Friday, February 1, 2013

Places I want to visit: Philippines

Definitely I want to visit all the provinces in the Philippines

Hope that I will cross out all of them some day :)






Potipot, Candelaria Zambales


If you want to have a camping adventure you must try to visit the Potipot Island in Zambales. It’s a 5-6 hour drive from Manila.

You can ride a bus going straight to Sta. Cruz Zambales, Victory Liner Caloocan have the first trip to Sta. Cruz at 4:00 am, we arrived at the terminal at 3:30 am but there’s already a long line for Sta. Cruz bus, since we really can’t make it for the sta. Cruz bus we just rode the bus going to Iba Zambales. When arrived at Iba, we rode again an ordinary bus going to Sta.Cruz until we reached our Inn.

We stayed at Alta Nina Resort and the negotiation went well with Ms. Nina but we got a little disappointed with the service of her care taker, he’s not very accommodating like what we expect based on the reviews on the internet but the place is quite relaxing, they have a kitchen and grill place that you can use but you will be charge for it.

Potipot was just a small island, you can choose if you want to spend your night camping at the island or you will just have a day tour.

Island Rates

200 overnight

100 day tour

In our case we booked two rooms at a hotel but we spent our night at the island. So if you want to pay cheaper and you are fully armed with camping tools you have the choice of not booking a room if you want a more relaxing trip you can also try what we did after all the long drive we went straight to the accommodation and took a nap to rest, cooked food for lunch and for our baon at the island.

You can visit their market nearby for food. We forgot to bring containers for food but we managed to purchase some at the market as well. By the way, we got the number of the tricycle driver that sent us to Alta Nina so we just texted him when we are about to buy food in the market.

After preparing and all, at around 5:30pm we went to the island with our tents for an overnight. We planned to have a bonfire but unluckily, it rained L

Day 2

We woke up with a majestic view of the island. The sunrise and the coastal line made the view dramatic so we didn’t waste our time and enjoyed the white sand and the beach.

Since it was just a small island you can stroll and walk around and appreciate the scenery altogether. And while we are walking we saw our high schoolmates at the place as well.

We found out that there is a comfort rooms at the middle of the island so you can really stay here even without booking a hotel.

At around noon we went back to Alta Nina to freshen up and we also took a long rest before heading back to manila.

When we got to Victory Liner terminal, the bus going to Manila already left and the next trip will be in 3 hours, since it is too late for me and my boyfriend because we still have work tomorrow we decided to take a bus going to Olongapo and from there we took the last trip to Cubao that night.

It was indeed a long trip but we all had fun J


Pictures soon to upload :)
 

 

 

How to organize a hassle free trip



1.       Choose a place.

If it’s in the Philippines you can never get enough of beautiful places here. Try the most accessible places first.

2.       Research

Read articles on the internet about the place so you will not miss any attraction and activities that you can do for the trip.

3.       Cut the expense, Invite people

The more the merrier and truly way cheaper J it is really ideal for organizing a trip since you have a great number of participants, more people will split the expenses. You can always create an event in Facebook to have a wide discussion for the trip.

4.       Give timeframe, choose a date

Once you already have the list of participants choose a possible dates for the outing and make them vote which date is the most ideal for all. Make sure that you will give them time to prepare financially, give consideration for the pay day J

5.       Call and book.

This is the most challenging part, you really have to exert effort to find a decent place to stay, but remember, you will not go to that place to spend all of your time in the hotel, most of the time, you will be out to enjoy the place, the only use of the hotel is for sleeping so don’t look for the most expensive hotel, try to minimize the expenses. Consider the proximity as well.

6.       Get the final list.

When you already found a decent place to stay that can accommodate all of the tentative participants before depositing down payment get the final list first and;

7.       Collect and secure

After getting the price of hotel and other transportation such as van, boat, bus, and all other things that has fixed price, sum it up and divide it equally, post it on the Facebook event you created. And to secure the money give them options to deposit their share, you can always give them a bank account number, remittance center or if possible they can give it in cash. Make an agreement that it is non-refundable to eliminate the stress that last minute back out people will give you. On this set up, once they gave the money they will be more hesitant to back out.

8.       Update

Always inform them about the reservation and any other changes and issues that will occur after that, you are all good to go J

 

Have a happy trip J