I awoke to a cock-a-doodle-doo. The sun rises at around 5:30 in the Philippines and so it is much easier to wake up at 6 or 7 because all of the birds are singing. We went and had our complimentary breakfast down at the restaurant and waited in the lobby until 8:00 because that was when we were scheduled to go see the Underground River, one of the 7 New Wonders of the World.
There was another family going on the trip, an Australian woman with her Ecuadorian husband, and the woman's parents. They are from Melbourne, on the southern tip of Australia, above Tasmania. Really fun people.
Before we leave, we have to leave all of our cash, passports, phones, and items of any importance in the safe at the front desk. I would soon learn that it wasn't the best idea to leave my phone behind at the hotel. Our tour guide, William, soon arrives. He was very genial, which is a very common personality trait among Filipinos. We walked to the village down the beach where our boat was waiting. At the village, there were quite a few souvenir shops set up, including one with at least 30 different patterned fedoras. I, for some reason, really like hats, and so I wanted to buy one, at which point I remembered that we left all of our money at the hotel. I vowed that I would buy one before the end of the trip. We walk to a covered area nearby a building with speakers playing feel-good songs from the 60's and 70's.
Because the bamboo is so sturdy in this area, all of the small boats have an upper frame with two extensions that sit in the water to help the boat balance. We climb into one of these covered motorboats, all 9 of us (William had a partner, Joseph, that didn't say much) not including the two boatmen. They start the motor, and it drowns out any attempt at conversation, so we mostly sat in silence and stared in wonder at the beautiful scene passing us by. I was complaining a lot to Rebecca that we left my phone at the hotel because I couldn't take pictures of this beautiful scenery. William took notice of this, and let me borrow his camera when we arrived at the Underground River entrance. What a great guy.
We get to the beach in front of the UR, with a big wooden sign saying "Underground River" and there is a path that leads into the jungle. It's not very long and soon there is a gathering area with a bathroom and crawling with macaques (monkeys) and monitor lizards. There is another path that leads to the river itself, and it is made of planks and not very even. On either side of is super dense jungle. Finally, it opens up to a platform with life vests and helmets and similar boats but smaller and not covered. Dad was volunteered to sit at the front of the boat and hold the spotlight because it gets pretty darn dark in there.
We enter the River on our boat and there are constantly boats coming and going in and out of the cave and the sounds of tour guides echo around. The whole trip takes about 45 minutes, in and out. The Underground River is home to many thousands of bats and so the whole time, the cave smells slightly like sesame oil, which is actually bat guano. Apparently bat guano makes fantastic fertilizer, but the area is protected so the natives can't go in and take it. The roof is also constantly dripping fresh water infused with whatever is on the roof of the cave, so afterwards everyone wanted to take a shower.
The tour guide would tell Dad which direction to point his spotlight to point out specific rock formations. A thing I noticed was that when he pointed out a rock that looked like something, it was a religious reference most of the time. For example, that rock looks like the face of Jesus, or that rock looks like the Virgin Mary. Near the entrance was a restricted bat cave, holding something like 10,000 bats.
The full Underground River tour takes about 2-3 hours, but it is generally not open to the public because it requires a special permit to go into, and the permit is tedious to get. The tour guide said that in the restricted area there were crystal deposits and other interesting things.
The tour guide split up the cave into sections. There was the entrance, the Cathedral, the Grocery Store, and maybe another, I'm not sure that had the highest point in the cavern, something like 60 meters high. The Cathedral held the widest point, around 120 meters. The Grocery Store was aptly named. Many of the rock formations vaguely resembled vegetables. The Cathedral was called the Cathedral because it was a huge space. It probably echoed if we spoke loud enough. On the way out of the cave, the guide pointed out some graffiti by American soldiers. The date written by the soldiers was '37.
As we exited the cave, we spotted a large group of young attractive women. I believe someone said that they were competing for Miss Philippines. We saw them both at an area behind the main camp area where some animals were doing animal things. We also saw them back by the boats posing for group pictures. All of the boatmen were off to the side staring at all of the girls.
We climbed back into the boat and headed back to the resort. I took so many pictures now that I had a camera. That area is so beautiful. The mountain that is above the Underground River is called the Sleeping Giant because the area directly above the river resembles a head, and a nearby peak looks like his knees are up.
We lounged for a while before it was time to go on the Mangrove forest tour which will be the next post.
There was another family going on the trip, an Australian woman with her Ecuadorian husband, and the woman's parents. They are from Melbourne, on the southern tip of Australia, above Tasmania. Really fun people.
Before we leave, we have to leave all of our cash, passports, phones, and items of any importance in the safe at the front desk. I would soon learn that it wasn't the best idea to leave my phone behind at the hotel. Our tour guide, William, soon arrives. He was very genial, which is a very common personality trait among Filipinos. We walked to the village down the beach where our boat was waiting. At the village, there were quite a few souvenir shops set up, including one with at least 30 different patterned fedoras. I, for some reason, really like hats, and so I wanted to buy one, at which point I remembered that we left all of our money at the hotel. I vowed that I would buy one before the end of the trip. We walk to a covered area nearby a building with speakers playing feel-good songs from the 60's and 70's.
Because the bamboo is so sturdy in this area, all of the small boats have an upper frame with two extensions that sit in the water to help the boat balance. We climb into one of these covered motorboats, all 9 of us (William had a partner, Joseph, that didn't say much) not including the two boatmen. They start the motor, and it drowns out any attempt at conversation, so we mostly sat in silence and stared in wonder at the beautiful scene passing us by. I was complaining a lot to Rebecca that we left my phone at the hotel because I couldn't take pictures of this beautiful scenery. William took notice of this, and let me borrow his camera when we arrived at the Underground River entrance. What a great guy.
We get to the beach in front of the UR, with a big wooden sign saying "Underground River" and there is a path that leads into the jungle. It's not very long and soon there is a gathering area with a bathroom and crawling with macaques (monkeys) and monitor lizards. There is another path that leads to the river itself, and it is made of planks and not very even. On either side of is super dense jungle. Finally, it opens up to a platform with life vests and helmets and similar boats but smaller and not covered. Dad was volunteered to sit at the front of the boat and hold the spotlight because it gets pretty darn dark in there.
We enter the River on our boat and there are constantly boats coming and going in and out of the cave and the sounds of tour guides echo around. The whole trip takes about 45 minutes, in and out. The Underground River is home to many thousands of bats and so the whole time, the cave smells slightly like sesame oil, which is actually bat guano. Apparently bat guano makes fantastic fertilizer, but the area is protected so the natives can't go in and take it. The roof is also constantly dripping fresh water infused with whatever is on the roof of the cave, so afterwards everyone wanted to take a shower.
The tour guide would tell Dad which direction to point his spotlight to point out specific rock formations. A thing I noticed was that when he pointed out a rock that looked like something, it was a religious reference most of the time. For example, that rock looks like the face of Jesus, or that rock looks like the Virgin Mary. Near the entrance was a restricted bat cave, holding something like 10,000 bats.
The full Underground River tour takes about 2-3 hours, but it is generally not open to the public because it requires a special permit to go into, and the permit is tedious to get. The tour guide said that in the restricted area there were crystal deposits and other interesting things.
The tour guide split up the cave into sections. There was the entrance, the Cathedral, the Grocery Store, and maybe another, I'm not sure that had the highest point in the cavern, something like 60 meters high. The Cathedral held the widest point, around 120 meters. The Grocery Store was aptly named. Many of the rock formations vaguely resembled vegetables. The Cathedral was called the Cathedral because it was a huge space. It probably echoed if we spoke loud enough. On the way out of the cave, the guide pointed out some graffiti by American soldiers. The date written by the soldiers was '37.
As we exited the cave, we spotted a large group of young attractive women. I believe someone said that they were competing for Miss Philippines. We saw them both at an area behind the main camp area where some animals were doing animal things. We also saw them back by the boats posing for group pictures. All of the boatmen were off to the side staring at all of the girls.
We climbed back into the boat and headed back to the resort. I took so many pictures now that I had a camera. That area is so beautiful. The mountain that is above the Underground River is called the Sleeping Giant because the area directly above the river resembles a head, and a nearby peak looks like his knees are up.
We lounged for a while before it was time to go on the Mangrove forest tour which will be the next post.
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