El Nido!

Ok so Jonathan and I are really trying to be better about updating the blog more frequently as well as being better about uploading our pictures. We are fortunate that the place we are staying has quicker internet than most places we have been too!
So we have really been enjoying ourselves in El Nido. It is a sleepy beach town in the middle of its rain season. The first day we were here we didn’t do much but lounge around and catch up on our sleep. Crazy travel days and only getting about four hours of sleep for a few days in a row were a little rough. The next day we were ready to get out and go island hopping or at least explore the town and would you believe that during the rainy season it rained all day?! Not just rained but poured ALL day! Yesterday we were able to explore much of the little town and some of the coast. We walked and explored for about three hours along the beach. It is stunningly beautiful here in El Nido! We actually have more picture of scenery this time than of Jonathan and I! Today we booked our flight from El Nido to Busuanga, which is another island. We are headed to a town called Coron. There is supposed to be amazing wreck diving and even snorkeling around the shipwrecks! We arranged our travels and were a little disappointed we had missed the time cut off for all of the island hopping tours but while we were visiting with these two guys that we met last night (one of them was from Texas!) this guy asked if we wanted to go island hopping with them! We gladly agreed since it was less expensive and the boat man just wanted to go out and enjoy the snorkeling himself! It was a really neat snorkeling trip! We went to three different places and saw tons of beautiful coral and fish! And our trip was only $20 US for the both of us! Well the electricity just came back on and we are heading out to our favorite beach side restaurant SeaSlug! We have to wait for the electricity otherwise Jonathan can’t have his beloved banana shakes! We have absolutely loved the food here in El Nido, good portion size, actual fresh vegetables and really inexpensive! Enjoy the photos! We will be keeping you updated!

http://picasaweb.google.com/WorldRamblers/PhilippinesElNidoIslandHopping?authkey=WsSNU7vM1Y8

Love,
Tara and Jonathan

Hmmm where to start?

I think in this case with the most recent events first…which would be a 7 hour bus ride that turned into a 12 hour bus ride via the public transportation system here in Puerto Princessa, Philippines. It’s cheap at only 7 bucks to ride to our destination in El Nido. Flights to the same spot cost upwards of $300. We could also have taken a 22 hour ferry boat ride for around $150. Or if we really wanted to, we could have rented a sling on a cargo ship for a whopping 36 hour journey @ just $25 per person. A no brainer – bus would be great, roll along the country side, stop at lots of places along the way and best of all…travel with the locals. We woke up at 4:00 a.m. to catch the 5:00 a.m bus. From our place to the “bus terminal” (read: dirt field) we had to take a tricycle. This is a deadly little machine in which a motorcycle with less than 300cc’s to its engine (about the same pulling power as 50 cats slung together) has been affixed (I use this word loosely) with a welded and custom made fiberglass frame, more fit in appearance for the Captain’s deck on a cruise ship or perhaps an air traffic control tower. They are also Philippino sized – think of this as the exact opposite of super sized. That’s right you only get one french fry. We load our bags, food, and 3 bodies into this machine and we’re off like a heard of turtles. Never mind the violent shaking of the front motorcycle wheel…this place is a beautiful mess.

The bus itself is more of an urban assault vehicle…well sort of. It’s cartoonish in appearance and looks as if Mini-Me, the dude from Space Balls and the cast of Super Troopers designed it to invade The Planet of the Apes. There are 10 inches of clearance from the axels to the ground and it has big old tires with dualies in the rear. People ride on the roof, the sides and anywhere you can sit inside. They even bring extra wooden stools so people can sit in the main walk way. It’s tight. The first 4 hours of the ride were great and we were treated to cool breezes, a sunrise and beautiful country side. The first obstacle was a giant mud pit created by the rain. Tara and I had no idea what was going on, the bus stopped and everybody looked concerned and after a few minutes started filing off the bus into massive amounts of thick red mud. We had to walk, this part of the road was not paved, was under construction and had become an impassable bog from earlier rains. They were going to take the bus up via the river and we would meet it about 1km up the road. Not a problem, we hot stepped through the mud with our little back packs and sure enough about 20mins later the bus came screaming and sliding up the river and back onto the road. Victory!...but short lived. After this we proceeded to get two flat tires within about 100m of each other. Three of the bus crew had to walk back to the town after the second flat. One carried the tube, the other the wheel and the third “new guy” had to mange the rim. It was a hilarious sight and they were laughing at the third guy who was practically throwing the rum just to get it to move. We were outside a loooooong time. I feel asleep in the “v” shaped drainage channel that ran along the dirt road which was surprisingly comfortable. Tara was sitting next to me and all along the road people were just hanging out. The guys rolled back riding on top of another truck, changed the tire and at that point I noticed something else…one of the rear tires was beyond bald, there was tube showing and I pointed it out to Tara. Sure enough, not 10mins later the tire blew out. I looked at Tara and chuckled. At least it was on the rear so we kept rollin’. What happened next was much more alarming. On one of the turns the steering wheel locked up and we went skidding off the road into the side of a mountain. WHAT THE @#$# We got off the bus and believe it or not Tara and I were totally mellow (she took some travel sickness pills and is just so fun on those things =p) but the locals were NOT happy. We were still 11km from our destination. One of the boys came up and told us that he hated this trip. I asked him if it was always like this and he said it wasn’t. They beat the crap out of the front tire with a breaker bar. It had slipped off something and lodged itself against the fender. They got it *fixed* and we finished a very long and rough journey. And there you have it, an epic bus ride full of jaw dropping action…did I mention that upon our departure we’ll be flying out? ^__^

Ok so the previous day…the Philippine’s are a very interesting place. I believe there are two ways to travel in places like this and I have experience with both. 1.) You take the mini fortress approach. You take a private car and hire your own armed guards or 2.) You fly invisible and under the radar. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. We however, flew low, very low. The guards are everywhere in the city of Manila where we spent 1 night. They own the fronts of stores, the insides of doors, the little spots next to vendors and atms and money changers. They bare heavy burdens: shotguns, pistols, machine guns, sub machine guns…there is no shortage of crowd control. The expressions on people’s faces are different here. They are hard and high strung. Too much action and not enough rest…or perhaps it is not enough peace I do not know for sure. Two days before we arrived there was a bombing in the city that killed and injured many people at one of the shopping malls. Our hotel was in the heart of the city next to the domestic airport. It was not welcoming and was more akin to a prison. Thick concrete walls, faux windows and poorly lit rooms made for an entrapping feeling. After check in, we walked discreetly around for a bit but attracted too much attention so headed back. We needed to eat and had some sealed beef that my Mom left us. We mixed in some 505 Green Chile Sauce and El Paso Taco Seasoning that we’d been saving. It was simple but holy cow it was a deliciously nice meal for my Birthday!! Yup hard to believe it but I’m 26 now J Green Chile is something that we’ve both been craving so it was quite the treat. Not long after, we were getting ready for bed when the power went out. It scared the bloody hell out of both of us. After lots of yelling in the hall it came on about 5 minutes later. Whoa. We went to bed after that but slept lightly. The next morning we were off to the islands.

Two nights ago we were in Puerto Princessa and decided it wasn’t what we wanted so yesterday we adventured up to El Nido. It is much safer in Palawan (the name of this whole island) than Manila and the people are friendly. We are once again without power for most of the day and have yet to find an internet place. The food on the island is amazing and by far the cheapest/best quality we’ve had. 2 bucks per person and you can eat a solid meal, for 5 dollars you’ll feast like a king. We’ll post shortly on the rest of Malaysia and Singapore.

We are trying something new so give us your feedack. Below is the link for the pictures associated with the blog!:
http://picasaweb.google.com/WorldRamblers/BusToElNido?authkey=6JcmVt4dAzs

We miss everyone! Keep adventuring on wherever you are and let us know how things are. We are learning so much about the world and each other and these next many weeks will be filled with travel as we journey to Macau, Hong Kong, China and Vietnam.

Jonathan and Tara

p.s Please let us know if you like the web album approach or the picture collage approach!

Singapore tour and the zoo!!!

We have been busy! I suppose that is the big difference between being in a city that’s designed like a theme park and being on a beautiful relaxing island! While Catherine was still here we enjoyed her company and made sure that we were back at the hotel when she was done doing her educational tours. We had a few more wonderful dinners, including an eat with your hand, absolutely wonderful Indian dinner! On the last day that she was in Singapore she had the afternoon off and we ventured out to Harbor Front which is one of the largest shipping ports in the world! We took a Harbor cruise on the Cheng Ho boat, named after a famous Chinese General. The tour was about 2 ½ hours through the harbor and we stopped off at a place called “Turtle Island” for a 30 minute stop. It was originally two reefs and was formed into a relatively good sized island. There were no large sea turtles, but sculptured marble turtles and plenty of areas with smaller tortoises. We enjoyed being able to relax, enjoy the scenery and enjoy one another’s company! It was such a nice treat to be able to meet up with her!

Obviously we had to move out of the Sheraton when Jonathan’s mom left so we had debated on where to go and finally decided on this place called “Betel Box.” We took a taxi and got there mid afternoon, which was quite possibly the worst time of day to arrive in a place that is only air conditioned in the evenings at the hottest time of year in Singapore! So we checked in and put our stuff upstairs in one of the big dorm rooms. We were a little put off by the place at first because it had said there were laundry facilities and that was something we desperately needed, as well as free internet. Turns out internet is only free for 30 minutes. Not to mention there were a few “characters” in our dorm… So we considered going to this neat little place we had come across in China Town when we were there the other day. We took the Metro over and booked a room there for the next night. I know, jumping all over Singapore just because of internet and laundry, but at the other place we would have access to a kitchen, which would help us save our money! Ok so the next day we took a one of a kind tour around Singapore via bike! It was so amazing but I am going to let Jonathan tell you all about it!

Ok so now we are at the Backpackers Inn in Chinatown! It is air conditioned all day and quiet. Also REALLY important we are doing our first loads of machine washed clothes since we left the states! Can you believe it?!?! I am way excited and am so glad that I can throw the clothes in a machine and not spend forever hand washing them and than finding a place for them to dry! Jonathan thinks it’s pretty funny that I am so excited about washing clothes, but it truly is a BIG deal! We went grocery shopping today! Now that you all know that we are really into our grocery shopping and markets, although here we hit up the grocery stores, which are all located in these huge malls. We even found the equivalent to a Whole Foods or Wild Oats, organic and healthier stuff.

One of the highlights of our stay thus far was a 35km bike ride around the island. Yes it’s true – we had no idea what we were getting into!!! We started the morning at around 10:30 a.m. and didn’t get back until 6:30 p.m. We were tired but it was AMAZING. The owner of Betel box Backpackers lead it and knew so much of Singapore’s history. From its founding days, to its problems with neighboring countries, to the many different factors that have contributed and driven it’s development. They are investing heavily in new water technologies at the moment…yup that means turning poop laden blue liquid into glacier clean hydration matter - whoa! We also had to take shelter because we got caught up in a wicked lightening storm. \ Singapore is one of the top places in the world for lightening strikes. In fact, one struck only about 300m away from us over a lake!! All this was cool – but getting a tour of their Red Light district was crazy. On any given night there are 1500-2000 girls on the street. When we were there (18:00) there were many girls already out. Some of the other backpackers were going to come back and ride in the back of Tony’s truck to see how many there were…we decided we were cool NOT doing that =p

We also went to the Singapore Zoo. It was spectacular. The walkthroughs allowed you to actually encounter the animals. Yes that means monkey’s jumping on you anywhere in the park, you could touch the ring tail lemurs, a herd of deer-mice walked right over our feet, giant red flying squirrels soared just above our heads and there were loads of other free roaming animals. There is a day zoo and a really cool night safari…all in all we spent 12hours there! Good thing we had lots of food and water. There were so many highlights…let’s start with Tara and I feeding a Manatee!! It’s true we had a great time watching them gobble boiled potatoes and carrots from our hands. Their skin was soft and they had whiskers that poked your hand every time you fed them! I must admit that I am trying to grow my hair long and one of the hobbit ponies at the entrance had the same color hair as I did…seriously I am now considering a hair cut. We watched Inuka (silent stalker in Eskimo speak), the 5m tall polar bear and his Mom Sheba feed on Watermelon and fish. They even throw a live fish in the water and we watched him hunt. You would think that a giant like that couldn’t sneak up on a fish…but ever so slowly and gracefully he did! Then there was the lion feeding…it was uneventful and the zoo people managed to hit a few lions in the face as they were throwing meat. Apparently, they had a big meal the day before so most shrugged off the blow but a few did eat. The zoo created a very intimate experience with the animals and the design let you be right next to them as you walked by! We were less than 10ft from white rhinos, tigers, hyena’s, giraffe’s and so much more. There was also a great seal show that involved penguins, seals, and sea cows! Seals are so fascinating, extremely intelligent and simply amazing in agility and speed in the water!

It’s Tara again! I get to talk about the Night Safari! Definitely the coolest part of our zoo experience, feeding the manatee was a close second! Ok so the Night Safari is the World’s first zoo that lets visitors visit animals and observe them in the nocturnal habitat. Pretty cool! The whole day I was wondering how the Night Safari worked and figured we would be walking around the same sections of the zoo, but just in the dark. WRONG! It was a whole separate zoo! Complete with a second set of animals, another pride of lions, herd of elephants, tigers, hyenas, giraffes, zebras, flying squirrels and the list goes on! So the best way to see the park is to take the tram that goes around the park around the main animal exhibits and than at the tram stops, get off and take a few of the walking trails. The walking trails take you through some of the exhibits (like the flying squirrels) or right in front of the exhibits. Ok so the funniest thing that happened during the Night Safari was at the tiger’s lair, ooohhh. Well the tiger spotted Jonathan (not that he was provoking it…) stalked back and forth a few times and then stalked towards the window (I thought he was going to attack the glass). He stops right in front of Jonathan and sprays his scent glands all over the glass in front of where he was standing. I started busting out laughing while Jonathan stood there speechless. My comment “So I guess all cats really are alike.” One of our friends here is an experienced San Diego zoo-goer and he swears that San Diego is the best in the World, but I am not sure, it was definitely the best zoo I have been to!

All of our love!

SINGAPORE!

HIIIIIIIIII! Well have you missed us?! Cause we sure have been missing all of you!

Malaysia update since the last blog… Jonathan continued to dive everyday and sometimes even twice a day. He was able to do a night dive which was during the middle of a rain storm, which eventually turned into a lightning storm. The lightning added some excitement because every time the lightning flashed it would illuminate the water for a few seconds. The light reflecting off of fish and coral and other deep sea life…. Of course I can only imagine what it was like, it sounds enchanting but I have yet to dive and time will only tell. I have spent my days reading on the beach and playing in the water!

Jonathan’s dive masters treated us to an amazing fish dinner our last night in the Perhentian Islands. Raeshe (Dive Master) had caught these fish himself and made arrangements with one of the best local restaurants to cook up these fish for us; two sweet lips, two red snappers, and a grouper. What a feast! Our friends, Kelvin and Soohee, also were with us at the feast and have been Jonathan’s dive buddies since we arrived on the island. They were actually our neighbors over on the other island and we decided to take their advice and move to the new island, which we enjoyed much more! Kelvin is from New Zealand and Soohee is from Korea, they are in transit moving from Korea back to New Zealand. They were fantastically fun and we all had a great time together! Soooo…

We are now in Singapore! We left the Perhentian Islands on the afternoon of the 29^th after a day of gray skies and looming thunderclouds…the start of monsoon season perhaps… We were excited to be heading off to someplace new, someplace exciting, and knowing that Catherine, Jonathan’s mom, would be waiting in Singapore! She is in Singapore for Educational tours and conferences to bring all the knowledge back to New Mexico! We decided to take the sleeper train down to Singapore, which was about 11 hours and super easy and relatively restful, well at least better than the bus! This meant that we had to take an hour taxi to a small town, Tanah Merah. Which seems easy enough to pronounce, but when you come from an area that has Spanish as a major language…it can definitely effect pronunciations and confuse the poor Malay taxi drivers, oops. Well we got there and I was starving. So Jonathan and I ran to get some food and in the middle of purchasing the food we realized that we still hadn’t bought our train tickets and we weren’t sure if we are going to enough money left…. So we head back to buy our tickets and it is 94 RM (Malay Ringgit), ughhhhh we only have 93 RM….Using his usual charm somehow Jonathan got the guy to lend us 1RM, so we got our tickets! Than onto the bus to spend our night on our little upper beds with all of our bags….Sleep Tight!

So it is important to say that in Singapore Jonathan’s mom is staying in the Sheraton and we are so fortunate that she is letting us stay with her! So we are living in the super deluxe, we definitely would not have stayed someplace this nice if it wasn’t for her being here! It came at a perfect time to meet up with her. Jonathan and I were both feeling a little homesick and it was really nice to have a little bit of home around! Our first day into Singapore we spent the day looking through the upscale shopping center near the hotel and coming back to the room to see if Catherine had arrived. Apparently we managed to miss her and didn’t get to meet up till later that evening. We discovered a wonderful little Gelato shop to satisfy Jonathan’s ice cream craving and also went to see “Balls of Fury” the new comedy about the Chinese and their Ping Pong, it was absolutely hilarious! Maybe funnier for us because we are out here in a predominantly Chinese city! Finally at about 9:00pm we met up with Catherine! What a small world!

Yesterday Jonathan and I ventured to the National Skin Centre in Singapore. I have had seriously wicked sores and irritations all over my body and have been quite miserable for about two months and was counting down the days till we were going to be in Singapore. They have an excellent reputation in Health Care. So turns out that I was having an eczema flare up. The doctor was great and gave me lots of new information as well as some prescriptions that have been highly successful already. I am a new person! I am curious if any of you reading the blog are eczema sufferers and what things you have found really work and what doesn't? Also does anyone know of a good hypoallergenic laundry soap? Help please!

The health care system here is so organized. Instead of having a triage room where you would normally talk to a nurse, upon registration you receive a receipt with a room number and patient number. You wait in front of that room until your patient number appears on the screen outside the door and you go inside and the doctor is already sitting there in the exam room! Not only are they super efficient but they also have nothing lost in translation, they have a central computer system and prescriptions are put into the computer and appear in the pharmacy. Prescriptions are filled by swiping your patient number/barcode through a reader and all of the services are on a continual tally. This means that you pay for the physician visit and prescriptions all at once! It was so easy for me and compared to my experiences at home, much better in comparison!

I guess I should say that Singapore is quite interesting. We were told that Singapore is a cross between Disneyland and East Germany. The government controls everything. Here there is no ownership for cars or houses, only rent. There is no gum chewing, no speeding, no jaywalking, no spitting, we have been told by a few that there are too many rules. As a result the city is very beautiful, clean and safe! All the reasons why I love this place, and oh yeah I don’t have to carry my own toilet paper!

Last night we went out for a wonderful Arabic dinner with Catherine and wandered around parts of the city. This morning we toured the Singapore Botanic Gardens, where there is a separate Orchid garden. It was beautiful! The Singapore Gardens have also been busy creating hybrid orchids, which resulted in more unique petal shapes, colors and they have even began creating orchids for fragrance! Jonathan and I enjoyed it so much and Jonathan took many pictures; however, there was much more to photograph so odds are good we will return sometime during our visit.

Remember our friends Kelvin and Soohee? Well they are in Singapore! They are actually only here till the end of today and than are flying home to New Zealand. We met up with them in Little India to have a delicious traditional Indian lunch and explore Little India! How cool! They have also said that they are excited for us to visit New Zealand, but the truth is I think we are more excited!

We are in Singapore for….well we aren’t really sure. The visa here is 90 days so we aren’t in a hurry to leave and we are enjoying everything that this city has to offer. We will make sure to update as we start to make more plans, and will continue to update on our adventures around Singapore!

All our love!

Tara and Jonathan

Also we have a few questions: Since we are in a big city is there any really great movies we should see while we are here?

If any of you have been to Singapore are there places here that you think we have to see while here? I just found out from my Grandma that there is a "Cavanaugh Bridge" which just happens to be my mom's maiden name and she had suggestions of what else to see here. We would love suggestions!

Lastly is there anything Jonathan and I can do to make the blog more readable? Is there things that you want to hear about that we aren't writing about? More photos perhaps? Let us know! We REALLY want the feedback!