Tag: travel

Time Traveling to the Philippines

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Life has been a little crazy for us over the past month. I went to Bali, then a few days later Holly arrived, overlapped with a visit from Jeff, followed by him and Fabien going to Japan, capped off with his parents arriving a day after his return and concluding with 4 of his friends arriving a week after his parents, who are here for 3 weeks. Not to mention, we’ve both been trying to secure jobs in Detroit and plan our return to Michigan. Phew. BUT, it’s all fun stuff, so we are not complaining.

The first week his parents were here, we decided to go to the Philippines. Instead of taking a plane there, we took a DeLorean back to 1960. Arriving in Manila for an overnight stop over, we were introduced to rainy season. Throughout the city we saw locals taking Jeepney’s, which instantly reminded me of something I would’ve seen in a Vietnam war based movie. Our hotel was in the Makati District which was filled with people, restaurants, bars and girls who didn’t even have to say “me love you long time” because their body language and clothing said it for them. Manila was a rather disappointing and sad city. For being the capital, we expected to find plenty of monuments and other tourist attractions. Unfortunately, we saw many homeless, children begging for money and a beach that looked like a land fill. The highlight of the visit was dinner at a seaside restaurant complete with fireworks. The next morning, it was sunny and our drive to the airport was scenic in the sense that we saw people living in shacks made with tarps, abandoned buildings and under poorly made highway underpasses. Sad.

Arriving in the Cebu province was much more uplifting. From there we took a boat to it’s neighboring province of Bohol and checked into a resort on the beach to spend the afternoon napping and swimming in the clear blue water. The next day, we arranged for a driver to take us to all of the great Bohol sights. The pictures will give the best description, but we saw the Chocolate Hills, a beautiful man made forest, a few churches, adorable tarsiers and took a lunch cruise where the riverside villages provided entertainment of dancing and singing. Both evenings were topped off with fantastic dinners on the beach where we picked our own fish which was caught earlier that morning. A perfect couple of days.

Some friends who had been to the Philippines made us promise that we would go to Malapascua Island during our week. So, we took the boat back to Cebu and a taxi to the bus station. With a little hesitation and a big sense of adventure, we boarded a $2, unairconditioned bus for a 4 hour journey through rural Philippines. It turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the trip. Yes, it was windy, uncomfortable and a little scary at times, but driving through the villages, seeing school children wave and the beautiful scenery of the country is something I will never forget. As if our traveling couldn’t get more grassroots, when we arrived to the port, the boat we needed to take made us nervously laugh. If I thought that taking the little fishing boat in Bali was scary, this was really, really scary. We hopped on a 4 person, turned 6 person fisher boat that took us to a bigger boat (yes, we changed boats in the middle of the Indian Ocean), which took us to another little boat, that took us to the very remote island. Fortunately, it was worth it because Malapascua was paradise and, considering that it was a mission to get there, the island was empty.

We checked into our hotel which had a front porch in the sand. For the next two days we napped in the sand, swam in the blue water, ate way too much, snorkeled and got massages on the beach. After major relaxation it was time for the long journey back to Guangzhou to greet Fabien’s friends. So, we boarded the boat, then a smaller one, bus for 4 hours, taxi to the hotel, shuttle to the airport, plane from Cebu to Manila, transfer shuttle to the international terminal, plane from Manila to Hong Kong, car from airport to China border, bus to Guangzhou and finally a taxi to the apartment. Again, phew.

The Philippines is not for those who are high maintenance or looking for a luxurious vacation. Also, if your looking for the latest and greatest amenities, you’ll need to look somewhere else. The whole country is decades behind, but for a week, it was nice to be in a more simple world. It’s also one of those place that requires hard work, thick skin and patience to discover the beauty. But once your there, it’s totally worth it!

Bali in a Coconut Shell

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Indonesia does not share the same views on efficient immigration as Thailand and Singapore. Getting through customs took two hours.  This includes the part where you have to pay 25 USD simply to enter the country. Whatever, I’m in Bali I thought. Then I looked around and scoped the people. I’m going to put on my pretentious hat….I thought I would see all of these beautiful, earthy,  yogi’s. What I saw was America and Australians finest. Mullets, missing teeth, a cut off Skynard t-shirts  and even one looker with sweat pants hiked up so high they were now daisy dukes. WTF are these people doing here?
Eventually I got through customs and arrived at my “hotel” for the night, the Gong in the south, Ulu Watu. It’s run by a typical Balinese family. When I walked in, the father was dressed in white and throwing holy water on the grounds. Unfortunately and fortunately, they gave away my room. Instead of a basic twin bed I had been upgraded to an apartment with a living room, dining room, huge king size bed and ocean view terrace. Score! In the morning I enjoyed coffee and ocean breeze before I headed to the beach to sunbathe on the sandy cliffs, watch surfers and waste the day away. In the afternoon I went to the seaside temple and fought off the monkeys who were trying to defend their territory and Asian tourists who wanted their photo taken with a white American girl.
After sunset, Balinese dad drove me to Sanur where I planned to meet up with the girls. We chatted and I was surprised to hear that he has never left the island. This is typical for a lot of Balinese considering the hefty air ticket expense. In Sanur we were hooked up with another huge room and terrace and I splurged on a pedicure and foot massage while I waited for the girls.
The next morning we took the boat to Nusa Lembogan and did nothing the whole day. This is a little island an hour boat ride west of Bali known for seaweed farms and mangrove trees. Believe it or not, there was another girl from Michigan on the boat. It was my favorite leg of the trip. Laying on the beach, listening to the bar play Jack Johnson, reading, swimming in the infinity pool and enjoying our gorgeous beach bungalow that we only paid $30 for. Our 2nd day in Lembogan was spent snorkeling in the morning and biking the island in the afternoon. We weren’t prepared for the hills which was comical to the passers by who intelligently rode motorbikes. It was a fantastic way to see rural Bali and a few of the secluded beaches. Sadly, our plan was to leave the next morning.
We thought it was a joke when this little fisher boat pulled up to our hotel. Nope. This was going to take us back to Bali. We braced ourselves with sunscreen and Marjorie took a motion sickness pill. Fortunately, we survived and washed ashore our first black sand beach. From there we hit Ubud and hiked through rice terraces, which are truly works of art. After a couple strenuous days we felt it was time for massages, milk baths and body scrubs. So we paid $15 and spent the evening at the spa. The next morning was spent visiting Ketut Liyer, the famous palm reader from Eat, Pray, Love. I could write a whole separate blog about that experience, but I’ll summarize. Basically he told me I was good, pretty, smart, lucky and a good driver. What a waste of $15.
Then the real adventure began. We rented a car and drove to the north city of Lovina. The cars are right hand drives and they use the other side of the road but fortunately, Marjorie is well versed having lived in South Africa. The drive was picturesque and included more rice terraces, a ride up a volcano, a crater lake and many surprised Balinese. I guess they don’t see three white girls in a green car that often. Lovina was a tad disappointing considering the dirty beach so we only stayed there a day before heading to Balian Beach for our last evening. There we splurged and stayed in a huge guest house with ocean and rice field views. The last day was spent like a lot of the others – laying at the pool, reading and napping.
Bali is a magical place. I went to there expecting to find the “balance of worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence” just like Elizabeth Gilbert did. I didn’t and the reason is because I already have it and visiting Bali just just made that clear. But I did find a great vacation and a fun adventure with two great new friends.
This Sunday I am off to Beijing to conquer the Great Wall with one of my favorite partners in crime, Holly.

Heaven on Earth, Part 3: Thailand

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Thailand knows how to……

…not ruin it’s beautiful beaches and countryside with huge resorts and sky scraping hotels.

…have a good time. Hello, Songkran.

…cook the most amazing food. You want spicy? Great. No spicy? No problem. Seafood, vegetables, meat, noodles, rice…these are a few of my favorite things.

…treat tourists. Refer back to our immigration experience.

…speak English. But as a side note, their language and writing is like the beautiful version of Chinese.

…do airline customer service. Before you board your flight they offer free newspapers, drinks, snacks and internet. While on the flight, there is always a meal and whatever you want to drink….at no cost to you.

…price products and services. $0.40 tank tops, $9 for a purse, $1 bracelets, $2 t-shirts, $7 massages, $5 pedicures and the list goes on and on.

…how to handle a nature disaster. The Tsunami was in 2004 and pretty much all that is planned to be restored has been.

…be awesome, making it my favorite place I’ve ever visited.

Our trip was not all white sand beaches, blue skies and beautiful scenery. There were a few funny, China like moments. When we were in the middle of the ocean and leaving Ko Lanta, our boat caught fire. Fortunately, the crew was able to put it out quickly and we slowly coasted to our destination with just enough time to jump on our connecting boat. Next, we had to stay in Bangkok overnight before our flight back to Guangzhou on Sunday. All we wanted was a room close to the airport, with air conditioning, a pool and free breakfast. I called a place on Travelocity and it was only 1,200 Baht ($30) and they had rooms available that night. Our sketchy taxi driver took us a good 20 minutes from the airport, then down an even sketchier road where 3 barking dogs chased our car and pulled up to this 1970’s inspired hunting lodge. We walked in the lobby and discovered that it was not only a hotel, but a butcher shop and a boxing arena that had karoking and dancing every night until 1:00 am. As we where shown to our room, we saw the pool, which was a color of green that I have never seen before. Fortunately, the room was fine, the air worked and we had quite a few TV stations.

In conclusion, it was a fantastic trip and I will be ever grateful to Fabien for taking me on this adventure of a lifetime. We were both a little bummed to return to China and as soon as we set foot in the airport, the shenanigans started. We couldn’t find an ATM that would allow us to withdrawal money, the taxi driver wanted to charge us double because we are white, no one in the airport spoke English, etc., etc., etc. So for the next blog, I’ll be back to ripping on China.