Impressions of the Philippines 2011
May 2011
The tourism authorities of the Philippines tell you that its a land of 7017 islands, so as a keen sailor it seems natural to want to return to the Philippines after having been away for slightly over a year. One should always be suspicious of outlandish claims and the reality is that over 3,500 islands are so small that they have no name and are either isolated groups of rocks or a sand cay. Still that leaves over 3,500 islands and even if you visited a new island every two days it would take some twenty years to see them all. At the same time the population of the Philippines is somewhere in the order of 90 million so every tiny islet that has some habitable land is fully utilised. The romantic dream of finding your own uninhabited sandy island with swaying coconut trees is exactly just that.
The real reason for returning to the Philippines so soon after our last visit was pragmatic. Our sails were over 10 years old and have been patched and repatched and were so weak that you could tear them with your bare hands and it turns out that there is a very good British sailmaker with a worldwide production loft in Cebu, the price was right and to have the sails freighted to Malaysia was going to cost another $500US so the decision to revisit was easy.
Cebu is the hub of the Philippines, geographically and is also the centre for local ferries and shipping. Its a thriving metropolitan city with 4 million people and you can get just about anything you need in Cebu without putting up with the smog and the mad traffic of Manila.Its also famous for its Lechon Baboy, (roast pig) and boasts one of the largest shopping malls in the world. There is an international airport on Mactan island and conveniently the Cebu yacht club is almost within walking distance to the airport.
We sailed from the tip of Sabah, East Malaysia to Puerto Princesa , Palawan for the first leg a journey of some 300 nautical miles (nm) and cleared formalities there, rested and restocked before sailing across the Sulu sea towards the southern tip of Negros. The weather was squally and we managed to shred both the mainsail and the headsail about a hundred miles short of Cebu, the headsail we repaired but the mainsail was beyond repair so our timing was almost perfect. As it turned out we were beset by a week of calm weather which was great for snorkelling and motoring so the sails were not required.
The sails had in the meantime been measured and made the season before by one of Hyde Sails distributors but collecting the sails required paper work to satisfy Customs that the sails were being exported so nothing is as straightforward as it first appears.
Four weeks later in pouring rain the sails were delivered in cardboard boxes which quickly reduced to soggy wheatbix so they were left on deck till the weather cleared before we attempted to hoist the brand new sails. It took five minutes to discover that the sail track attachments were the wrong size when they kept popping out of the mainsail track when you yanked. Its a little disappointing and could have been disastrous if we had freighted them to Malaysia but as we were only 15 minutes away from the loft, one phone call and the next day two sailmaikers and their supervisor arrived and within a couple of hours had removed and restitched the new fittings. Apart from this single hitch the sails have performed well and we have used them through a huge range of wind speeds from almost no wind to gale force winds.
Directly south of Cebu is the island of Bohol, its a fairly large island, I think the tenth largest in the Philippines but has a population of probably less than 100,000 so it has quite a rural feel to the place. Once an agricultural island now its main income is tourism that plus overseas funds repatriated by the millions of Filipinos working overseas and its blessed with an unusual limestone formation known as the Chocolate Hills that have made it a worldwide tourist attraction. Much more endearing, its home to the tarsier, the planet's smallest primate no bigger than your palm yet complete with all the fingers and toes that make their larger cousins our nearest genetic relative. The waters around Bohol are clean and deep with strong currents and must still contain sufficient fish supplies as we saw one of the largest pods of spinner dolphins go by one day consisting of several hundred madly cavorting dolphins having the time of their lives as spinner dolphins seem to, doing backward flips and full forward somersaults and aerial spirals. I sometimes wonder whether its a method the dolphins have developed for driving the fish they feed on as the sound of the impact of a falling dolphin underwater is quite a large bang.
By now its early July and the typhoons are beginning to whiz by at regular intervals. While historical records show that they tend to go by along the North and East of the Philippines at this time of year each passing typhoon drags in several days of wet squally weather for hundreds of miles . With this in mind we start heading south towards Mindanao to create as much distance as possible from typhoon alley.
Mindanao evokes strong emotions with anyone who is familiar with South East Asian politics. Thoughts of the struggle for autonomy by the MORO liberation front the later active terrorism by Abu Sayaff and the kidnapping of tourist divers from Semporna, Malaysia make Mindanao anything but a popular tourist destination. All our friends outside the Philippines tell us to beware of pirates and more disturbingly when you are in the Central Philippines they warn you of the pirates in the south. There is a good historic reason for all this mistrust as for five hundred years pirates have seasonally come North during the South West Monsoon to raid the islands like Bohol etc. The Spanish had watchtowers built to look out for pirates and lit smoke as a warning for locals to move inland. Such was the ferocity of the pirates that they were allowed to plunder at will. In local speak the word Habagat which means the South West Monsoon can also be used for pirates. The later Christian Missionaries, the Jesuit Fathers made the mistake of building their first church by the sea and had to rebuild further inland to avoid the regular attacks. While not most of the population in Mindanao are Muslim there are certainly more Muslims present in Mindanao than the rest of the Philippines, so the Christain North lump the two factors together and associate Mindanao with Muslim terrorists and pirates.
Before arriving at Mindanao island there is the little province and island of Camiguin. Its a steep little island, volcanic in origin, mountainous and can be circumnavigated by road in a couple of hours. The islanders are friendly the villages are clean and planted with flowers and all available flat land seems to be covered with rice padi. Unlike the other islands Camiguin seems to be devoid of ugly squatters crowded along the foreshore. We sheltered there out of some blustery weather and went ashore to tour the island by jeepney, do a little stocking up of fresh produce and generally take in the ambience of the island. Right in front of our chosen anchorage was mangrove with a recently built walkway which we conveniently tied our dinghy to. Ashore was a lagoon with fish farms and a little road side bamboo cafe where local fare was served. Anne was delighted to find green coconuts for sale at 15 pesos, about 40cts NZ. We stayed several nights and when the weather settled set off for Mindanao Island. As the locals say 'Come again to Camiguin'
Cagayan de Oro is the Provincial Capital of North Mindanao and that was where we were headed. It is our last offical port for us to complete departure formalities. My impressions of Mindanao from the reading of Time magazines and other journals was a backward rural, terrorist ridden outpost, so I was totally flabbergasted when some 15 miles before arrival the shoreline was dotted with container port, shipyards, heavy industries, power plants, steel mills and other major industrial establishments larger in scale than any present in NZ. The city itself has several universities each competing with the other and identifying themselves by having their undergraduates wear uniforms!. I must admit that having groups of young ladies smartly dressed in uniform completely with three inch heels moving around the city malls in the middle of the day does make shopping a more interesting proposition. I don't think you will find any Kiwi undergraduate willing to don uniforms in the university.
Customs officials in the Philippines are notorious for their corruption and there are regular articles in the local papers about feeble attempts to weed them out. Today with the internet the floating community intelligence is right up to date and there are a number of ports that are best to avoid for extortionist custom officials, namely Subic Bay, and Cebu. Hardly anyone clears out of Cagayan de Oro so we were unsure as to what would be required. We breezed through immigration without paying and so were feeling upbeat. Customs was very polite but before issuing us with final clearance the officer said. "The charge will be 1500pesos ($45 NZ) are you prepared for that". I said, "you're, going to give me a receipt" and when the official said yes I coughed up. I still have the individually type written receipt, dictated to a secertary in front of me. It says for additional services provided such as food, transport and accommodation. All this for 10 minutes in his office. C'est la vie.
We spent a further three weeks cruising North Mindanao wending our way westwards back towards Malaysia. There were many delightful bays with friendly villagers and courteous coastguard officials and so it was a truly enjoyable time. Interestingly, the locals warn us not to go to South Mindanao where the pirates and terrorists hang out and this time we heeded their advice and when the weather cleared headed across 400miles of the Sulu sea back to Sabah, East Malaysia. It was a rough crossing with the wind directly from the front. With our usual luck, the SW didn't materialise, instead we had westerlies for 6 days and we're of course heading west. Winds turned to SE the moment we dropped anchor in one of the other of the islands west of Kudat, Sabah. The local fishermen that came to talk to us when we dropped anchored were very friendly. Offered us a couple of fish that were edible sizes I gave them biscuits for those yummy fish. The next day they came back with a bag of very large crabs. We feasted well for a few days. There are still fish in Malaysia unlike the Philippines where the locals were eating aquarium fish like Moorish Idols and all types of sea shells including cowries.
