I planned on going to Surigao’s Sohoton Cove last December and swim with the jellyfish there but unfortunately mother nature thought it was a bad idea so she had rain visit my hometown every day forcing me to stay indoors and accumulate fat. I decided not to tempt fate and listened to the rhythm of the falling rain. hmmm.

It wasn’t really such a good holiday season for me. True I get to go home to Buenavista, Agusan Del Norte, stayed at my adopted city– Butuan City and played cashier in the SO’s store. Though truth be told, I was only pretending to do some cashiering– I was too busy with the internet to really notice the shoppers who came into the store. My holiday was short-lived though. I was able to spend Christmas with the family but I was painfully alone during the New Year which is some kind of a mortal sin if you’re Filipino. But what can I say, as a corporate slave (not for long though) I have to do the bidding of my corporate masters.
[ad#link468]
My first real trip for the year occured a few days after new year and this was another road trip to Pampanga. I went to Alfredo’s Resort which should be one of the premier summer outing destinations for Manila based companies. Especially for those who have a large number of employees. Of course there will be a post on this one and lots of pictures too!

Another first for the year is my first overseas trip. I went to Macau to see the Venetian Hotel and did a little side-shopping in HongKong. The good thing about this trip is that instead of the usual all expense paid trip courtesy of yours truly, this time I am the recipient of one. Sweet yeah? The trip lasted for 4 gloriously painful (to the feet) days. In fact, it ain’t over yet. I’m actually at the Hong Kong International airport typing this quick update.

I love the wifi here. PCCW provides the free WIFI to passengers. Not sure if the government of Hong Kong compensates the Li family for this but I’m almost positive this service is on the Li Ka Sheng house.

I should have a more interesting account of this trip in the coming days. In the meantime, stay cool, stay mobile, and keep on travelling them Philippine Islands!

With hundreds of thousands of passengers (maybe millions, who knows) going home to their cities and provinces during the week preceding the 25th, and especially more so on the 23rd and 24th of December, the airports are gonna be packed tighter than your favorite brand of sardines. It’s not a stretch to imagine that. Just how many airports are there in Manila, Cebu, and Davao? How many entrance gates (this is important)? And lastly how many are going home to their provinces?

If there’s one event during the year that needs intense and urgent preparations, its going home for Christmas. Marriage? Fuuu, no one’s ever prepared for that so don’t bother. Kidding.

Alright so here’s a few simple guidelines for your Christmas travel.

1. Book and book early. When I say early, I mean now, yes, while it’s still September. There are a lot of advantages for booking this early;
> If you’re working, you can advise your boss early and he’ll be very happy that you gave him ample time to reshuffle resources. I should know. (hmm..)
> There are still plenty of flights available you can choose what date and what time– hassle free.
> When you book this early, you can avail of the many Christmas Promo flights, like the Cebu Pacific Air Christmas Promo. Trust me on this one. Try being stubborn and book your tickets two weeks before Christmas and you’ll either;
>>>get the highest ticket price known to man,
>>>get the worst schedule ever,
>>>and if you’re not very lucky, you’re not getting any. Hmm that didn’t come out right, I mean you won’t be able to get any ticket AT ALL coz everything’s fully booked.

2. Be at the airport a full 2 hours before your domestic flight. If you’re going out of the country, be at the airport a full 3 hours before your scheduled flight. The queue in getting into the airport is so long you think it’s the biblical times all over again and Moses is out in front. It’s not hard to imagine getting stuck in that queue line for an hour. There are going to be queues everywhere so better be there very, very early.

3. If you can swing it, wear slippers (or slip-ons), and jeans without belts. lol. Airport security is just crazy these days. One of the things that I really hate is having to take off my shoes and my belt and put it through the xray machine. I was even thinking evil thoughts one day and wanted to step on cat poo just to let them smell my annoyance (I didn’t though). But seriously, youll see that this will actually save you a few wrinkles (and time too).

4. Bring an MP3 player or a portable DVD player (if you’re rich) or a book. It’s the Christmas season, and during this time, God loves to test our patience with flight delays just to see if we can still ‘give love on christmas day’ when you’re stranded in the airport. Having these things will help you pass the time. It’s a good way to meet cute bored girls/guys too. Use your imagination on this one.

5. Never forget to bring a jacket or anything that will warm you up. Airports can be quite cold and even if you’re travelling at noon, there’s no telling that your flight’s gonna be cancelled.

Oh well, that’s all for now. All these things are at the top of my head so if you have other Christmas Season travel tips, leave a comment!
[ad#agile336]

PAGASA is a Philippine national institution dedicated to provide flood and typhoon warnings, public weather forecasts and advisories, meteorological, astronomical, climatological, and other specialized information and services primarily for the protection of life and property and in support of economic, productivity and sustainable development – Wikipedia

Accessing the Philippines weather forecast is easy enough. You just go to PAGASA’s website at http://www.pagasa.dost.gov.ph/ and you can easily get REAL TIME WEATHER, FLOOD FORECAST, CLIMATOLOGY, etc., etc.. What you won’t get however are the itsy bitsy details that are so very important to travellers like; the weather for obscure Philippine locations e.g. Buenavista, Agusan Del Norte, or more importantly what’s the weather forecast for Boracay Island in the next 7 days. These are the little things that are oh so lacking in our little backyard (should I say backward?) weather institution.

Weather Forecast Resource Alternative

Of course we don’t just give up. If our local weather stations cannot give us the information that we desire, we just have to look somewhere else. And this is the resource that I found if you want a 7 day weather forecast for a certain Philippine destination:

WWW.WEATHERBUG.COM

It’s unbelievable what this site can do. It can drill down to the city or town level in the Philippines and provide its 7 day forecast. How absolutely amazing is that?

To make your life a little bit easier. I have here the link that will automatically bring you to the city/town selection page so you don’t have to exert anymore effort.

7 Day Weather Forecast For Philippine Cities and Municipalities

So there you go. Enjoy planning your next trip!
[ad#250]

Darn, I can already feel the trip jarring my bones but man, I can’t contain my excitement!

If you can’t feel my excitement, you might want to read this article by Jojie Alcantara that awesome photographer from witerary.com ==>> Return to Hinatuan’s enchanted river

Photo shamelessly lifted from dokhey.blogspot.com.

[ad#336]

As I have loads of photos to upload, I was only able to upload my photos for my Caramoan and Baler Adventures. Do visit the gallery from time to time to check on the latest uploaded photos

Check out the photo gallery now at agiledeals.com/photos.
[ad#250]

Having said that, what’s not to love about Boracay, the best beach in the Philippines.
[ad#250]

Related Posts:

I’m not sure how much has changed in a couple of months but the last time I travelled with Cebu Pacific, the queu was horrendous. Sure they’re now in NAIA 3 and there are a lot of generic (no speicifc routes) check in counters to cater to passengers, but still, the lines! Even if you come in really early for your flight, you still have to go through this very long passenger line.
[ad#link468]
Now we could hem and haw about the really bad service (or so we think) or we can all just RELAX.

Relax because well, there’s no point bursting an artery just because the lines are long. The trick is to be at the airport between 60-90 minutes before your estimated departure time. Anything earlier and you’ll burst an artery. Anything later and you’ll die of nervousness.

I’m not sure if you’ve noticed, but when a plane is due to depart within an hour, the Cebu Pacific people will open a dedicated line for that particular route. All passengers who are in queue and headed for that route are asked to transfer to that line.

This my friends is the window of opportunity.

You don’t have to be frustrated over the really long line, just be there with enough time to spare, you can queue if you like, just make sure that when the Cebu Pacific crew begins calling out for departing passengers bound for blahblah, you haul your behind and go into that line. For sure you’ll be in a very short line and you won’t be left behind by your plane.

What if you’re in the queue outside the airport?  Well just tell the guard that your plane is due to depart in an hour, show them your ticket and they’ll allow you to get inside.  Look for a Cebu Pacific crew and check if a line has been opened for your route and that’s it.  You don’t have to camp out or anything.  Just a little common sense and street smarts should do the trick.

Hope this is helpful for you harrassed passengers.
[ad#250]
photocredit: daylife.com

Another reason for this blog is to reach out to like minded individuals who share my passion for travelling and seeing new places and discovering awesome sites. By networking and linking with you guys, I hope to be able to learn from you as well. Thus I really appreciate the effort you guys took in posting your comments here. I have not been a very good blogger in the sense that I haven’t been replying as soon as I should. The reason for that is that the commenting system that comes with this template sucks. There I said it.

But not to worry, I have remedied that situation and installed the Disqus commenting system here, which sort of pretti-fies the comments section and allows me to thread comments. Which means that when I reply to your comment, it automatically is linked to your comment that I’m replying to. Sounds cool doesn’t it? Another good thing about this as well is that even if you don’t have a Disqus account, you can still comment. This is a really cool thing because people are often turned-off by anything that requires them to register. So that should take care of that.

However, I would suggest that you register and install the commenting system in your blogs as well as it really rocks, both in ease of use and aesthetics.

So folks, thanks for your comments, I hope you post some more comments, and if you have travel tips for me, let me have it. It’ll be very much appreciated. Hey, expand those comments enough and you could probably have your own guest post here! Ta!
[ad#250]

I’ll be going to these places in the 3rd and 4th week of April. Man I can’t imagine how much all of these is gonna cost me but hey, it’s only money right?

Stay tuned for my review of these places. In the meantime, why don’t you subscribe to my feed by clicking this link ==> Philippines Travel Blog.? This way you don’t have to visit this site everytime there’s an update. All my posts will automagically find their way to your rss reader. Don’t have a reader? How about an email? Of course you have. In this case you can subscribe to Subscribe to Philippines Travel Blog by Email.
[ad#250]

Earlier this year, I made it all the way to Southern Mindanao tracing the Nautical Highway, spending a couple of days checking out some of the major destinations in the Visayas; places I’ve already been to but have never forgotten.
[ad#336]
I stayed overnight at one of the resorts in Guimaras (Villa Igang), had breakfast at Ted’s Oldtimer in Iloilo City and then proceeded to Bacolod City to have a quick lunch at Manukan Country. I then rode the bus from Bacolod all the way to Dumaguete City. I made a quick side-trip to Siquijor via fastcraft but didn’t have any encounters with its notorious black magic practitioners. Coming back from Siquijor I visited Silliman University of course and had my fill at their canteen. I then boarded another ferry, this time taking me to Dapitan, the place where Rizal was exiled, I didn’t even stop for coffee as I was too excited to experience my friend’s hospitality* in Cagayan De Oro.

*The hospitality turned out to be a face numbing experience with something called Tanduay and an introduction to Pinakurat. Manila folks, you simply must try this “suka” it’s available at Market Market. It’s almost a crime not to.

So I got into a van bound for Ozamis City where another ferry awaits that would take me to Iligan City. The van was filled with the stench of travellers and that unbelievable man who was lugging a 29 inch tv propped on his lap. The ferry from Ozamis to Iligan was too short for comfort. I boarded a bus that was already on the ferry and immediately, when the ferry reached the other side, my bus was already zooming down another road, this time to CDO.

CDO passed by in a drunken stupor. Before I knew it, it was already dawn and I was sleeping in my friend’s girlfriend’s room (the girlfriend is somewhere else of course) and it was time for another bus that would take me to Butuan City, where my journey ended with 4 days of pure mahjong bliss and the roaring of a PAL plane taking me back to Manila.

ooOoo

[ad#link468]It has always astounded me that there are a lot of folks who have yet to discover places outside of Manila. Everytime I talk about a certain place, Cebu for example, and I get a blank stare, I immediately ask the person if he has been anywhere outside of Luzon. More often than not, I get a negative answer. I then ask how old he is. I always get a confused reaction when I ask this last question.

That question is not about condescension nor is it meant to ridicule the person. I ask that question so I can gauge how many years the person has left before marriage or any other form of prison cramps his mobility factor. When a person is already in a state of responsibility, travel becomes limited, one way or another. The wife and/or the children will now have to be considered when making travel plans.

I often wonder why some folks are not too keen on discovering what lies beyond the bend, or whether the road he must have traveled a thousand times on the way to his house stretches on and on. I think that everyone should have at least a semblance of curiosity when they see an open highway or the sea’s horizon, or at the minimum wonder as to what lies beyond the setting sun. I don’t know. Maybe it’s just me.
[ad#250]
photo credits:
Drenched in the rain – Vanessa
Wearing Down – preciouskhyatt