El Nido

Hey everyone! I've been preoccupied moving these last few months, but I finally have internet at my new place so I can continue playing catch up with the blog. Yay!

The second place we went to on Palawan was El Nido. I really wanted to do this place justice because it was so beautiful and relaxing. First, a couple important points should you decide to go there:

• There were no ATM machines, so bring enough cash for your entire stay.
• There are really only two ways of getting there. You can take a bus from Puerto Princesa, or a boat from Coron.

El Nido is not a convenient place to travel to, but oh so worth it. We took a charter bus from Puerto Princesa, and that took several hours (I think about 8?) but it was worth it for the air conditioning and leg room. El Nido isn't a large town but it sports some lovely ocean views.

The balcony at our first hotel.

After our first night we found a new hotel with more room since we were meeting up with +Aubrey and +Philip! We picked the Rainforest Hotel because we fell in love with their back porch and view.

They also had cats! Sold!

With Aubrey there, I finally had a breakfast companion. We found a fabulous little french place that had both real coffee and fresh fruit. After many fruit deprived winter months in Korea, this made me so very happy.

The town of El Nido is pretty small. Aside from buying food or doing a little tourist shopping, there isn't much to do in the town itself, but it is near some nice beaches and is starting point for many island tours.

It is really easy to find a trike or motor bike driver offering to take you to the one of the many beaches.

Everywhere sells tour packages in town, so we took one offered by our hotel. Instead of taking a minibus to a destination, we were picked up by boat right from the beach. we just waded into the water and up the ladder to start our island hopping tour. We spent the day snorkeling and beach bumming. It was nice to hang out together because Diane was leaving us for the next part of her adventure in a couple days, and the following day the boys and I were going to start our scuba diving certification.

Deep vs shallow water

Tour provided lunch!

At the "Secret" Lagoon

Here you can see a Damsel fish unhappy about human feet being so close to its territory. These little guys bite!

Parrot fish munching on coral. You can hear them really well underwater, grinding away with their sharp beaks.

The tour was fun, but we spent most of our time just staring at the beach in front of the hotel.

That view did not get old!

Aubrey and I took a trike to a beach a few miles down the road. Not only did the driver take us there, but he also offered to wait for us so he could secure our fare back into town. 

Path down to the beach

Coconut trees!

Loving those pastel sunsets.

Next up is learning how to scuba dive in El Nido.