After the rain started coming down in Siargao, it became impossible to dry any of our clothes. I wore the same shirt and shorts every day. We decided to take a small trip to Leyte Island. It took two ferry rides, the first to Surigao City, and the second to Illoan on the eastern island of Leyte. The ferry schedule is reliable and usually there are several different ferrys routes to get where you need to go.
Once off of the ferry Jess and I walked around with our backpacks for a while to see what was around the area. We wondered where we should go from there. We were pretty sure that there was a place to stay an hour bus ride north so as soon as we saw one drive by we jumped on.
Well from there everything fell into place....I sat next to a woman who happened to speak english, to be the niece of the chairmen of conservation for the whale-shark tourism, who is also a pastor of the local church. She called and arranged a home-stay with her family there in the small barrio of Son-Ok, the center of whale shark activity in Sogod Bay. We happily accepted her offer. If there ever was a sign from God saying "I've got everything covered, just go with it"....this was the time. We got off of the bus with her walked down a hill toward the barrio cradled inside of a bay formed inside of a towering cliff line.
We stayed in a bedroom of this nice family's house. Our hosts were Armay and her husband Reggy. Jess and I settled in pretty well there, the family made our meals for us and we were able to hang out with the family throughout the day, though much of our time was spent in the water.
The day after we arrived we arranged our trip out to find the whale shark (aka tiki-tiki), we went out with our guide Pastor Ernesto and started the search. They have a set routine for spotting the tiki-tiki. There are two small boats with a spotter in each who go out and search while you are in a boat with a guide who is also looking. Of coarse, the more eyes the better to watch for them and it is a good business for the local people. Many of the resorts from across the bay have guided tours arranged by the Pastor. They come over in the resort boats and meet up with the spotters and guide from Son-Ok. We enjoyed paddling around in the three person bangka boat. Our experience felt much more natural than I imagine it would have been with the resort. We did not see anything for the first three hours so it was decided that we would go have some lunch. Just before we started to eat one of our spotters ran up to the house yelling "tiki-tiki! tiki-tiki!!" Wow, what a whirlwind it was as we grabbed our gear and raced to put on our snorkel gear. We ran out to the banka and paddled over to where we saw two resort boats floating next to a bunch of snorkeling tourists....there it was the largest fish in the ocean. They live to be 70 years old on average and dive up to 700 meters deep.
We swam with a whale-shark. This was accomplished on our first day there and the pressure was off. From then on we snorkeled on our own in the protected marine sanctuary and saw many beautiful fish and sea snakes. We stayed in a families' home where all of the meals were made for us and we enjoyed the people. On Sunday we were invited to visit the pastor's church and to share an encouraging word with the congregation. It was a very good time. Pastor Ernesto took us around on his motor bike and gave us a tour of the area. We were blessed with this whole experience. It was more than we had hoped for.
Jess and I were the first tourist staying in Son-Ok of the season. We were given the special privileged of snorkeling in a preserved marine sanctuary. The whole reef was amazing. There were so many fish of all size shape and color. The coral was beautiful as well. Jesse and I saw many lion fish, damsels, and fire fish, also our swim was joined by a sea snake just under five feet long!! One of the days Jesse saw a manta ray around six feet wide from wing to wing. We had a beautiful time.
After spending four nights in Son-Ok Jess and I moved on to the other side of the Bay to a small town called Padre Burgos. This area doesn't have a lot of tourism but those who do come show up for the scuba diving. There are several amazing dive trips that can be made here, and many of them are taken right off of the shore. We decided to do two boat dives with one of the guides from the resort. Both were drift dives and were such an amazing experience! There were giant barrel corals as well as some that were splayed out like lace tables larger than eight feet in diameter with a couple hundred bright blue fish weaving their way through these massive coral homes.. This trip gave me a new excitement for scuba diving. But aside from the diving Jess and I went out snorkeling every day up and down the reef in front of our room. The variety of soft coral was amazing. All of them were various shades of red, yellow, peach, melon.... it was beautiful. We could see from our room when sea turtles were swimming around in front of the resort, so we would grab our snorkel gear and go out to the water. One morning we saw four turtles in the half hour that we were out. Here we also saw many more lion fish, sea snakes, and I had the priveledge of seeing a cuttle fish.
We met an awesome couple here, he was from Sweden, and she from Chile. Together we visited an orphanage nearby run by a German man. It was really good to see how it is run. There are around nine houses all with about 6-8 kids per house. Each house is created to simulate a family home. There is a house mother who cooks the meals and is a parent for the kids. Every Saturday all of the houses dine together and enjoy a movie. The whole thing is done very well. There is an area on the side of the property with livestock and building materials, where the kids can learn some everyday skills needed for Filipino life.
We ran into a friend from Siargao twice while we were in southern Leyte. We met a few diving instructors through him and learned a bit more about the wealth of sea life in the area. I would love to return to Leyte to do some more diving, there is so much more to see in the area. Next time around I suppose...
No comments:
Post a Comment