A Weekend at the Bohol Bee Farm

Bohol has long been at the top of our list of “Favorite Places in the Philippines”.  We love so many things about it: the undeveloped nature, the quality of the diving & snorkeling, the friendly people… the list goes on and on.  The only thing we weren’t so hot about was the resort we picked on our first visit over New Year’s.  Happily, last weekend the world was righted when we found ourselves perfectly at home in our “cottage by the sea” at the Bohol Bee Farm.

This charming place is the closest darn thing to a cabin that I’ve been at in a LONG TIME and let me tell you – IT FELT GOOD.  Truly, I loved every minute of it.  The veranda area overlooking the ocean, the open-air living room, the outdoor dining – it was the Anti-Manila!  For only $150 a night, we were able to share this lovely 2 BR place with our friends Andrea and Brian.  What a steal, huh?  Nick’s parents are already eyeing it for their visit here… any other takers?

We didn’t do much of substance all weekend – it was mostly composed of eating, napping and reading and snorkeling (check out those sea urchins below!).

The Bee Farm has a unique story.  The owners are a Filipina and an American (a married couple).  The place began with the cottage we stayed in and a small restaurant.  Due to the high-quality nature of the organic food they were producing, more and more people started showing up.  Eventually they started asking to stay overnight.  This led to the building of more overnight lodging and you could say it has grown organically from there (pun intended!)  It’s a wonderful example of a self-sustaining livelihood project.  The Filipino families that staff it are provided with stable jobs for all members of the family and they also get a place to live.  You could see on their faces how much they enjoyed working there.

So as I was saying, not only do they have the resort, but the organic food and product production as well.  They grow all the herbs and vegetables they serve at the restaurant and make a variety of food products as well.  They also do weaving and crafts, both of which are sold in the store.  It’s a brilliant concept that’s hard not to fall in love with.

Our good friends Andrea and Brian joined us for the weekend, along with their travel-savvy baby Leni.  Let me just say that Nick was more than a little bothered by the fact that we DID NOT blend when we had that adorable baby with us.  And here’s the wild thing – perfect strangers would just walk up to her and put out their arms and try to take her and hold her.  Ummm… we don’t do that in America!  UNCOMFORTABLE.  But that’s the thing, this is a baby-loving culture, so of course you would hand your baby over to any interested party…. glad I wasn’t the mommy making that decision!

My camera absolutely LOVED this baby.  She’s just so darn photogenic!  Here are a few of my favorites…

And here’s the part where we try being “fake parents” and then decide it’s exhausting and hand her back as soon as the crying starts…  :)  Doesn’t Nick look the part though?  Check back at a later date and see if we feel like forfeiting our nap time yet…

The low point of the weekend would be when Brian lost his wedding band snorkeling!  BOO.  Our hearts were warmed though when the local dive shop came and spent 90 minutes in the water looking for it, FREE OF CHARGE.  Did I mention that this place rocks?  Alas, it wasn’t meant to be found…

I think I’ll leave you with one of my favorite shots of the weekend – yet another stunning Philippines sunset.  The beauty of this place never fails to astound me!  And if you like these, you’ll definitely want to check out the remaining 200 pics at SMUGMUG.

My Failed SCUBA Attempt

Just got home from a long 3-day weekend spent in Batangas, in the Southern part of Luzon (the island Manila is on).  We’ll just cut right to the chase – YES, IT’S TRUE.  I FAILED AT SCUBA.  Seriously, if there’s one thing I hate, it’s failing.  It stings just writing it.  But I tell you, SCUBA and I just never clicked.  And it was not for lack of trying because I worked my butt off to get it and I still SUCKED.  How miserably depressing to admit defeat and disappoint my amazing partner who had dreams of us SCUBAing together off into the sunset.  Here’s a recap of how the weekend played out…

We took off from Manila at 6 AM on Saturday morning to beat traffic.  We stopped at a fabulous little breakfast place called Bag of Beans in Tagaytay on the way.  It was a beautiful morning and the farther we got from the city, the fresher the air got.  It was delightful!  We should have known that it was going too well – no traffic, a nice breakfast, good weather.  Far too perfect for Manila.  As we were nearing the final drive segment, the driver asked for directions to Balite (Bah-lee-tay) and we followed this windy road for about 30 minutes and arrived in a random town not at all near the ocean.  SURPRISE- wrong Balite!  We need the BalEte (Bah-lEE-tay) with an E!  Who names two cities near each other a same phonetically-sounding name???  That’s ludicrous!  So back we went down the windy road for 30 minutes, asking directions 10 more times until we finally reached our destination at 10 AM.  Now that’s more like what we’ve come to expect from Manila…. The result: we had to cancel our morning pool session and push it to the afternoon.  Fine with me, I always prefer to eat before working!

The resort was a 5 minute boat ride from the drop-off spot, only accessible via water.  The resort is owned by Carmela and Arnel, a couple that live in Manila.  Arnel is a full-time Dive Master, but Carmela still holds a traditional office job.  They come down each weekend to run the resort.  They started out wanting to own property that they could dive from frequently and it morphed into a resort from there.  It reminded me a lot of a bed and breakfast that focuses on diving.  We definitely felt like guests in their home – it was very intimate and all the guests were incredibly social.  Location was superb, resort had a cool vibe and the dive facilities and instructors were excellent.  If I was to ask for a few upgrades, it’d be a softer bed and better food (I’m done with rice for awhile).

Classes started right after lunch.  I started to freak out when I realized that they expected me to put the big, huge, heavy tank on my back and walk over to the pool and take a giant stride into the pool.  Problems with this scenario: I do not like lifting heavy things (I had convinced myself that tanks could always be put on in the water), I’m not coordinated enough to carry heavy things and gracefully land in the water AND what if I hit my head on the tank on the way in (which I could easily see myself doing).  Alas, this was only the first of many challenges.  Happily, I did manage to safely make it into the pool.  It went downhill from there – couldn’t remove my mask and put it back on (water kept flooding up my nose, causing me to choke).  Didn’t even attempt the skill after that because I was so water-logged.  It was not pretty.

I was wiped after 2 hours in the pool, but the instructor insisted that we go try an ocean dive.  I tried to delay it, but he insisted.  The low point of the day was being towed around the reef by the Dive Master because I couldn’t figure out the buoyancy thing.  I am not over-exaggerating: he pulled me around by my jacket!  And to top it off, my mask fogged the whole time, so I couldn’t enjoy the beautiful fish.  SIGH… Nick and I talked about it at dinner that night and I made the decision to stop.  It was obvious to both of us that this wasn’t meant to be.

Apparently the instructor agreed.  When I went to tell him my decision, his reply was, “Good choice.  It’s always better when the student comes to that decision themselves.”  Translation: I wasn’t going to pass you anyways.  Thanks for saving me the tough conversation.

Nick was obviously pretty disappointed but we had some great conversation around it and I felt fully supported in my choice.  I am grateful for having such a wonderful partner!  And so the search for our shared couple’s activity continues…. potential options we’re exploring are: Bird Watching, Ballroom Dancing, Badminton, Photography and Boating to name a few.  Don’t worry, I’ll keep you updated on our progress.  We are realizing now that the tough thing about being opposites is that you don’t like the same activities!

We failed to get a picture of me in the equipment ( I promise I really did do it)!  I also have included a video of the boat unloading procedure that all guests go through- it was wild stuff!  Sorry this is so lengthy!  Part 2 will come tomorrow… Sad story over for today.

THE END.

Off to Batangas for a Diving Adventure!

Here we go… I’m off to get up close and personal with the marine life of the Philippines.  3 days of pool sessions and open-water ocean dives!  I have some serious concerns about my stamina but I’m holding out hope that my body will pleasantly surprise me!  We’re heading down to Batangas in Southern Luzon, the island that Manila is located on.  Even on a Saturday, we have to head out in the wee hours of the morning to avoid traffic (which would change it from a 2.5 hour drive to a 5+ hour drive!)  Rest assured that on Tuesday I’ll be back with a full recap of the resort and my experiences with diving!  Enjoy your weekends!