelling, with the coral teeming with life. It was while serenely drifting above coral, that a fish swam into my mask at high speed. I put it down to a somewhat disconcerting error of judgement on the fish’s part… until it swam into my leg. I turned around and it was repeatedly trying to bite my flippers – it was only a few inches long and it was a lovely pale pink. I swam on and was left alone. On the way back to the boat, I can only assume we passed the exact same bit of coral as I saw the fish swimming towards me from the distance. When we got close it suddenly aimed at my mask and swam full pelt into it again! Definitely trying to kill me – not sure what I did to upset it so, but I did swim away a bit faster than I normally might have.
And so ended our tour, at about 4pm – a full 8 hours of ocean exploring, towering cliffs and refreshing dips. It was an amazing way to spend Christmas (and our engageaversary). What a start to the honeymoon!
Day 3 – Wreck Diving
Interestingly, we somehow managed to be jet lagged to a different time zone than the UK. We’ve met a few Brits now who can’t get to sleep till the middle of the night, but we can’t stay awake past 9pm and find ourselves wide awake at 4am. Our way is more conducive to the early starts, and so we arrived at the dive centre VERY chipper at 8am, ready to see us some wrecks. Our boat consisted of a Englishman, an Irishman and a Japanese woman. I’m not sure where the joke is going, but it feels like we’re building up to something?
Our divemaster, Jan, was a local Filipino man who has been diving for 17 years. Very friendly, very confidence inspiring. Today we would dive three Japanese shipwrecks. If you were paying attention earlier, you will remember that the Japanese occupied Philippines, then part of USA, during WW II. Well, they had a supply fleet hiding in a bay near Coron and some US bombers found them and blew em all to smithereens, both helping the war effort and simultaneously securing Coron as a wreck diving haven for years to come.
The first dive was ‘East Tangat’ wreck. Visibility was bad, the wreck somewhat uninspiring and while fish, not what we’re used to from our admittedly very spoilt history of diving. We got out, a bit concerned the hype wasn’t real…
Remaining positive, we were in the water again an hour later for Morazan Maru, a 93 meter long cargo ship. Well… this was a different story… we were the only divers there (till right near the end of our dive) and the wreck was massive! We swam through the bridge and various decks and corridors. It sent a shiver down my spine, swimming through it. The wildlife was great too – we saw Lionfish, Oysters who would slam shut if you got close or shined a torch on them, spotty grouper and the fantastically named juvenile harlequin sweetlips. We got out and were immediately gushing about how amazing the dive and wreck were. A memorable one for sure!
The third and final dive was a hybrid wreck & reef dive: the Lusong Gunboat. A smaller boat at approx 30m, this was another great dive. What was particularly nice was that you could actually see the whole boat at once, giving a great impression of the boat itself in the environment. Beyond this, the coral on and around it was epic. We saw electric clams, which appear to spark with electricity when a torch is shined on them (it must be seen to be believed), nudibranchs, clownfish galore and a big ugly crocodile fish, among many others!
We were extremely pleased and settled in for an hour’s boat back to Coron. So tired we were, it was a miracle we made it back to bed after dinner in town! Keeping this level of fantastic activity up will be neigh on impossible – what a start to the holiday!
Day 4 – Birding the Camayan Creek Kingfisher Preserve, Coron
During days 1-3 in Coron, I did my classic Google search of ‘birding in name of place’ and deep dived beyond the lists of which birds could be seen to the good stuff. Where to see the BEST birds. I discovered two names ‘Camayan Creek Kingfisher Preserve’ and ‘Erwin Edonga’. The former, a location that a few of bird photographers said was simply unbeatable, with pictures of kingfishers and other exotic birds aplenty to prove it. They all named their guide as Erwin Edonga. The location itself doesn’t come up anywhere and nobody outright gives directions, though I managed to triangulate a general area for it based on some of the birders giving their travel times to it from their various hotels (my guess was SPOT ON fyi). In the comments section on one of these blogs, I found a phone number for Erwin and also his son ??! I messaged Erwin to no response. I messaged his son in a moment of weakness… nothing. I found Erwin on Facebook, downloaded messenger and sent him a message on Christmas Day, so desperate was I. Not a peep from the Edonga family. My last attempt was to message a tour company who referenced Erwin on their website in a blog post of theirs. Amazingly, they said they’d reach out for me and, despite not being able to give a tour as they were busy, sent someone free of charge to guide us to the creek, and then endorse us to Erwin who lives there, and ask him to give us a tour. Remarkably, it all worked. The person even wrote Erwin a handwritten letter that the guide gave to him upon arrival. It was incredible. And so we spent about 4 hours of Day 3 with Erwin, looking at birds.
Any twitcher worth their salt knows that birds like water. On all our adventures, without fail, the best birding spots are waterholes. This creek has a river running through it, and that’s what brings in the birds, most excitingly, three types of kingfisher. The blue collared, the ruddy and, my favourite, the rufous-backed. This was what I wished to photograph the most, though I was extremely excited for all the other birds too!
The preserve is owned by a bird photographer who bought the land the creek is on, buying more bits of it as and when he can afford. Erwin is the caretaker. None of it seems to be for major touristic profit, but rather to preserve the birds’ habitat and share their beauty with those who might appreciate it. Good stuff!
The first three hours passed wonderfully, we photographed many birds at various feeding stations he had setup as well as walking around the local area down the roads. Erwin had incredible eyes and would see a bird sitting still in a tree thirty meters away, seemingly impossibly. Billie, as usual, was very good with her eyes, spotting a few that Erwin missed even. I believe Erwin was impressed. Despite my laser eye surgery, I spent most of the day saying “where? I don’t see it” and understandably so, I think you would agree if you were there.
I love the small colourful birds the most, but seeing a goshawk was very cool, too. Erwin spotted it from someone’s driveway, about 150m away in a tree just sitting there, completely still – another impossible spot! We then went back to the feeders and my excitement grew for some kingfisher activity. Alas, none were there on the prepared perches above the river, so he suggested we go birding, something I thought we were already doing!
What he meant was that we go out there and stalk ourselves a kingfisher. He led us along the creek through undergrowth – surely the perfect place for a snake, a concerning thought that kept repeating while I carefully placed my sandal-clad feet… We were crossing a makeshift bridge across the creek when I heard a high pitched call and a whizz of red flew past me. “There!” I whisper-shouted and saw it land above the river on a perch. It was indeed what I wanted to see most: a rufous-backed kingfisher. I raced to take snaps and simultaneously tell Billie where to find it. After a few moments it flew off and I was disappointed to find my camera had focused on a branch in front of the bird. It was perfectly visible, but not the picture I wanted. I was bolstered, though, that they were around and we had seen one.
Erwin led us back to the feeding spot. It was 10.30 and we’d agreed to stay till 11 as, realistically, there’s only so much time on a honeymoon you should really spend birding…
No joke, at 10:59 Erwin urgently whispers for me to go to him and, there it was, a bit further up the river, a rufous-backed kingfisher again! This time, I managed in-focus snaps. It was very dark and the bird was far away, so my camera struggled to get truly sharp images, but I love the feeling of the final image below. It’s such a colourful bird, and stands out so well from the somewhat bleak surroundings, it’s comical beak jutting out.
We parted ways with Erwin who said “If you want to find me, my name is Erwin Edonga… on the internet” as if I hadn’t spent the last several days stalking him and desperately trying to contact him to absolutely no response. He also gave me his mobile number which was completely different to the one I found online… Who knows what’s going on there! He could have an amazing tourism business if he wanted – but maybe the way it is is best for him and the birds.
So we spent a great morning doing that and I felt that while it wasn’t quite like diving through an old warship, it was another winning day of the holiday, doing something truly unique and exciting, something most people don’t know exist.
We were aware that we’d hardly had time to read our books or relax or anything like that! So we decided to spend the remainder of our time in Coron doing just that – interspersed with delicious meals and beer, of course!
What an essay! It’s been an action packed few days in Coron, so loads to write about. It’s been fun to be back on the old blogging again. We’re on the way to El Nido now which promises many more water based activities.
Shoutout to Liz, surely our biggest non-family blog fan. We love you Liz!