Oslab was not a city or town as much as a collection hastily built hostels and cheap hotels for tourists to stay for a single night in order to wake up early and see the sharks. We highly doubt anyone stays multiple nights. By the time we had finished with the sharks, breakfast, showers, and packing, it was still only 7:30am. We headed off to the bus for Moalboal, our next destination.
We had no plans in Moalboal, no hotel, and no interest in looking things up, but what's an adventure without a little mystery? Multiple people had recommended the place, so we went there confident the place was interesting, based on the name alone. Moalboal. Mo-All-Bo-All. It's fun to say and fun to read. Moalboal.
From our hotel in Oslob we caught a bus for 25p to Bato, 45 minutes south. From there we transferred to an AC bus to Moalboal. Regular price 110 pesos, student price 86 pesos. Score. On the 2.5 hour ride we got around to finding hotels and activities in the area until we arrived on the main road of Moalboal which connects the three beaches of the town, Pasagama, White Beach, and Laguma. We went to 2/3.
We selected Rosita's Cottage in the direction of Pasagama. Online blogs agree that 50 pesos is a fair cost for a ride to Pasagama beach, but it still took a while to get that price. Later that week we found out the true price was 10p per person, so we overspent by 30 pesos (60 cents). We say it again. It's not about the money. It's the mistreatment of tourists and expectance for us to pay double, triple, quadruple than the locals.
At Rosita’s we were shown the sanitary, quaint, yet comfortable room. From 1,400 pesos we fenagled down to 1,000. Outside the door was a non-cooking kitchen, with a fridge, plates, utensils, a water jug, and a kettle. Wasting no time, we left our bugs in the room and headed out to the beach to snorkel. Aside from lounging on the beach there, that's the main attraction. The town consists of a few main streets lined with restaurants, hotels, massage parlors, bars, clothing stores, diving companies, mini markets, and other tourist shops. If this sounds familiar, it's become it looks like every other town in Southeast Asia. Running parallel to the main strip is a kilometer long unattractive beach. The real beauty was inside the water.
We laid out our towel (we only have one between the two of us), left our sunglasses and sandals, and strapped on our snorkel masks. Once inside, after swimming passed enchanting coral reefs with a spectacular drop off (Nemo reference anyone?), we greeted by THOUSANDS of sardines. It wasn't a school of fish, it was a university.
The current pulled us south, continuing to see a large variety of fish, a few jellyfish, and colorful coral. Along the way, we crossed paths with a three foot turtle! Since the water was so shallow, only a few feet deep, it meant we could see the turtle close up! It was feeding on sea bushes next to the coral right in front of without a care in the word. The little green seaweed looking plants on the floor of the water is certainly not called a sea bush, but whatever. That's what we're going with. Swimming with turtles was what we had been waiting for the past few months in SE Asia. Back in Port Barton on Palawan, we signed up for the island hopping tour with a promise to see multiple turtles, but we only saw one or two, but they were on the move so we didn't get to spend much time with them. But here we were, face to face with this beautiful reptile who didn't seem to mind our presence. After we said our goodbye, we came across another one, and another one. We ended up seeing four in the span of a couple hours. It was a wonderful afternoon. The only negative was that Ben saw a Filipino father with two small children grab a turtle by the back of its shell and pull it towards himself so it couldn't swim away. They all laughed, along with other Filipinos in the water. He would have said something, but it was impossible underwater :/
The following day, January 23 in the 2020th year of our Lord, we had plans to go to White Beach, a bit further up the coast. A bit more off the track, less touristy, we wanted to see check our the reefs and turtles. We woke up lazy and undetermined to move, so we basically repeated the activities of the day prior. We also tasted the famous Filipino appetizer lumpia. More snorkeling resulted in more fish and turtles :)
We knew we had a week until our flight to Macau/Macao from Cebu City, so we drew up a rough plan to inch our way up the coast, exploring beach towns and untouched beaches. Every day we found a new reason not to leave Rosita's. The place had serviceable WiFi connection, decent location, somewhat comfortable beds, respectable neighbors, and hot water. Aside from 30 minutes one night, we had electricity the entire time.
Each day we tried to do something new and interesting. After our second day at Pasagama Beach, we ate our oatmeal and banana breakfast and went to White Beach. Unable to locate the public tricycles, we were still paying more than double the local price, but still half of what most tourists were paying. 50 pesos got us into Moalboal town, but still decidedly short of White Beach. Another 50 peso ride took us the remaining 5 kilometers to the beach, where we were forced to pay some public servants another 5 pesos each to enter, non-negotiable, for environmental tax, or something. It's pure poppycock. The beaches have trash on them and the locals stomp on the corals and treat the sea with utter disrespect, so where does the money go?
On White Beach we found a changaro on the water for some chicken and rice, and to enjoy a lovely view.
Armed with our underwater gear, we attacked the water, eager to find more turtles and Bezrat HaShem, clown fish. The current was really strong, making it different to stay in one place. The waves were nearly swallowing us whole, occasionally reaching the top of our snorkels. The turtles must have been turned off by the strength of the water and stayed away that day. We did, however, see quite a few clownfish. Not as many as in Siquijor, but they were home and available. We laid out for a while, soaking up the last bit of the sun before we left Southeast Asia and into colder pastures of China, Japan, and Korea.
Usually tricycles are a dime a dozen, so the bargaining power is with the rider. In White Beach, it's the opposite. Few visitors means few drivers means options. We knew we beat and wouldn't get the price we desired, which in all honesty, is the fair price. Unsure of how to proceed, and unable to counter the offers of laughing drivers who showed us no pity, we walked down the road hoping for a miracle. Within seconds of sticking out our seasoned thumbs, we caught a ride with two Filipino men who were visiting from out of town. G-d is good. Not only did we not spend a couple bucks and sticking it to the condescending drivers, we had a really nice conversation with two local countrymen. The guy riding shotgun worked on an oil tanker and had traveled the world twice over, hence where his kindness and understanding to pick us up comes from. Travelers respect other travelers. The driver was quiet yet friendly, probably due to his poor English skills.
Back in Moalboal, we wandered around until we finally found the public tricycle station, if you can call it that, tucked behind the produce market. We had been asking around for it, but most people would laugh at us and insist there was no public transport. It was rude and annoying, but eventually we found enough decent human beings to point us in the right direction. It was here we found the real price of 10 pesos per person, saving us an extra dollar or two worth of rides every day. Considering we were only spending about $30 a day total, saving $2 a day is no small change!
Back at Rosita's, Nadine hung out in the room to do her band exercises while Ben found a pick-up basketball game on a run down, so he suited up and eagerly ran off to participate. The game ended minutes after he arrived, and the players went home. Dejectedly, Ben pivoted and went to a British owned gym to get a work out in.
Dinner that night was at the Three Bears restaurant. Chicken and coleslaw.
We had been hearing all week about these majestic waterfalls an hour south called Kawasan Falls. Raving reviews online confirmed its beauty. In the morning, we packed out belongings for the tiyul and hit the road in search of a ride. Ben worked his magic, exchanged words with a woman in a pick up truck, and summoned Nadine over to hop into the truck bed with him. Hitchhike numero tres! From Moalboal town, we found a bus to Kawasan for a student discounted 28 pesos. Tours from Moalboal are 1,500-3,000 ($30-60) per person, but after paying 90p total for our entry fees, we did the trip ourselves for under $4. Thank goodness we didn't spend that money too, because the waterfalls flatted out sucked. As is the case in most places we have visited, it's because of the locals, not the nature itself. Hundreds of Filipino adults and children infested the waters, dirtying the surrounding area with plastic bottles and food wrappers. Even without the people, the waterfalls were unimpressive. To be fair, after visiting Iceland, every waterfall we have seen in the past three years since then have not been able to hold a candle to those of Iceland. We snapped a few pictures, mostly of stray dogs, and headed to the bus home for more chicken at Three Bears. We also ordered Coca Colas, which is only notable because we have basically been soda free for the entire trip. This was probably our second or third in five months. Ben had been feeling sick that day and needed the Coke as a pick me up.
It was also around this time the Coronavirus began to become known. More on this later.
The following day Ben was still suffering from his illness, his congestion, body aches, and overall crappiness was overwhelming, so a rest day was taken before we would need to move forward with the trip. We have been burning the candle on both ends, so getting sick was inevitable. The last thing we needed was to enter China under the weather and susceptible to coronavirus. We walked around town, played some darts, and ate some food at Chief Mau's.
Finally the day arrived when we needed to leave Rosita's, Pasagama, Moalboal, and ultimately the island of Cebu. We made one final stop Chief Mau's for our last meal, took some takeaway for later, and used our now expert skills to getting a tricycle at local prices. We found the bus stop, gambled on whether it had AC or not (it did), and made our exit. Goodbye Moalboal. You've been good to us.
Nadine once again score us student prices of 125, saving 42p total. The ride was 2.5 hours, bumpy, and stopped frequently. By the time we arrived in Cebu City, Nadine was ready to puke.
With both of us feeling ill, neither of us had had the strength to find a hotel online for our lone night Cebu City. The next morning we had a 9am flight to Macau, so we needed to find a place near the airport. We found a coffee shop for Nadine to sit and reserve a hotel, while Ben went off solo in search of masks to wear in China, only to find every single pharmacy and store were out of stock, both of masks and hand sanitizer, which he had already purchased in Moalboal.
A 1.5h bus ride through the jam-packed city took us to our hotel, which was this odd combination of hotel/restaurant/church. From our room we could hear loud singing prayers coming from downstairs, so we went down and admired for a while. Again, Ben headed out for masks, but came back an hour later with no masks, but six sticks of various meats.
It was a long, trying day of travel and very little fun, but we remained in good spirits with Macau, Hong Kong, and our cruise on deck!
That night Ben went out to get masks and came back with 6 sticks of different meats. All together it was a pretty uneventful night. The next morning we had our flight to Macau via Manila.
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