Do-It-Yourself Bicol Roadtrip (Part 2): 5 Things To Do in Albay

We checked in at Balmar Hometel at Daraga, Albay. The Hometel is owned by my friend's auntie. The rate is 435 pesos per head. We were 6 in the room. There were 3 beds and one bathroom. It’s relatively roomy for 6 people. You can reach them at (02)3462973 or 0906-591-0785 or 0932-879-1791.

Here are 5 things you can do in Daraga and Legazpi, Albay:

1. Take a pic with the glorious Mayon Volcano

It’s not a Bicol Roadtrip without a picture with the magnificent-looking Mayon Volcano. It’s a perfect-coned volcano that really needs no further introduction.

2. Visit Landmark Places - Daraga Church and Cagsawa Ruins

Daraga Church or Nuestra Señora de la Porteria Church (Our Lady of the Gate) is located in the municipality of Daraga, Albay. It’s a beautiful old church with the view of the grand Mayon Volcano.

Cagsawa Ruins are the remnants of a Franciscan Church and a reminder of the most violent eruption of Mayon Volcano. Today it stands as one of the most famous landmarks in Bicol. The glorious content of postcards from the region.

3. Go cam-whoring in Misibis Eco Park

I don’t know if this place could be reached by public transport. The place is an hour drive from the center of Legazpi. The place looks amazing! I would have loved to spend more time here but we needed to leave early. Entrance fee in Misibis Eco Park is 25 pesos per person.

Misibis Amphitheater

 

Misibis Church

Note: The Misibis Bay is different from the Eco Park. Misibis Bay is a luxury resort and a few-minute walk from the Eco Park.


4. Try Bicol Delicacies

Of couse, you must try Pinangat! Some say it’s different from Laing; some say they’re the same. I’m confused, really. All I know is that from someone who hails from Camarines, Norte, the Pinangat I tried in Legaspi was the best. Visit Dad’s Special Pinangat. It’s cheap and delicious! And don't forget to try Bicol Express.

We visited 1st Colonial Grill. The food was okay. It’s the ice cream you should try. They were legit flavored-ice creams. We tried these flavors: gabi, sili, pili, tinutong na kanin, kamote, malunggay, cucumber, salabat and kalamansi. They were all worth a try. My favorite was pili ice cream. It tastes like an ice cream I’ll buy everyday and I just really love pili when used in desserts.

Try the streetfood as well! Here we were on the streets near Pacific Mall, Legazpi.


5. Enjoy the scenery

Support our local tourism industry. Visit the Bicol Region! 

Do-It-Yourself Bicol Roadtrip (Part 1): Burias Island, Masbate

Note: This is the first part of a two-part blog of our 3-day Bicol (Masbate and Albay) Roadtrip.

Getting to Burias Island, Masbate

I would have loved to share how to get there by commuting, but we traveled by car. If you’re commuting, there are buses that will take you to Naga. Less heavy traffic, it takes 8 hours to get there from Manila. From the terminal, take a jeepney to get to Pasacao Port. For a more detailed way on how to get to Pasacao, visit Lakwatsero Blog.

If you’re bringing a car, you can leave it in Pasacao Port for 6 pesos per hour. We left ours there for 33 hours (forgive the rhyme).

From Pasacao Port, Naga, we took a lantsa/boat to get to Burias Island, San Pascual. The boat ride takes two (2) hours. Fare is 80 pesos per person. Burias, San Pascual is where the Tourism Office is located, but that’s not really where the activities are concentrated. In the Tourism Office, you would have to pay:

Environmental Fee - 50 pesos per person
Usage Fee - 10 pesos per person

SOMBRERO ISLAND

Tip: Water and food are expensive on Sombrero Island. If you’re tight on the budget, you can eat first in Burias before traveling and checking in at Sombrero. We also bought our drinking water in Burias because they said water was expensive, but we bought one and the price was regular.

I think the accommodation in Sombrero Island is relatively new. They have a lot to improve on their services. I would have preferred that they inform guests upon checking in of all the fees that have to be paid. I honestly didn’t know who was in charge of the place. I think a small community handles the guests, but it’s hard to tell who’s the point person. On a positive note, they’re pretty chill and they pretty much leave you alone.

Maybe the services were like that because they’re not used to people checking in on the cottages. You can just pay the entrance fee and set up a tent. There are comfort rooms and you just have to pay 50 pesos per gallon of water. There’s also a karinderya (small store) for your other needs. Burias Island is unspoiled and raw so don’t expect to get pampered.

This is what we spent on Sombrero Island:

Entrance - 30 pesos for 6 people
Cottage - 3000 pesos (accommodated 6 people)
Extra drum of water - 300 pesos
Food* - refer below

PROS AND CONS

Note: There is no alternative accommodation on Sombrero Island.
The cottage was big enough for 6 people. It has one bathroom. It was a comfortable stay despite a lot of missing amenities.

CONS

I do hope that they no longer ask for an entrance fee when you’re about to check in on one of their cottages. That doesn’t make sense to me. But again, I think they’re really just used to people spending overnight on their tents; hence, the entrance fee.

I was okay with 3,000 pesos for a small cottage for 6 of us for 24 hours. What was not okay was there were just 2 pillows and no blankets.

They have a problem with electricity supply because of a typhoon so the power supply is cut off half of the day (from 6 AM to before it’s dark -- if I remember it right).

They also have a problem with water supply. They get their water all the way from Burias. So if you consume your 1 drum of water included in your cottage fee, you would have to pay an additional 300 pesos for another drum.

MAJOR PRO

All criticisms aside, Sombrero Island has an amazing view, shore line, water, sand, and vibes. It is unspoiled and raw and really beautiful. Only a few people were on the island when we visited. There was a huge young group who were there with us, around 20 of them, but even then the island didn’t look crowded. I would come back, really. I think all my criticisms are due to the fact that they don’t have a lot of people managing the area. Also, they have a water and power supply problem because of their remote location. The fact that there were people accommodating you is already a big plus for tourism. If you don’t want to spend as much, bring a tent. Anyway, I like the chill vibe as always. You just check in, take care of yourself and enjoy.

ISLAND HOPPING

Supposedly, from Burias, you start your island hopping, but we opted to go straight to Sombrero Island to leave our things and freshen up. Because of this change, we were asked to pay an additional 500 pesos on top of the 4,000 pesos we had to pay for the boat ride services. The amount covers the travel from Burias to Sombrero Island and then back, and the island hopping. There were 2 persons (Kuya Bernardo and Kuya Yolando) in charge of our motorized boat and they stayed with us the entire time - around 28 hours.

We just went to 2 islands. Our priority was Animasola, and it was a little far from Sombrero. I think the boat ride took us more than an hour. It was worth it. The rock formations are amazing. We had our lunch there (we brought our own lunch).

Part of Animasola Island 

Then we went to the Tinalisayan Sandbar. By the time we got there, it was high tide so we didn’t see any sandbar.


We returned to Sombrero, had some booze fix, swimming, dinner, more booze, then capped off the night lounging on the sand and under the stars. We left early morning to catch our 9 am boat ride from San Pascual to Pasacao Port.


SUMMARY OF COST

Boat Services
For Island Hopping - 4,500 pesos for 6 of us (usual rate is 4,000)
Tip - 300 pesos
*Food - 120 pesos per person per meal.

Kuya Bernardo, one of the kuya’s in charge of our boat was in charge of our food. I don’t know if you can order food from Sombrero people, but when we needed dinner and breakfast, Kuya Bernardo took care of it. So our payment for boat services included food.

Tourism Fees
Environmental Fee - 50 pesos per person
Usage Fee - 10 pesos per person

Lantsa from Pasacao, Naga to Burias, San Pascual - 80 pesos per person, one way

Sombrero Island
Entrance - 5 pesos per person
Cottage - 3000 pesos (accommodated 6 people)
Extra drum of water - 300 pesos

Others
Pasacao Port Parking - 198 pesos for 33 hours
Toll, back and forth - 572 pesos
Gas (for our entire Bicol Trip) - 3,000 pesos

* * *

Thanks for reading! Enjoy your trip!

Mt. Pamitinan Travel Guide

How to Get to Brgy. Wawa, Rodriguez Rizal

Our meet up place was in McDo, Kia Theater, Cubao. We walked our way to Farmers Market to ride a van going to Rodriguez, Rizal. Fare is 50 pesos per person.

From where you'll alight, you can just ride a tricycle or jeepney to get to Brgy. Wawa.  In our case, we rented the same van for 330 pesos for a special trip to get to Brgy. Wawa. There were 11 of us.

Once you arrive, you would have to sign up, fill in a waiver and pay the environmental fee of 2 pesos per person in Brgy. Wawa/Tourism Office. You would be assigned a tour guide. In our case, there were 11 of us in a group. We were assigned 2 tour guides, Kuya Tomas is the main one, and Kuya Jimmy was his auxiliary.

It’s the Cliiiiiiiimb!

We started the trek at around 9AM. Pretty late compared to those who arrive when the sun was not yet up. This bridge will be the start of your trek.

The trail is very beginner-friendly, but don't be fooled... it's still pretty challenging. 

For rock climbing enthusiasts (and daredevils I must say), there's this part where you can rock climb.

There's a part near halfway the trail where you can rest and buy buko or melon juice for 15 pesos per cup.

It took us two and a half hours to get to the summit. I think we were slower than regular. It was a combination of a lot of factors, like there was actually a lot of people hiking during that time. Di lang sa Manila uso ang heavy traffic. Some of the paths were really narrow so we did a lot of waiting for other people to pass.

Summit 1

We reached summit one, had our lunch, waited for our turn to take pictures. The group before us --- I think they were more than 10 in a group --- took a long time to take their pictures. One of them maybe had 10 poses. We waited, I think, for 30 minutes. We were very patient and even cheered for them when they make their poses, may it be awkward or more awkward. :)

When it was our turn, we took just 1 to 2 shots each. We were very sensitive to those other groups waiting in line, knowing that our group was pretty huge. Unfortunately for us, the group after us were an impatient bunch. Anyway, they didn’t rain on our parade. We left and went to the second summit.

Second Summit

Fro the second summit, you have to use a rope to get to the top. We chose not to get to the second summit. The sun was really high at that point. It was past 12 noon. The lines were long. And we just couldn’t wait any longer, knowing that the group before us in the first summit was also waiting in line, and there was another huge group currently taking their pictures. We left and started our descent. Boo! But honestly, summit 1 was more than enough for me. The view is almost the same.

We started our descent. We took a different route going down. It took us another 2 1/2 hours to descend. This was where we exited.

Here’s some Wawa Dam pictures.

 
How our day went (these are approximations)

Departure from Cubao	6:45 AM
Arrival at Brgy Hall	8:30 AM
Finished Registration*	9:00 AM
Start trek	9:00 AM
Summit	11:30 AM
Finished with lunch, photo op	1:00 PM
Start Descent	1:00 PM
Arrival at Brgy Hall	3:30 PM
Departure from Rizal (after bath)	4:30 PM
Arrival at Cubao	6:00 PM

Note: We were relatively slow in pace. Read other blogs and you’ll know you can do this trip way faster than we did. We were just really taking our time.

*It took us a long time to register. The lines were long. And also, they ran out of barangay-registered tour guides (yung may ID as the locals say) so we had to do some waiting and convincing for some people to be our tour guide for the day.


COST

Van fare, Cubao to Rodriguez, Rizal (and back to Manila)	50 pesos each
Rodriguez Rizal to Brgy. Wawa	10 pesos trike/jeep*
Environmental Fee	2 pesos each
Brgy donation	Any amount**
Melon/Buko juice (optional of course)	15 pesos each
Tour guide	We paid 500 pesos each tour guide***
Bath (again, optional)	25 pesos each

* In our case, we rented the same van for 330 pesos for 11 people
**We gave 100 pesos. We’re generally generous, plus there were a lot of us.
*** We always pay 500 pesos per tour guide wherever we go. But according to other blogs, 400 pesos per tour guide is the usual rate. Just make an additional pay if you're doing a twin hike to Mt. Binacayan. 

Going home, we rented the same van we rode going to Rodriguez, Rizal, then Brgy. Wawa. If you want to do the same, just get the kuya driver's phone number and talk to him about picking you up from Brgy. Wawa to Cubao.We paid kuya driver 1000 pesos. 

Hope you find this post useful!  Good luck on your next hike! Please be extra careful. And enjoy! Please remember "to leave nothing but footprints and take nothing but pictures".  Let's all do our part to make sure that other people, especially the next generation, will get to enjoy this adventure.

3-Day Stay in Low-key Mindoro (Bongabong & Bulalacao)

For this year’s sembreak, we sailed to Mindoro. Well, we didn’t really ‘sail’. But unlike our usual roadtrips, this time we were mostly traveling by water. A welcomed first for our law school #squad since we usually travel north to the boondocks.

Mindoro trip satisfied more than I expected. It’s the kind of vacation I needed. Satiated my wanderlust. Relaxed my stressed mind.

First RoRo Trip Ever

It was APEC week in Manila (and I honestly didn’t want to be a part of all the crazy). We left Tuesday night, right before the start of the declared holiday. We departed from Manila 7pm and arrived in Batangas at 10pm. Reina Delas Flores of Montenegro Lines departed past 10:30 pm.

It was my first time on board a RoRo. I did expect to get scared since I fear being in the middle of the ocean, or space, or anything endless really. But the whole ride was okay. I didn’t get sea sick or scared. Just a little anxious at first. The RoRo trip lasted for 3 hours.

Inside RoRo Pilot House

My friend, Cindee, befriended the officers manning the vessel. We stayed in the Pilot House (or Bridge as they call it abroad). There were two officers there who explained to us the different apparatus they use. I remember the radar and forgot everything else. Very educational really. For a first-timer, a visit to the Pilot House was pretty spectacular.





Day 1 in Bongabong, Oriental Mindoro 

We arrived in Calapan, Mindoro around 2am. Since we were starving, we stopped at this roadside eatery. They serve goto, mami and bibingka. They also give salabat for free. That was the nicest salabat I tasted. Their goto was different. It looked more like papaitan, but really delicious. I would probably be looking for this goto one of these days after a booze fix. Their bibingka was simple and tasty and cheap. We ordered 7 gotos and 4 bibingkas. It only cost us 280 pesos all in all. 

By the way, the couple who run this gotohan sent their 3 children to school using their income from this small business. So a plea to all travelers who care to listen: when you go to the provinces, spend your money on these small businesses. They need and deserve it more.

We drove from Calapan to Bongabong.

Our first day in Bongabong, Mindoro was pretty laid back. We just rested, talked, ate and ate some more. Thank you to Cindee Guno's family for their warm welcome and for spoiling us. 

The latter part of the day was spent on Lito Camo’s beach house, which he offered for free. Thanks to Niño Liwanag for arranging this accomodation for us and for accompanying us on most of the places we visited. 

Lito Camo's Beach House

We capped off the night lying by the beach, chatting, looking at the stars -- one of my favorite parts of this trip. 

Day 2 in Bulalacao, Oriental Mindoro 

We woke up at 4am to start our day.We traveled to Bulalacao by car, had a brief courtesy call with the Bulalacao Mayor. He arranged for our boat ride for our island hopping. Again. For free. A lot of freebies for this trip.

Island Hopping. By island hopping, we mean 2 islands. The islands are separated a little far from each other. And we didn’t get to go to the other islands because of the huge waves that day.

Aslom Island. There’s nothing much on this island. It’s actually mostly privately owned and still under construction. We were still allowed on some parts however. It was windy here. I can imagine a lot of water activities, like windsurfing, that travelers may patronize. We just had our lunch there and left. 

Aslom Island

Tambaron Island. This is the highlight of our trip. We were the only ones in Tambaron (except for the caretakers of course). Imagine an entire island all to yourself. It was beyond words. The pictures cannot capture the serenity that this island has left me. 

We were accommodated by Tambaron Green Beach Resort. (See below for cost and contact details)

You can go to the other side of the island by trekking for 15 minutes or so, or you can go there by boat. It is as beautiful. I don’t know if there are accommodations available on the other side. We just had our photo op and went back.

Tambaron Island

You can go swimming and boating in Tambaron. Here’s a picture of my friends as I watch them own that part of the sea. They were the only ones there. I mean...it was beyond amazing.

Tambaron Island

Tambaron Island

Mandatory sunset pose!

Tambaron Island

And of course drinking session near a bonfire, by the sea, under the stars. What more can I ask for?

I woke up at 5 am, sat by the shore alone, watched the light breaking through the darkness as I hear the calm waves hit the sand, deep in my thoughts. No pictures. Just me, and the ocean, and the sky. It was my favorite part. 

Day 3 in Bongabong, Mindoro 

We had our breakfast in Melzar’s Restaurant. Very scenic. Food needs improvement.

We went around Bongabong, Mindoro. We lounged by the river...

Bongabong Mindoro

We walked around...

 And we went up this lighthouse.

Bongabong Lighthouse

It was my first time to ever go up a lighthouse. Usually pictures are just taken with lighthouses as backdrop.. We were allowed to go up and I have to say...it scared the hell out of me. I’m not afraid of heights or of narrow places; I anticipated that kind of steel ladder; I’ve always wanted to go up a lighthouse; but I didn’t expect it to shake so much as we climbed up. There were 6 of us who were supposed to go up and I seriously didn’t think that the lighthouse could carry all the weight of 6 people, but I went up anyways because #YOLO. Two of us fortunately yielded so I breathed a little. I was still scared since it shook a lot when somebody was using the ladder. That lighthouse seems short, but it felt like forever climbing up the ladder. The thrill was nice though. And that’s a part of my non-existing bucketlist crossed out.



We departed from Mindoro at 4am November 21, 2015. If I felt anxious on my first RoRo ride, I was asleep the entire trip on my second.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Cost
What we spent during our entire trip. Note: The table below does not contain our expenses for food (except for the one in Tambaron).

	Expenses
RoRo Fare - Montenegro Lines (for Private Car, one way)	1,600 pesos approx. (Depends what car you have)
RoRo Fare (one way)	192 pesos per head (No fee for the driver)
Gas (Manila to Batangas,Batangas to Manila, around Mindoro )	2, 000 pesos approx
Toll fee	600 pesos approx.
Tambaron Resort Overnight Dorm	350 pesos per head
Boat ride fee fromTambaron Island to Fish Port*	700 pesos
Dinner in Tambaron Island	1, 500 pesos  (Enough for 8 people)
Tips	600 pesos

*We got a free boat ride from Bulalacao fish port to Tambaron. If you want to go to Tambaron Green Beach Resort, you can just contact them and they will arrange the boat ride for you (back and forth). Here are their contact details: