Summer Vacation: Part One - Palawan, Philippines

Palawan is a great place. Full of ridiculously beautiful scenery, friendly people, good food, and you can turn up with a pittance and do everything you want and more. Overall, not including the plane tickets, I spent around 550,000 Korean Won on the trip, which is about 300 pound and we stayed for about 8 and bit days. Where's the 'but'? There is no 'but'... unless you don't like insects or food poisoning or sweating. OK, OK, maybe food poisoning is a bit harsh, just don't ask for ice in your drink, let's put it that way...

Rather than babble about different stories and things that happened I'm just gonna do what I did with my girlfriend and narrate some pictures and if a story crops up then you'll hear about it.

Puerto Princesa and the Journey to El Nido

Actually I'm going to start off with a video.

So this is me and Denis in something that results from a motorbike mating with a car on our way to the hotel. When we turned up at the airport we were hunting for a taxi. Some guy approached us, like they always do outside the arrivals bit in airports, and hassled us to get into his cab. Today we wanted to be hassled by a cabbie because we wanted one but when he pointed to his car/motorbike freakshow I was like 'Car, please. You know, "beep! beep!"' and done a condescending 'driving a car' gesture with my arms. He said 'no car' and at that point we looked around and actually noticed that there were no cars. 'Sod it', we thought, 'lets go for it'. Turned out to be a brilliant little 5 minute trip to the hotel on which I managed to professionally shoot this video:

We got to the hotel, found a small lizard in the room, drank, ate, slept, and then the next day we were off to El Nido!

'What was that? 10,000 pesos to El Nido from Puerto Princesa? Is... that... a... good deal?' - turns out, yes it was as most other 'people who own a mini-bus' (I shouldn't really call them mini-bus companies cos it's literally a 'man-with-a-van') in the area were charging 12,000 pesos and over. Between four of us this price was negligible and the hotel decided to reduce the price of the tour that we got talked into taking that day because a German couple, who we actually got on with pretty well, wanted to do the same thing that day. So for a 6 hour trip to El Nido from Puerto Princesa with stops on the way at some 'mangrove' tour; an unplanned trip into some mini-rock climbing excursion, which we did in flip flops because we didn't know how demanding it was gonna be (very, as it turned out.. in flip flops anyway); and add onto that lunch and the underground river tour, which was hands down the best thing of the day, made it an awesome 'first proper day' in Palawan.

This is the view at the top of the climb that I previously mentioned. You can't make out all the sweat from this picture but I assure you that I am drenched (the German guy had to strip and change his t-shirt :/). Around the time this photo was taken we first realised, if we hadn't already at the hotel the previous night where they had karaoke set-up, that Filipinos love to sing and our tour guide decided to bust out a tune at this lovely location. I didn't know what to do or say so I just clapped a little bit and went about my business of staying in the shade and taking pictures of the scenery. He wanted us to sing but we weren't really having any of it.

This is the entrance to the underground river. There were thousands of bats screeching in and out and throughout the cave, which was awesome. I'm not afraid of bats :) I did jump a couple of times though when some flew near and people were getting pissed off because I had the job of holding the only torch on our boat - a job which was short lived as I got fed-up and handed it to Denis.

This is me in the underground river, all 'health and safety'-ed up. If you look closely you can make out the shape of a bat just above my helmet.

El Nido

El Nido is, in one word, beautiful. The island hopping tours are a must-see. If you go to Palawan without island hopping on a rickety boat that you hired all-day for chickenfeed then you don't know what your doing. We snorkeled at pretty much every island we visited on the tour and the coral and the fish were so beautiful. I say we... I only managed to muster up the courage to risk it on the last island (nicknamed Helicopter Island, on the count of it's shape) because it's no secret that I'm a shoddy swimmer but the coral at this place was in the shallows so I managed it OK with my friend Beth's help. I owe her one because I instantly noticed what I had been missing when I stuck my head under the water and saw all the beautiful coral and colourful fish. It was seriously one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Beth said she saw two little reef sharks at another place we went to. If I had seen 'em I would've panicked and needed rescuing... The sea is another world and not ours to be messing about in. I would've bricked it, honestly. Talking about that I actually had a dream last night people were snorkeling at the side of a boat and a huge shark turned up and attacked someone. I was on the boat watching and waiting for the sea to turn red but it turned out that the person who had been bitten only had a tiny little nip like they had been snapped at by a small dog :/ Anyway, here are some pictures of our island hopping adventures:

First place we went to. Not sure what it was called but it was gorgeous. When we rolled in on the boat we saw a huge monitor lizard wandering about on the beach we were going to be sitting on soon. I think that's when I first realised that we were in the wild now and that if I was going to get hurt in some way then hospitals were few and far between. It was cool to see the lizard, even if it was from a distance, but it did make me think and I was more cautious/worried from then on. I'm not a pansy, it's just that there's snakes and sharks about! and I didn't wanna get munched on...

This is the boat we hired for our tour. All the boats in Palawan pretty much have the same set-up: large frame jutting out to keep it stable, crewed by a couple of guys who just chill out on the boat for 5 hours while you chill out on beachside sipping at a cocktail :P

This is me at the same beach but on a different day (our next island hopping tour included the same beach so...). I think this was when I got the most sunburnt, which wasn't much. Sarah told me to be careful cos I'm pasty and I didn't fancy peeling everywhere (I peeled everywhere :/). By the way, those shorts weren't really by choice... I forgot to bring the Speedo swim trunks I bought at Grand Mart and I was desperate :/ I grew to like em though :)

This is Helicopter Island where I managed the snorkeling :) It was brilliant... found some cool shells here too.

Don't think I really need to say much about the next picture except that it was taken on a beach in El Nido with a beer in hand :)

Next stop, Port Barton! The weather on the night before we were supposed to be going to Port Barton was horrendous. The roads were all muddy and wet and generally treacherous so it took us a while to find a mini-bus driver who was A) up to the task, and B) was offering a good deal. 6,000 pesos I think it cost us direct to Port Barton from El Nido.

Port Barton (a boatman we met there said it was called something else by the locals but how am I supposed to remember...)

We stayed in some cool little cottages that were 'more pricey' than what we were used to in Palawan, but not really. It still was dirt cheap. 1,400 pesos per room (so split between two) for a awesome little cottage thing with a good view. So about 10 pound a night each. Ridiculously cheap. This is what we stayed in:

On this beach:

First day: Spent all day in bed reading books because I was sick. I won't go into details but I think good advice would be not to ask for ice in your drink. My mates all went out and got the most sun that day that's why in any group pictures you might see of us on Facebook I look like a vampire in comparison.

Second day: Went to a place called 'Blue Cove' about 40 minutes boat ride from where we stayed. It was like a paradise island, seriously. We rolled up and had a beer and a cocktail almost straightaway (I say 'almost' because the service in Palawan is so slow it's unbelievable. They are so chilled out you almost have to preempt how hungry you are gonna be in an hours time because you know the food is going take that long again once you've ordered. I was a bit annoyed at times but I was on holiday so I was in no rush :P). Again, here are some pictures:

The beach at Blue Cove. There were a lot of coconut trees dotted around and my mate, Derek, threw something at the coconuts in the one of the trees near me and the noise it made made me literally leap out of the way because I thought I was gonna take a falling coconut to the head.. :/

Me enjoying my first hammock experience. You can tell it's me by my nose sticking out over the top of the hammock like a sharks fin.

Back at the cottage in time to enjoy another Palawan sunset:

Check out my website 'www.leeisaprofessionalphotographer.com/bigtime'.

My friend Beth (who is a genuine pro-photographer just like me) took this of me.

Puerto Princesa

Back in Puerto Princesa after our epic journey around the northern half of Palawan and we stayed at the hotel where we stayed on our first night there, which I recommend (Del Loro it was called). Though their 'continental breakfast' consisted of 3 slightly toasted slices of bread with butter and a choice of tea or coffee.. ;) Oh, the night before though we went to eat at some foreigner run restaurant down the street from Del Loro hotel and I had the best steak I think I've ever had in my life... again, so cheap. If you go there order the cheapest steak on the menu (Filipino beef (angus and porter house is twice as expensive and wasn't as good)) with blue cheese sauce... it's making my mouth water just thinking about it. Might try and get a steak tonight actually..

I don't think this blog would be complete without commenting on how many times I thought I was going to die on this trip... The mini-bus drivers are mental. The streets are so botched and muddy and treacherous and then they go diving around corners on the wrong side of the road (if there is a 'side' of the road you were supposed to be driving) whilst overtaking other cars on blind bends.. We had to change a tyre at one point because the roads were so bad. Driving in the dark is worse. Oh well, we played '20 questions' and Beth's Boggle game on her iPod touch to pass the time. Anyway, I'm alive :P

[By the way if you looked for the bat above my helmet in the underground river picture then you have been successfully tricked by me. So, one-nil.]

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Div-ling

Sat down at my desk to do some work when I realised that my keyboard was out of place and there was debris on my desk. 'Wtf,' I thought, 'I bet some nosey geek has been on my computer'. So, after typing in my password and whacking on some Nirvana, I noticed that the monitor was now a 20 inch flat screen... God knows how I graduated university. My parents are very proud, you know.

In other news, I go to the Philippines on holiday next Tuesday (27th July). Time flies. It feels like only yesterday I was frantically trying to buy plane tickets online and finding myself constantly rejected (by the website..). I go onto Hong Kong on August 4th and I'll be back in good ol' Incheon on the 8th. Cannot wait :)

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Camp Casey

I've been seeing Sarah now for around 2 months so inevitably I met a couple of her friends. A married couple, it turns out, are her best friends here in Korea and so we've hung out a bit over weekends, had dinners etc and got to know each other as much as you can really over a two month period. One of em - the husband - is in the U.S. army and is based up in Camp Casey near Soyosan way north on Seoul Line 1. He and his wife are leaving to go back to the USA within the next few weeks so Sarah wanted to see him off at Camp Casey before he left. First question I asked was 'As a Brit, can I just wander onto a U.S. army base? What I mean is can I plleaasee come??'. Answer was 'Yes, but you have to have him with you at all times to "supervise", as is the same with all visitors'. Second question was 'Can I A) hold a gun, and B) see helicopters and tanks?'. Answer?: 'Yes, to the choppers and tanks. Hell no, to the gun'. So, good news and bad news then.

So, Saturday morning came and we took the 2 and bit hour journey from my place in Incheon to Camp Casey. It looked really nondescript from the outside - very much unlike the U.S. embassy in London, which looked like it belonged more in the middle of a war zone than opposite a nice park with a 'dungeon themed' pub nearby. I'm not sure whether I should really describe much about Camp Casey really in case I'm breaching some kind of 'security code' or something. But basically they have a Popeyes, which do the most amazing 'biscuits' (scones with a slightly different recipe) and chicken; a Starbucks; a place where we had an awesome 'Philly Cheese Steak', which consists of plenty of cheese, plenty of steak, plenty of onions and green peppers.. in a roll; a bowling alley; a cinema; and a Taco Bell. It was glorious, to be honest. But, for an army base, it didn't seem like much 'army-ing' was going on. Mind you, it was a weekend and people go off post etc. Also there was an awful lot of bellies around.. like if there was a war they would whip out their guns only to find that they're clogged with chicken batter. Still, I felt weaksauce.

We stayed in a nice 'American style' hotel, which basically meant that they had carpet, and then set off on the Sunday after a nice chicken tender and biscuit breakfast. Not quite continental, but I think I got my '5-a-day' in OK.

Me and Sarah bowling away on the Base. My arm still hurts :/ The price you pay for victory, I guess.

Don't think I mentioned that it was like a monsoon out, did I? Well, it was like a monsoon out, and we all got very wet. My umbrella also leaked, which didn't help. And the road to all the cool tanks was flooded so we couldn't walk close to them :'(

Just noticed that Sarah got a half-strike from a split... nice :)

This is me (plus brolly) and Sarah (plus snazzy jacket) in front of an inactive tank they had lying around. Our friend described the history of 'KEEP UP THE FIRE!' but I've forgotten it :/ Something to do with covering fire or something? Not sure.

Well, that was my awesome weekend on U.S. soil :)

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Fun times at school

Seeing as they finished their English exam yesterday I thought it might be a good chance for them to just veg out this week and either enjoy or (more likely) fall asleep during a showing of Shrek. Good plan eh? Oh, wait, this is Korea. Literally one minute before class I get a message from my co-teacher saying that the vice-principal has said 'no DVDs'. Right, so I have 30 seconds to think of a 45 minute 'fun' lesson. I thought to myself, "my so called 'well planned' lessons aren't even that fun, so wtf am I going to do now?". This thought took up about 15 seconds of my prep-time. So I shuffled into class and pretended to be messing with the computer while I thought of something. "Right", I pondered, "maybe some kind of hangman gig? Or maybe bingo? Basic, but it might soak up some minutes...". So I bust out the 'Korean bingo' game that my girlfriend, Sarah, taught me.

Instructions are each student draws a grid however big the teacher tells them, lets say 4x4, and they have to think of 16 things in a given category. I chose 'brands', which took them forever! I was like 'do you kids just not watch TV or go shopping?'.. then I realised I was looking at Korean children whose sole purpose is to either study, read manga, or improve their skills at online games. Might've had more luck if I chose manga titles, which I will in the next lesson, or Starcraft build orders... Anyway, some kid managed to wangle two candies out of me by conveniently winning on his turn and then another kid guessed 'BRAZIL' correctly on the hangman game I busted out in the last 5 minutes. By the way, Korean kids don't really guess letters... they just guess one or two letters at the beginning then start throwing out whole words. For example, for _ _ A _ _ _ one girl guessed 'America'... It wasn't an advanced class.

This was second grade. Next up: my mental first grade class who stand on chairs and chant my name when I enter, who don't seem to know any English except 'give me candy', and who get so excited at the prospect of candy that they shout 'wrong!!' and jump up with their hand up screaming 'me! me!' when their classmates answer a question... even though the answer is right. And I've just said it's right.

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Busan

Jumping straight into it.

After putting off going to Busan with my girlfriend (Sarah, 24, Alabama, USA) for the past couple of weeks due to various reasons, we decided to travel the 200-odd miles to Busan using the super-fast KTX train. At 300 km/h max speed, the KTX really is the only way to travel to Busan... unless you fancy the bus. We took the KTX, though, seeing as Sarah doesn't get off work 'til late. From Seoul station to Busan station it took close to 3 hours, which wasn't too bad.. got a bit of shut-eye on the way there. Saying that, I got woken up by some screaming kid who really wasn't being considerate... but other than that it was a nice smooth trip :) oh, actually, on the way back someone decided to bring a small container full of fish (or something that smelled strongly of fish) and chucked it on the overhead shelf.. and a woman sitting across the aisle from me brought a bag of kimchi with her, which smelled... and we were having so much fun in Busan that we actually forgot to eat so we were starving... can't fault the KTX though :P

When we got there, Busan was great! Slightly overcast but sweltering hot (I got sunburnt again..). Shorts weather, but I wish I had flip flops (tip: buy flip flops if your hitting Busan cos it's just plain uncomfortable otherwise). I'm not gonna sit here and describe all the beers we drank and the streets we wandered down, so here are some pictures :P louder than words, an all that.

This is me in the tunnel they have through the main tank in Busan aquarium. It's full of nurse sharks, which looked terrifying because they were bearing their teeth; huge groupers, which were really ugly but the same size as the nurse sharks, which instantly made me think of some kind of fight between the two mainly because I saw a video clip of an octopus killing a shark the day before and I wanted to see the grouper-nurse shark equivalent (I watched them more closely after that thought); and large schools of shiny fish.

Can't remember where this was taken, but Sarah and I are in the jaws of a huge shark (fake though :'( ).
We took a boat ride out into Busan's surrounding waters on a little tour and it got sooo cold. It was such a bumpy ride that I'm surprised we managed to keep our stomachs intact let alone take this picture :P but it was a great ride, to be honest. Busan is beautiful.

We visited a coastal temple on the Saturday, which was, again, beautiful. The view was great, the temple was nice, and authentic too because there were plenty of people about praying and that while we took pictures. I'm pretty sure I wasn't being disrespectful when I couldn't be bothered to switch my flash off but I'm sure I'll be forgiven somewhere down the line.

Another one of us at the temple.

This is me next to the - guess what!! - KTX :P It's a double ended train, which we didn't know at the time, and we were confused for a few seconds as to why the train was setting off in the opposite direction. Divs.

Other things happened like the amazing curry place Sarah took me too... argh, it was like heaven. It challenges some of the places in the UK, I tell ya. 'Ganga' it's called, if anyone reading this is planning a trip to Busan, and it's right by Haeundae beach below the TGI Friday's. 40 minute wait to get in, but I could've waited longer, to be honest..

And that was Busan :) Check my facebook for more pictures if you want.

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World DJ Festival

Starting off with an apology because I haven't written a blog in a while :( I'm sorry if you've been sitting at your computer hitting the refresh button on this blog page for days, just put a plaster on those blisters cos blood is hard to scrub off a keyboard :/

Anyway, I went to the 'World DJ Festival' on the weekend in Seoul - they say 'world' because they had the odd bloke from Europe or Japan there - and it was hectic! It kicked off at 4pm or something and didn't finish until 6am (we left at 3ish). So, I turned up with a bag of booze in blistering heat and as we wandered up to the entrance they had the Men in Black on security checkin everyone's bags for booze and things that looked like they could contain drugs or whatever. Funny thing is they took my water bottle off of me and my So-J (Soju + Orange juice (lethal..)) but didn't even bother to check my bag! So, I was like 'oh yeah! Got some Cass (Korean beer) on the go!' but then when I whipped it out victoriously later in the night I realised that I had bought 'Cass light'... what a mug. Definitely was not worth the hassle. It was like opening a Christmas present shaped like a PS3 and opening it to find a Wii staring you in the face.. let down :P

Wasn't too fussed though because they had a 'Vinyl' stand at the festival, which is probably the best idea for an alcohol vendor anyone has ever had. I'm not sure if I've said this before but 'Vinyl' is a street cocktail bar in Hongdae that sells 'baggy' drinks which are basically like one of those IV sacks that you see in hospitals full of blood or whatever but the ones from Vinyl, if your me anyway, are usually full of Vodka lime ;) You can wander the streets, or festival, with an IV bag full of a cocktail sipping it with a straw... it's gonna be even tastier in the summer :P (I bet that would work with pimms too... maybe chuck some fruit in... sounds like a plan :O)

So, the festival itself was badass. Had some sick DJs playing stuff from Trance to DnB to Dubstep, but the highlight of the day was definitely 'The Moonshiners' (see em here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tlGHTvj7bxg), a Korean rockabilly band that were soooo awesome. I can't wait to hunt em down and see em in a gig ASAP :D

Other than that there's not much more really to say about the festival really. There was music, booze, people, Dr. Martin transfer tattoos.. generally an awesome time :)

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Muuido

Muuido, in a word, was amazing. It had everything: sun, sea, sand, mud..

Day one - Journey to Muuido:

We set out straight after work on Friday evening and after an epic series of bus rides, taxis and train journeys me, Denis, and Andrew made it to the ferry port where we met Lindsey, John and Beth for the 8:00 ferry to Muuido! So, after a short walk, we turn up at the port and... what was that? We missed the last ferry? dammit... or so we thought. After acting like complete foreigners we somehow managed to convince the guys at the terminal to do one more run on what was essentially a car ferry for just the 6 of us! Nice blokes :) Unfortunately, we were also waiting on another group of friends who failed to get to us in time and could not convince them to do yet another run so I think they stayed in a hotel or something. This is the huge boat that ferried just the 6 of us to Muuido:

When we got to Muuido we asked some bloke in a shop how to get to Hanagae beach and he summoned what could have been either his mate with a van or an actual minivan/taxi for us. Either way, we got there in good time :)

Day one - Hanagae:

We turned up at Hanagae and tried to rent out a cabin. After a typical Korean vs Foreigner exchange we managed to get what we wanted: a cabin! The guy behind the desk seemed to find it hilarious that 6 of us wanted just one cabin but we just ignored him and headed onwards! Granted, the 'cabin' was tiny - it felt more like one of those changing huts you see on beaches in England - but we didn't plan on spending much time in there outside of sleeping and we could just about squeeze us all in there which was fine. These are the huts I'm babbling about:

We had a wander, got drunk, and then fell asleep in the cabin ready for the next day :)

Day two - contender for best day ever:

Beth and I woke up earlier than the rest of the group so we went for a little walk. Hour and a half later and we trundled back to camp after a little mini hike where we took a look around the forest and admired the morning :) sounds lame, but it was fun having a little bit of an explore. When we returned we mustered up some breakfast and then headed out to the mountains for a hike in the same direction Beth and I went. It was more hardcore this time because we climbed this bloody great mountain and I was the mug that did it in Converse..:

Needless to say, I was knackered.

Day two - the mud:

The mountain we climbed down was very woody and so the trees blocked most of the view. So, when we came down the mountain and we were confronted with this view we were stunned:

The tide had gone out like half a mile or more during the time we were hiking (about 2-3 hours). It was immense. And to make things more surreal, when we returned to camp there were people on horses galloping around the mud flats that had been created by the tide going out and people just wandering around on it. So, after lunch, we barefooted it out to try and meet the shore and this was the result:

Muuido is the best :)

Day two - the campfire:

After playing 6-a-side beach football against some Koreans (the score was like 15-3 to the foreigners (us)) we set about getting a campfire sorted because the temperature drops like a stone at night during the spring. It was a pretty awesome campfire: sang songs, drank booze, made 'smores' and cooked marshmallows.. top drawer stuff :)

Day three - sunburn:

Absolutely gorgeous day. We got up slightly later because we were hungover and then cooked some bacon to eat for breakie/brunch, which was amazing (thanks Beth :P). We then set off back into the mud but we decided to head out in a different direction to where the rocks were. The mud wasn't as solid as the mud the previous day, which I put down to it not having as much time to 'bake' under the sun than Saturday - we must've got there earlier in the day :S But it was still awesome. I almost fell down countless times because I was sinking in the mud hehe:

And that concludes the best weekend ever :)

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