Winter Break 2015: The Philippines

After winter break in Korea, school continues for another 3 weeks before completing the school year. This year, graduation happened a few days before the Lunar New Year holiday, so students had almost 2 weeks off before starting the new school year. Some teachers refer to this as "spring break" even though it's still February.

For my time off, I looked up the cheapest place to fly from Korea and ended up with a plane ticket to the Philippines for 10 days. I arrived on Sunday, and the first 5 days I spent exploring the country by myself. Then on Thursday, I was joined by my friend Andrew for the remainder of the trip.

I began with a day in Manila, as it is where I flew in. I stayed the night at a hostel in Malate, called Where 2 Next, and then spent the entirety of the second day exploring the city.


That evening, I took a 10 hour, overnight bus to Banaue. This is a town in the north of the main island of Luzon, in the province Ifugao. From here I traveled to the small village of Batad to see the famous rice terraces and stay with the native people there.


After 2 days in Ifugao, I returned to Manila. I spent the morning exploring Mall of Asia (the 10th largest mall in the world) and then met Andrew at the airport. Next we took a short bus south to the town of Tagaytay, which is home to the smallest volcano in the world: Taal Volcano. The following day, we went to a nearby town called Nasugbu. Here we were referred to a beach only known by the locals. We spent the afternoon sitting in the sun and then headed back up to the airport in Manila.


We spent a night at a hostel near the airport and then took a plane to the island of Palawan, the 5th largest in the Philippines. There we went to El Nido, a remote area full of incredible islands and beautiful beaches on the farthest north point of the island. The first day here, we rented a kayak and went to a beach down the coast a bit from our hostel. We spent the entire afternoon sitting in the water and then watching the sunset.


The second (and final) day, we took an island hopping tour. A tour guided boat took us to 5 different islands with a series of amazing beaches and lagoons. We got to do a lot of swimming, snorkeling and sunbathing among the extraordinary views.


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