Chocolate Hills and Tarsiers in Bohol, the Philippines

Without a doubt Boracay is the most famous beach in the Philippines, usually ranked among the top ten in the world. It is a place where sun worshippers flock en masse each year, with accommodation catering to the budget traveler and resort tourists aplenty and several water activities available to entertain everyone. This means however that the beach can get crowded, and besides swimming and laying in the sun there is not much more to do. Thus we chose another beach which has all that (maybe is not as long) and more: Alona beach in Panglao island, Bohol.

Getting to Alona beach from Cebu is easy: a 1.5 hr ferry to Tagbilaran (550p/p) and a trycicle to the beach (200 p) which wil take an additional 30 minutes. Cheap accommodation is scarce, so if you are tavelling alone you might want to head elsewhere. For 800 pesos you can find a room at Bohol Divers Resort ( no frills) and for 1400 or there abouts you have a lot to choose from- good bargaining can make the prices drop about 40%.

We visited several options as suggest by our trycicle driver, and eventually chose Bohol Sea Breeze- a big cottage with 2 levels, cable, AC, clean, excellent staff and Hank being the manager you would like to find everywhere.

Alona beach is about 800 m long, with palm trees, white sand and turquoise water. It is one of those picture perfect beaches. Snorkelling is not very good but can keep you busy if you wish and there is plenty of diving, but prices are higher than anywhere else in the Philippines.

It is also a good place from which to visit the Chocolate Hills and Bohol’s Tarsier, a primate that is an endengared species and endemic to these islands. There are several options to do the trip, but we chose to rent a scooter (450 p) for 24 hrs and stay overnight somewhere in Loboc, the closest town to the Chocolate hills.

Alona beach is about 800 m long, with palm trees, white sand and turquoise water. It is one of those picture perfect beaches.

The ride to Loboc is about 1 hour from Alona, where accomodation is easy to find in Nuts Huts or Cottage Hills, both offering stunning views. We stayed at Cottage Hills because it wasn’t as secluded and getting to town was easier. We made friends with Jani, a Finnish solo traveller with whom we would hook up the following day to ride to the hills. The 2 motorbike convoy rode smoothly through spectacular scenery, spotting places that you usually only see in Nat Geo or Discovery Channel. The Hills are an interesting site, but I would say that riding the motorbike and stopping along the way to take pictures and chat with locals is the best part of it all.

After visiting the Chocolate Hills we went to the Bohol Tarsier Sanctuary to see the Tarsier, an endangered primate with two species one of which can only be seen in Bohol. The sanctuary is relatively well funded (donations) and is one of a kind in the world, and the keepers make a big effort to preserve this sleepy little animal.  There are other places where you can see Tarsiers near Loboc, but these little creatures are very nervous by nature and stress out easily, many of them dying in the hands of the owners who do not care about them being endangered and only about the money they make when showing them to tourists- it is up to you to decide where you want to see it.

The following day we expected to hop on a ferry on our way to Mindanao and eventually reach Cloud 9 in Siargao, but were surprised to learn that communication problems had us in the wrong side of the island at departure time. We made it to Jagna a day later where the ferry now departs from, and I rented a scooter again to get lost  somewhere in the mountains- a wonderful experience yet again, spotting  Kawasan falls but not being able to jump in the emerald colored water because it was getting dark and I had to make it back to town.  If you have to sleep here do so at Idea Pension House and Garden Cafe, a simple guesthouse run by deaf people who will go out of their way to make your stay as confortable as it can be.

I believe that choosing Alona beach versus Boracay was the best decision we could have made. We spent several days at the beach relaxing and enjoying the fine sand and weather and once we wanted to see something new we made our way to the Chocolate Hills and Tarsier Sanctuary. The motorcycle rides accross the island are superb, the area is safe and despite Alona not being the cheapest of beaches the  place  is very well worth visiting.  Will I be back some day?

Have you seen the Chocolate Hills? Were they brown when you were there?  How about Alona beach, did you make it there? It was fascinating to see the Tarsier as well, don’t you think? Please share this post if you liked it!