I promised I will keep you updated with throwback travel stories so because it's been days, perhaps a week now so I decided to finish our Busuanga trip with this article.
Disclaimer: Long article and photo overload!
The last episode was our remarkable feeding of the Giraffes and how we adored the Calamian deers as well as the Zebras and all the rest of the animals in Calauit. You may read the full story in the articles below:
But first, thanks to all my generous sponsors! You guys rock!
Our group managed to get back to Busuanga Island after the pursuits we've done at Calauit. A lot of other tourists had arrived at the Safari park and since we were the first ones to come, we were also the first ones to leave.
Our other companions didn't avail of the island hopping tour and I was thinking of backing out but according to the agency representative, the boat that will take us to our island-hopping adventure was already waiting for us and so we have no option but to continue with this venture. My reason though was that we already had a long day yesterday at the seawaters and we thought we might see the same kind of underwater here in Busuanga too so why bother? But, we just had to show up instead because we already agreed on this.
Private Island Hopping?
I felt like it was a private island hopping experience as we have a bigger boat but we were the only ones in it. Unlike in Coron where the port is filled with tourist boats, this one in Busuanga didn't have many, I don't even know which place where we dropped by the van but it was somewhere in the town.
We were greeted immediately by the boatmen, there were three of them. We already had lunch so there shouldn't be a problem if we were already departing at past lunchtime.
Another Shipwreck
I had been looking up references on specific island-hopping spots in Busuanga but I always ended up being referred to Coron's Island Hopping so forgive me I had forgotten the name of this shipwreck but it is yet another Japanese ship.
The time it took for us to reach here was perhaps 15 minutes from the port. It started with just us in the area then a huge private boat came and more than 20 tourists, locals, and foreigners went down the boat. I regret not taking note of what that boat's name was because it was such a cool one where a tourist can tarry in it for days while it travels to different islands and spots within Busuanga and Coron.
This shipwreck is visible from the boat and swimming in there, it won't be that tiring as we can stand on one of the boat's parts. There's a hallowed part of the boat where those who are good at swimming can get in and exit at the other side. Again, none of us could do that but one of the other tourists did, we were all jealous!
There were attractive corals and sea creatures that had already occupied the ship. The fishes here are again plentiful, they were not even fed but they would go here and there like they were socializing with us.
My husband spotted a clownfish too protecting its little one. James tried getting near them but they are territorial and would attack the camera. But gladly, he got a good shot on his first attempt.
The water was rough on the surface so when snorkeling, it was hard to stay afloat, we could easily be carried by the water current. So after a few minutes, we decided to get back to the boat and rest. The boatmen asked if we should go to the next spot and we nodded.
The final look of the ship before moving.
Coral Garden
We only had three locations for this afternoon's island hopping and the next one was the coral garden. I was very excited about this as its name prompted me to imagine a huge area with corals, alive and colorful.
As the boatman positioned the boat to a safe spot, away from any coral, we started snorkeling. It was a carefree kind of snorkeling as one of our boatmen carried us from boat point to the end of the coral garden.
I was pointing my action camera here and there to capture all the sides of this garden but I noticed that the corals were bleaching! I mean it was evident that a huge part of it is losing its vibrance although there were still alive ones, we even spotted some giant clams!
I had a 12-minute long video of the coral garden and most of the time, the view looks like this in the photo. It was a little disturbing for me, I have learned about coral bleaching and it means that the water becomes too warm, the algae expel from the coral, living the coral tissues white. Although they are not yet dead, they can actually survive such an event but when this occurs it means the corals are stressed and it might be subject to mortality.
Global warming is indeed real and to think that it was 2017 when we did this travel, I don't have an idea how the coral garden looks now.
The field indeed covers a huge area of corals, if they were not bleaching, this could have been a beautiful sight. But the fishes present here were super friendly and so abundant too! The boatmen dropped some rice in the waters and hundreds came like crazy! We had our time taking photos and videos while they were having a feeding frenzy!
Here's my brother and wife enjoying the presence of these fishes:
Now off to the next...
Pass Island
Our last and final destination was on this white sand island. Getting here took a lot of time and we also passed by so many other islands of Busuanga, thus it's called Pass island. According to the boatmen, most of these islands are private ones owned by famous artists and politicians as well as the wealthy families of the country. I guess Manny Pacquiao owns one.
Powdery white sand with a great front view of the Calamian islands as well as a rich coral area near the shore is usually the last spot of island hopping tours in Busuanga. Upon entry, we noticed that there were a lot of tourists in there, mostly foreigners such as Koreans and Chinese, there were also Caucasians sunbathing.
There are settlements on the island and there are also houses for rent here. Tents for guests to rest are present too and buko! We got ourselves some freshly picked buko and we just took our time here.
We found a well in the center of the island, some locals were playing basketball too and the husband and brother tried to join in. We had quite a long time staying there, it was also a great time to just relax and rest before heading back to Busuanga.
Pawikan!
It was time to say goodbye and on our way back to the port, we were so sleepy, we all were tired from all the swimming we did. I couldn't help but close my eyes but the boatmen shouted and we looked towards the direction he was pointing, a sea turtle! A huge one! It peaked out of the water and then it dived back into the dark blue-green body of water.
I only had a short glimpse of it but it brought an excitement that I didn't get to sleep back! I was looking here and there, hoping that the turtle might emerge again, but no. We reached the port where our van was waiting.
We headed back to Coron and rested for the whole afternoon. Next stop, I will share with you some photographs of Coron's Lualhati Park. For now, you might want to check the following other travel blogs:
xoxo,
mommy jean of momentswithmatti
Love harder than any pain you've ever felt.
Blue blue blueeee 🤩💥 pag ganyan naman kaganda ang sasalubong sa papasyalan ko na lugar. Mas gugustuhin ko nalang ma jan tumira 🤩💙. Ang gandaaas huehue 🤩