Thursday, February 23, 2012

Day 3: a 6 - hour Cebu sidetrip!

Ughh, it took me days to finally do this post. Blame my brain-dead brain and crazy schedule (feeling busy playing Wii). 


Recap: 
Day 1 - Panglao Island (the only day when we felt like actual tourists)
Day 2 - Bohol City Tour (time to get dirty, literally, by driving around Bohol in a tricycle)


We had a little discussion on what to do on our day 3. Remember, everything's unplanned. So it was a choice between Bohol Bee Farm (and Suislide) or a Cebu side trip. Cebu won! So Cebu it was. We quickly planned our route and itinerary that night and woke up early to catch the 8am ferry. We slept late with sore bodies, praying we'll be able to wake up that early.


8:15am, we were still buying our tickets. Obviously, we missed our target schedule. Oh well, we bought the next one which was 9:30 am with Ocean Jet Ferries. The last cruise will be at 5:30pm. Travel time is 2 hours. With that, you can conclude that we only have 6 hours of exploring eastern part of Cebu. 


It was our first time to ride a ferry. Expectation: Titanic -looking ships with plenty of outdoor room for ocean viewing. Reality: It kinda looks like a floating bus with at least 3x4 feet smoking area. 


It's not bad at all, I'm just so naive to expect more.
In all fairness to Ocean Jet, the ferry was clean and was on-time. We enjoyed sea watching and spent most of the 2 hours travel time outside, soaking all the sun's glory without any sunscreen. We ended up looking like moisted (from the sea moist and not to mention, sweat) chocolate cakes (sunburn!).

Totally worth it!

We arrived Cebu around 11:30am, it was lunch time already. We skipped it as we saw Fort San Pedro right outside the pier. Cebu was never short of rich history and this fort was one of them. It was built by the Spanish Government (in which one of them was Miguel Lopez de Legazpi), as a military fortress. 


We just figured using sephia tone will produce some Spanish feel. Or not?
An old Spanish Flag
The Founding of Cebu - in photos.
Good thing about Cebu Mactan Pier is that it's near to 3 tourist spots. First was the Fort San Pedro, the other one is the Basilica de Sto. Nino and Magellan's Cross. Three birds in one stone. One down, then we headed to the next one.


Getting ready for the Sinulog Festival. Too bad we didn't witnessed the actual festival.


Basilica's Facade


The amazing altar.
After stepping out of the Basilica, we immediately asked for Magellan's Cross directions to a kind-looking security guard. To our surprise, it was just outside. After few steps, a small kiosk housing the cross itself greeted us. It was said that the Portuguese and Spaniards planted this cross on this same spot, as commanded by Magellan himself as they landed in Cebu. Well, of course, this is not the actual cross, but relics were said to be inside this chapel.


The closest I can get to Magellan.
It was a hot humid day and we were walking around, asking for directions and commuting around Cebu. It was both tiring and fun! We managed to get to our last stop - the Regency Hotel. Nope, not to check in, but to get high - literally! I dreamed for so long to try their Sky Experience Adventure. Upon reaching the hotel, we immediately checked their schedule. They open up at 2pm, so we had our lunch first. Luckily, Regency Hotel is located right next to Robinson's Mall. I had to say, their food court's prices are crazy affordable. For only 49 pesos, the meal included rice, a deep fried crab, achara, soup and an iced tea. What a complete meal! And they're generous with the serving too! Yeah obviously, cheap foods excite me.


At last! It's time to test our marriage, lol. You see, my dear husband is afraid of heights. Not really acrophobia, but it's somehow close to that, hahah. I had to pull of my sad face just to make him agree of just one ride. That's good enough for me. I signed up for 3 rides (2 skyrides + 1 extreme) and he signed up for the roller coaster ride. His was 550 pesos (entrance of 250 plus 300 for the roller coaster ride). Mine was 1000 (they were on a promo, i think). 

The first stunt was fun! We got to ride to an actual roller with its tracks right on the edge of the building. We could even tilt the seats to have the 'falling' feeling. After that, I checked his pulse hands and they were cold. I commended him for the going all though that in the name of fun. The next stunt was the Sky Walk. I was on my own this time. I admit, it looked boring. I was strapped on a harness, and got to walk on a platform placed around the building's edges. Some of the platforms are transparent, so I got to see the height I were on. Then I was asked to stand on the edge with one foot raised (their signature pose) while having my photo taken. Hmmm.. strange. I felt my knees slightly turning to jellies. It was surprisingly scary. Anyway, I had a bird's eye view of Cebu. The person assisting me, showed some interesting landmarks like the dancing inmates' prison, Mactan Island and the on-going construction of yet another SM (he said it'll be bigger than MOA, let's see).
Taking photos is prohibited, souvenir photos cost 250Php each. Expensive? But they're too awesome to pass up?
My final stunt was interesting. From the package I got, this would be the 'extreme' one. I would be ziplining from one building to another. It was on the 40th? floor. I would then be returned to the original location by a Sky Lift. I had tried ziplining in Subic before, but this one feels different. It was said to be the first urban zip line in the world. Cool, but I was thinking of some worse case scenarios. If I fell from a superman ride in Subic, I will be landing on tress. Plus the trees below hid the actual height of the ride so it was less scary. While this one is pure height! You'll see cars and concrete below. I almost backed out. But wth, I paid for it, and surely, I will definitely regret not doing it. Plus I read they're into double redundancy safety, whatever that is, it sounded good. I went for it. Imagine being thrown away to another building 250m away, 473m above the ground. It was exhilarating! 
This is me, being brought back to Regency Hotel's 40th? floor, ganyan talaga akong pumanhik ng building, because elevators are too mainstream, bwahahah.
We barely noticed but it was already 4:30 and we were still in this hotel. We needed to catch our ferry for our hotel in Bohol was already paid for and getting another hotel here just because we were late is plain stupid. We rode the jeepney good thing Cebu's jeepney drivers were as aggressive as Manila's. It was rush hour and the traffic was bad. We got down on a familiar spot and just walked our way to the pier. It was still a long walk though. When we reached Port San Pedro, we saw some joggers there so we jogged along, hahah. After all the rushing and running, we reached our destination and had some more minutes to spare. That concluded our little Cebu side trip. 


Oh, and I got to watch Rise of the Planet of the Apes while aboard. Nice movie. I wish I could just throw some ALZ 113 to some people (even to myself during these times when my brain is malfunctioning). 

2 comments:

  1. Just followed your blog. :)

    Too bad we were not able to try the Sky walk when we went to Cebu last December :(

    ReplyDelete