Puerto Princesa, Philippines - February 10, 2006
Now Puerto Princesa is a cool little city! We flew here early this morning.. and WOW. Its a nice size and the scenery is beautiful. The city is small and walkable and a bit of a tourist place. It looks like they put money into the place, or in the process of it. First of all, there are lots of streetlights along Rizal Avenue going all the way from the airport itself all the way down to the waterfront. Lots of good restaurants and music bars as well. We just had the best Filipino food I've had here in this little extremely bamboo-oriented fixture of a place. Open-air restaurant loaded up to the heels with bamboo everywhere. Loved it. Speaking of bamboo, are Pension house, called Puerto Pension is all decked out in bamboo everywhere as well. Its beautiful. In addition, we are up on the third floor with an amazing view of the bay with mountains jutting up on the other side of the bay. Beautiful.
As to today's events.. we packed in quite a bit. First off, we went to Viet Village about 14km outside of the city. We took a bike there - they outlawed taxis in this city. So its all tri-cycle bikes. (Just like Dumaguete and Tagbilaran). The tri-cycle drivers are happy about that. Cuts down on their competition. So anyways, we had one take us out there for 50 pesos (US$1).. and then he left. We walked around the village and there were some tourist shops and such. Mostly it was half-abondonded buildings everywhere with some still being lived in, and some Vietnamese still around building, tearing down, or just maintaining the place. It was alright, but far from amazing or anything. I did think of my old San Francisco roommate however who I beleive lived in the Philippines for a fears back in 1975 I believe before his parents emigrated to San Diego. I began to wonder if this is the same village he once lived in a child. Afterwards we found we were stuck out there without any jeepneys going by once we decided to leave, but fortunately met a Manila tourist who accepted my plead to bring is back into town.
From there we went out to a Crocodile Refuge Center going another direction from the city. I believe it was around 12km outside this time. We took another tricycle driver. This was alright. Lots of crocodiles and even other animals to take a look at as well. Plus the usual tourist-oriented gift shops. Strangely partly eco and partly not. There was a shirt saying to be careful of endangeering the species, but one of the attendants who worked there was wearing crocodile leather boots of some nature. Interesting place nontheless.
From there it was back into the city. The Catholic Church was very cool in the town. As well as a waterfront they are working on developing. From asking around, we found out that the waterfront had tons of old homes along it, but they burned down in some fire. So the city built new housing for them, and then cleared all that land to develop some infrastructure for the locals and tourists to enjoy. At this time, it was a nice boadwalk area for walking and not much else yet.
All in all, I am very impressed with the city of Puerto Princesa. Definetely one of the safest and cleanest cities I've been in - although Davao felt really safe as well. I gotta say I like Puerto Princesa. Now we are debating about taking a boat to El Nido tomorrow and coming back here later, or just enjoying another day before we make that trip.
More on the Philippines..
February 12, 2006
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