February 22, 2009 - Filed under Drinks, Planning, Scuba Diving, Travel, Weekly Report
With a week left before we head to Thailand, we’ve attempted to mark off the last few random things remaining on our Philippines checklist…
#1. Try San Miguel Strong Ice
We’ve never seen anyone drinking it. Is it a cider? Nope, it turns out that it’s yet another pale pilsen. This time its ice filtered and packing a bit more of a punch. 6.3% alcohol, making it a close second to Red Horse Strong Beer.
Posted by: Shim
February 21, 2009 - Filed under Planning
Ever thought about spending a couple of months in the Philippines, but weren’t sure where to start? We’ve teamed up with Location Independent to bring you a guide to living in Dumaguete, as a traveling freelancer, digital nomad, location independent professional, or whatever label you prefer.
The guide contains information on:
To find out more, or purchase a guide ($7) visit locationindependent.com
Posted by: Shim
February 20, 2009 - Filed under Foto Friday
February 17, 2009 - Filed under Scuba Diving, Underwater Photography, Weekly Report
The battery pack on my strobe light broke again. This is the second time it’s happened in the last 6 months and as you can probably imagine I’m less than impressed. It couldn’t have come at worse time either. We’re nearing the end of our stay here in the Philippines, and there isn’t enough time to get a replacement shipped before we leave so, it’ll have to wait till we get to Thailand. I’m really bummed as there were a couple of dive sites I wanted to return to, to capture a few last shots to remember them by.
Despite this, Mike and I did a couple of dives this week anyway. It’s still beautiful and I love it, but I kept wanting to take pictures of all the cute little critters. I think it’s definitely gonna take me a while to get used to diving without my camera. Hopefully I can figure out how to replace it once we get to Thailand, but until then here are the last of my underwater pictures.
Posted by: Shim
February 9, 2009 - Filed under Weekly Report
We’ve mentioned before that we’ve been getting a lot of bad weather lately. It’s been raining off and on all week, but this weekend we definitely saw the worst of it. Saturday morning Raina and I decided to go into town for a massage. It had been raining all morning, but like I said, lately that’s been kind of the norm.
We took the El Dorado shuttle into Dumaguete, and headed for Nuat Thai. Mike and I had been there before, and although not the best massages we’ve ever had, better than a couple other places we’ve been since arriving in the Philippines. Unfortunately Raina ended up getting the short straw and had a less than enjoyable massage. In fact I think she described it as “borderline abusive”. Anyway, when we walked out an hour later, the rain was coming down harder than I’ve ever seen and puddles were starting to form in the streets. We considered taking a trike back instead of waiting for two hours for the shuttle, but reconsidered when we realized how wet we’d get. We had lunch at Why Not Bar, and watched, as the rain continued to fall and the water continued to rise.
Posted by: Kelly
February 4, 2009 - Filed under Eats, Random Factoid
…until you expose them to air. Much like people in speedos, too much exposure makes you nasty. Yet still cheesy.
Posted by: Shim
February 3, 2009 - Filed under Drinks, Eats, Entertainment, Scuba Diving, Stuff to do, Weekly Report
It’s likely due to our limited time left in the Philippines that this week we attempted to be a little more social with a few of our local friends. We’ve been busy working and preparing for the next phase of our trip, but no excuses! Parties must be partied…
Early in the week we had Patrick from Dive Society over for a lasagna dinner accompanied by a few bottles of wine. He’s given his notice at the dive shop where he works as a dive instructor and will be becoming a nomadic yogi rambling through Bali in the near future. We hope to meet up again in Thailand in a couple months. Patrick is also an illustrator. Check out his portfolio site if you’ve got a minute.
Posted by: Shim
January 27, 2009 - Filed under Planning, Weekly Report
After spending an entire afternoon at the travel agent we finally have official plans for phase 2 of our crazy nomadic life. On Feb 24th we head to Kuala Lumpur, after spending 8 hours in the Manila airport. Apparently the later flight, which would leave us with only 5 hours in Manila would be cutting it too close, according to our travel agent. I know Cebu Pacific is notorious for late flights but I kinda thought 5 hours would be enough. I guess not. So if anyone has any suggestions on what to do in the Manila Airport for 8 hours we’d love to hear ’em.
We’ll be spending 4 days in Kuala Lumpur, before heading to Thailand. After much research detailing horrible experiences with the Thai Embassy in Manila, we decided to try our luck with the Thai Embassy in KL instead, as most people seemed to have pretty positive reports from there. We’ll be applying for a 60-day tourist visa, with an optional 30-day extension, which will give us 90-days in Thailand. If we decide we want to stay longer, we’ll have to leave the country and come back in. But for now we’re thinking 3 months will be a good start. Read More…
Posted by: Shim
January 25, 2009 - Filed under Planning
The other day a reader of our blog emailed me asking for a hotel recommendation in Dauin. A lot of the guide books are pretty lacking on this area and usually only have one or two listed. I realized this was something we haven’t really talked much about since we arrived here, and figure it was about time we made a post about it. Keep in mind we haven’t been to all of these, but I’ll give you a bit of info about the ones we have been to, and then list the others in the area and you can check them out for yourself. Read More…
Posted by: Kelly
January 19, 2009 - Filed under Weekly Report
The last couple of weeks we’ve had some pretty gross weather. Although this is suppose to be the dry season this week has been anything but. I know it’s nothing compared to the crazy weather back in Vancouver, but for those of us who moved to a tropical island mostly for the weather… well it kinda sucks. Read More…
Posted by: Shim
