The motel staff woke us up at 2.20am, I thought they will just give us a sandwich or something for breakfast. In fact, I was surprised that breakfast starts as early as 2am. We struggled to wake up at this odd hour, and were directed to a Chinese restaurant next door for breakfast. The breakfast was nothing much to shout about but at least it's a hot meal at this hour. We did some quick packing and were really to leave at 3.15am. Another plus point of the motel was that the free shuttle is operational at wee hours too.
Initially I was wondering if it was necessary to go to the airport more than 2h ahead of flight as it is so near. P said it will be crowded even at wee hours and he was right. There was already a lot of traffic at this time, jeepneys already on the road and when we reached the domestic terminal, there were long queues to clear the security scans. Manila is the capital city of this very populated country, thus it never sleep!
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| Finally boarding |
The check in queue was considered short as we were served immediately, after that there was almost an hour left before boarding. Finally, our onward journey to PPS! I'm crossing my fingers that our remaining vacation will be smooth and problems free. When I was booking the flight just the previous day, it looked quite empty and there were a lot of seats, However, we were surprised again that the waiting area was full of sleepy commuters. I'm so glad that we're able to get on board at such reasonable fare.
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| Simple fare on board but still better than Cebu Pacific |
A week before we set off for the trip, we had booked a private van to send us to El Nido from PPS. This part of the journey is the most dreaded as it is a 5h ride on bumpy roads. We chose a private van as I had read that it is faster than the public Ro Ro or Cherry bus. A shared van will be even more ideal as the cost will be shared between 10-12 passengers. However, as our initial flight will only reach PPS at 6.15pm, which is later than the latest shared van scheduled timing at 6pm, we decided to splurge and spent on a private van (6.5k) to get to our destination fast. Now that we missed the flight, it's a waste of money as we can just take a shared van in the morning. Even though we knew the money already paid and it is quite unlikely we can get a refund, P still tried his luck and asked them. Much to our delight, they agreed to refund part of the payment and convert the rest of the sum to payment for 2-way shared van. We're eventually happier to know that we spent less than we had thought (100+ SGD) to resolve the missed flight problems.
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| At the rustic airport |
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| We look tired, but definitely happy to finally be here |
Landing at PPS is so cool, it's like arriving in the middle of a rice field. There is vegetation everywhere and low huts in the villages nearby. We are glad to have finally arrived at PPS after this mishaps on the previous day. It is hardly 7am so we waiting around for the scheduled shared van to turn up at 7.30am, P finally spotted someone holding a piece of paper with his name and we followed the guy to a nearby Eulen Joy office where there were several people waiting for the van. However, there was more waiting and we only boarded the van when it was close to 8am. A shared van is 10x cheaper but there was also a lot of waiting, the van stopped at picked up people at several points until it was full. I was amazed when the driver hopped to the top of the van and placed some luggage right on top to save space. After a English guy grumbled about being picked up at 8.15am when he booked a 9am ride, all of us realised that we actually booked our ride at different timing, some as early as 6.30am! I guess they really want to utilise the petrol used so they combined a few bookings into one, and it could even be different agencies!
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| The private/shared vans |
It was almost 9am when we finally left PPS town proper, and as I rode in the van, I surprised myself by falling asleep almost immediately when we hit the straighter road up north. It felt like a long time as my butt hurt when i was awake again, I had to shift my weight around to relief the ache. I woke up and look at the time, it was only 10.30am. Shortly after that, the van stopped at a small roadside cafeteria for a break, and all of us filed out to eat something. We were famished after the early breakfast at 3am, so we ordered two dishes and some fruits. The weather was really warm so I was glad that we could hide in the air con van once lunch was done.
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| My luggage was one of the lucky ones chosen to go on top |
The van only stopped once more at Taytay for some of us to visit the washroom, and finally pulled into El Nido bus terminal at about 2pm. Including the lunch break, it really took us about 5h to make the journey, luckily most of it was concrete roads and smooth so there was no need to worry about motion sickness at all. Nevertheless, I was really glad we finally arrived at our home for the next 4 nights. The bus terminal is just a very small and dusty one, I do not see that many foreigners around so I guess this place is even more rustic than Bohol, a paradise that is not easy to reach. Even though the inn was said to be just 3min away, we decided to pay 50php to take a trike to our inn since it is hard to carry our luggage all the way there on the uneven road.
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| Our luggage on the trike (different design at different parts of ph) |
I was happy to see that the inn is new and clean as reviewed by other travelers. Among the rows of huts, the white brick walls of the inn stood out. The owners were nice and helpful, P talked to them and they agreed to refund us the amount for the previous night. We decided to book the tours with them in return. We were given the top floor (Rm 7) initially, but P asked for a room at 2nd floor as it is a hassle to climb up and down. The view from the top was just the rows of coconut trees and limestone mountain across the small road. The area around the inn is still under renovation so there's awkward pile of stuff at odd places.
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| View from the room (3rd floor) |
We paid $60 SGD for a night stay by booking through Agoda (redeemed my points) so it was not too bad for a basic and comfortable room. When I was looking for a hotel, I realised that things are not cheap here in El Nido, rooms with mixed reviews and just the basics can be quite expensive. I decided not to expect too much and book one with the best reviews within our budget. I was delighted to see that there's a bathtub in the room, so I took my time to take a long bath and soaked in the bathtub. P was already asleep when I was done, I updated my blog while waiting for my hair to dry and took a nap as well. I heard a loud sound around 5.30pm while I was in my dreams and realised there was a power outage, the TV and the air-con went out but we continued our nap. It seemed quite common to experience that here in El Nido, therefore many shops and guesthouses have their own generator to provide their own electricity in such situation. When we finally woke up at 6.30pm, the sky was already falling and the power did not come back on. I peered out and saw that the houses next to us were also using candles to light up their place so I guess there's power outage in the whole area.
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| Free flow coffee, tea and milo at the inn |
We went out to explore the place and get our dinner. It was just a short 10min walk from the inn to the main beach area. The stretch just next to our inn was also in darkness, and many lit up their shops using candles or torchlight. Most of the shops along the street were small and selling basic stuff like titbits, there were no fast food outlets in this small town, another sign that it had not become too touristy. Most of the bigger restaurants are opened by foreigners, who chanced upon this place and see its potential in attracting tourist business.
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| This is the only bakery in town and its popular, we only bought this once |
The beach front area is somewhat like boracay but the number of shops along the stretch were not as many and there was no proper footpath. Most of the sea facing bars have an area for people to drink and chill out by the sea. We saw quite a few eateries and Seaslugs caught my eye, I remember reading some reviews about it so I was telling P we can just eat here if we can't find other places. We walked further down and it was just a few shops with only a few customers so we turned back to Seaslugs. It was brimming with people but I could see that service was slow and many people were waiting for their food with an impatient or bored look. P was keen to try their seafood so he was undeterred, we managed to get a nice table on the beach with candlelights and sand under our feet.
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| Nice setting and ambience |
We waiting for abt 10-15min and our food started to get served. I could hear the staff telling the next table that they had stopped accepting orders for 10min to clear the piling food orders, so we were considered lucky.
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| Very nice shakes and we came back for more |
The drinks came first and I'm happy with the quality of the shakes. It cost the same as Jonah's shake in Boracay. P ordered prawns with tomato sauce and crabs, I felt that the prawns are not that fresh although it tasted fine. The crabs, unlike those we normally have in SG, were smaller mud crabs so there was a muddy taste. But P was happy with the food and he finished most of the crabs. Later on I realised that I read mostly negative reviews about the place but I forgot all about it.
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