i tried to post this on the dragon slayer's board and kept getting bounced back to the "registration" area. hope it works here.
as was the case with my last post on zamboanga, this post probably does not belong here, but i can't think of any more appropriate place to put it, so it goes in the davao section.
june 11th was a monday and a national holiday here, which gave us a long week-end, so my lady and i decided to go dive in camiguin, where neither of us had ever been. we made arrangements to go with another two couples, and set off on saturday morning. camiguin is about 100 kms. northeast of cagayan de oro and can only be reached by ferry, so it's a long trip from davao but, as i hope i'm able to convey later in this post, well worth the effort.
we drove our own car from davao to cdo, and it took us about 6.5 hours, including a stop of about an hour at the pines hotel in malaybalay (lovely name) for lunch. the entrance to the pines is about two thirds of the way through malaybalay, and malaybalay itself--which is a lovely little place--is about two thirds of the way to cdo. the road is two lane all the way, but in reasonable shape, and you can average about 80 kph for most of the trip, including the time spent chugging along at 20 kph behind slow, smoke-belching, overloaded trucks. i would not advise driving yourself unless you are fairly accustomed to driving here. the alternative is to take the "executive class" bus, which is air-conditioned and plays videos, and which runs several times a day. the cost is about php400 ($8.50).
we arrived at the mallberry hotel about 15:50 and, while waiting for our friends to arrive, had a nice latte at the hotel bar. i've written about the mallberry before. it's a new, business-class hotel directly across a narrow street from rboinson's department store. the rack rate is about php2200 and i think i paid php1,800. eventually, we walked up the street to bigby's for dinner. bigby's is sort of a filipino version of a tex-mex place (a local version of tgi friday's) and it's not bad at all.
the next day we picked up our filipino friends, and headed the 85 km. or so to the port where we would get the boat to camgiuin. again, the road is strictly two-lane, but in decent repair, and we made the trip in about an hour and fifteen minutes. the drive is beautiful, and wends through some extremely rustic countryside and banana plantations. on arrival at the wharf, we paid php1250, a price that included our car and four passengers.
the trip on the ferry took about 90 minutes and we could see camiguin the whole trip. it's a beautiful volcanic island with mountains sloping right to the edge of the sea and looks much like some of the hawaiian islands in that respect, though there's no surf to speak of. if you do not have your own car, there's frequent bus service between cdo and the port, and all of the hotels offer shuttle service from the camiguin port to the various hotels.
camiguin is an oval, about 65 kms. in circumference, with one road running around the whole place, so it's no possible to get lost. we headed toward the highlands mountain resort, which is the newest hotel there. it was lovely, but a little removed from things. however, it's got cable tv, a large pool, very large rooms and is extremely clean. the price was about php2,200 for an enormous double room with a front terrace overlooking the sea. we had lunch at the hotel, and it was a mistake. i've had better food in economy class on airplanes. if you stay there, make plans to eat every meal away from the hotel.
later that day we descended the mountain to scout out the dive shops, and wound up at paras beach resort, which has its own dive operation. after arranging for a dive the next day ($20 per person for two dives including air) and decided that this hotel was much better suited to our needs than the one in which we were staying, so we made arrangements to transfer the next day. this hotel is not as attractive as the other, but the location is much better, the place much funkier, and it's smack on the ocean, with a small beach, a large pool, and lots of [url=http://isgprohibitedwords.info?CodeWord=CodeWord118][CodeWord118][/url] including jet ski, parasailing, banana boats, etc. the food is light years better as well and the service was cheerful and reasonably efficient. the room price was the same.
we had two dives the next day: one over a volcano and the other over a forest of black coral. both of these were interesting, if not spectacular, and yielded some sights that we don't see during our dives in davao bay. again, the boat was on time, and the dive master was excellent as was the pilot.
unlike boracay, there's little white sand on camiguin. however, "white island" which is a 2 km. sandbar, sits a 5 minute boat ride from the beach of the hotel, and we dropped my friend's kids off there to play while we dove. there are small beach huts rep001tered around the island, several vendors selling soft drinks and junk food, and it's entirely safe. the beaches of the island are beautiful.
after the dive, we all hung around drinking tropical concoctions, and lolling around the pool. it was all quite relaxed. about half the guests of the 39 room hotel were european and the balance filipinos.
for dinner, my lady and i went to a restaurant called el paradiso, which is owned by an italian guy and his girlfriend. the food was surprisingly good and truly italian, with the ingredients imported from italy via cebu. there's a small selection of decent, reasonably-priced, standard italian wines, good service, and a totally relaxed atmosphere. i asked the owner if there was any nightlift at all on the island, and was told that there's a disco that operates on friday and saturday nights only. he didn't know about the possiblity of picking up women, and my guess is that camgiuin is strictly a byo-type of place.
all in all, the island is totally relaxing. in addition to the beach, it offers hot and cold springs, a soda spring and a couple of volcanoes. you can rent small honda or kawasaki bikes for php500 a day, and there's so little traffic that a bike is an excellent way to roam around.
the only mistake we made was allotting only two days to the island. the next time, we'll take a week. this is a great and inexpensive way to chill out. the scenery is gorgeous and there's enough to do that you will not get bored. also, it's still reasonably priced and, because it's not that well known, has not yet become touristy.
ge
