As you might know I took a 10 day trip to the Philippines to meet the lovely Meaghan McGuire for an epic adventure that ended far too quickly. We decided if we ever went back, we'd need at least a month to truly enjoy all the amazing things that the Philippines offers.
We both arrived in Manila, a massive, hectic, bustling metropolis that has an amazingly diverse and intriguing culture.
Manila Bay is known for its amazing sunsets.
Jeepney's zoom down the streets. They are a lively, cheap way to travel.
But we only stayed one night in Manila, the next day we spent all afternoon searching for the overnight bus that would take us up north to the mountains and rice terraces. And after a less-than-pleasant 9+ hours on the bus, we were in the cool mountain air. We booked a room and then wandered around, we were in the heart of valley surrounded by meticulous rows of rice terraces, it was simply amazing.
These views are just a few minutes hike out of town.
We then hopped in a "trike," a dirt bike with a covered sidecar welded onto it, and cruised down the cliff-side road to the trailhead. We hiked for a good 6hours over, around, on, and through the rice terraces before reaching our destination of Batad.
This is one of the many "trikes" that whisk tourists and locals around the town.
I nearly had to drag Meaghan on this part of the hike, but we made it to the 30m waterfall.
Boasting perhaps the most striking of the terraces, Batad is simply amazing. This photo is the same area pictured as the map below.
You can also check out the Batad rice terraces on Google Maps!
And some more terraces near Banaue.
Banaue at night.
After two nights and 3 days of hiking and racing around the mountains in the side car of a trike, we were back on the night bus to Manila. When we arrived back in the heart of the city, we hopped on a bus to the port city of Batangas and caught a ferry to the island of Mindoro.
We got off the ferry in a little town called White Beach, and while their beaches were what you'd expect from the name, it also had a "Cancun-Mexico-spring-break-vibe" so we flagged down a trike and headed as far as we could down the coast. We found a nice little enclave of small lodges and restaurants and we threw our bags in the room and wasted no time finding a nice spot on the beach.
The ferry, a Bangka, from Batangas.
We stayed at a little place called Mengie's.
Chillin with the man himself.
Fortify the walls!
At least we left on a cloudy, grey day.
We spent the final night of our trip back in Manila, and all I can say is it all went too quickly! It was an awesome trip and if you are ever considering travelling to Asia, the Philippines has it all; wonderful food, amazing scenery, pristine beaches, friendly people, and most importantly it's cheap!
So now that I'm back in Daqing I'm teaching winter conversation classes. The last day of class we had an "American Food" unit so we made sandwiches, which, as you know is my specialty.
Kurtis makin the bacon for some BLT's
Yoyo dominating a sammy.
It snowed again here a week or two ago, another light dusting I got a glimpse of just how everything gets done around here.
A light dusting of snow.
No need for snowplows, brooms and plastic shovels will do. (This is on the main street in Yixi)
And one last thing, a shout out to Brett for the Chinese New Year card. Pretty epic dude.
It's the year of the DRAGON.
