The week-long PVMA convention had already come to its end, thus,
for today I could already be with my veterinarian friends on a trip to Sipalay,
Negros Occidental.
If you are planning for a good dive, either you can choose to be
in Lakawon Island, Capiz City, an hour from Bacolod city, or head towards south
and drive 5 hours to Sipalay, Negros Occidental.
And yes, we chose the latter.
Day 2
4:00 Wake up call
To catch one of the earliest trips
available, we woke up around 4am, packed our bags and checked out at the
pension house.
5:00 South Terminal
From the pension house, we took a
tricycle going to South terminal. The fare costs Php 30, and in a matter
of five minutes, we reached the terminal.
As soon as we were dropped off by
the tricycle driver, we climbed to the non-airconditioned bus bound to Sipalay,
Ceres Liner bus leaves every after 30 minutes from 2:30am to 8:00pm. Fare to
Sipalay is Php 170. There is a one air-conditioned bus trip scheduled at
2:00pm.
There was at least one stop-over during
the trip. To secure your seats, if you are to go down from a bus to have
your breakfast or go to comfort rooms, you might want to leave some of
your bags or pillows or anything that has of no much value, because if not,
you might found somebody else owning your seat, and you cannot just shoo them
away.
10:00 Sipalay town proper
For what seemed to be an eternity,
finally 5 hours later, we reached the town of Sipalay. But the problem
was, we did not make prior notice to resort owners and to reach the resorts
in Sipalay, one has to travel the narrow road by means of a habal-habal, which is
very limited or a service car provided by the resort.
Good thing that one of our travel
companions who was raised in Negros bumped into an old friend in Sipalay.
She got her pick-up and drove us to the nearest resort in Punta Ballo.
11:00 Robinsons Cruise
Beach Resort
Sipalay city is becoming a popular
travel destination especially among divers. There are many beaches in
Sipalay, most of which are yet to be discovered by travelers. One of these is Punta Ballo Beach, a
kilometer stretch of sugary sand beach.
Robinsons Cruise Beach Resort is
one of the first resorts we had seen in Punta Ballo. The resort offers
snorkeling and scuba diving.
After checking on their rooms, we
had decided to stay in the resort for a night. The standard
air-conditioned rooms are offered at Php 1,500 to Php 1,800 and cottages at Php
800.
12:00 Lunch
The resort has a
"bamboo-restaurant" serving Filipino and international dishes. We ordered
for nilagang baboy, rice and pancit. Foods are priced at Php120 on an average,
quite pricey for the taste.
1:30 Snorkeling
Sipalay is known for its rich and
undisturbed marine resources, a reason why many divers would list Sipalay
in their must-dive sites.
Two of our friends are licensed
scuba divers, and majority of us are not, so we settled for snorkeling
instead.
We hired for a
boat, Php 1,500, to lead us to the marine sanctuary
.
After a few minutes, our boat came
to a stop, we put on our vest and jumped into the water. It was drizzling
that afternoon. We thought that we would not be able to see much of the
fishes. Good thing the drizzling stopped. And indeed, Sipalay is a home to
diverse marine life.
Puerto Galera and Honda Bay in
Palawan are among the best snorkeling sites I've been to, and now Sipalay
joins my list.
We swam with the fishes, watched
them, saw the beautiful corals, enjoying the whole experience for almost
two hours.
4:00 Back to the
resort
The resort has a swimming pool,
and since we were the only ones in the resort at that time, my friends
took advantage of it.
7:00 Dinner
We had our dinner at a nearby
store. We had asked the store owner earlier if they could cook for us. We
gave them a fund enough to buy fresh crabs and fish and an additional fee
for the cooking service.
They had
prepared us grilled fish and crabs. It's the most "sulit" dinner I
ever had.
9:00 Time for a drink
And to end our day, after dinner,
we assembled table and chairs in front of the resort, bought some beers,
and shared some stories, most of which were about college life, while our
feet our soaked in a powdery Sipalay sand.
Lakawon Island Beach Resort
Cadiz Viejo, Cadiz City, Negros Occidental
Facilities: Non-Aircon and Aircon Cottages, Tables and four
chairs, Nipa Hut w/ Papag
Contact Nos. Tel: (034) 433-0808 / 434-7737
Robinson Cruse Beach Resort
Punta Ballo, Barangay 4
Sipalay City, Philippines
E-Mail: robinsoncruse@sipalay.com
Tel.:
0063 920 3318508 / (0063 920 8890139) Day
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