Paka King goes to Davao City and Samal Island plus a lot more of stops!

My wonderful wife and I at BuDa

What comes out from your mind when you hear the word Davao? President Duterte? Durian? How about places in Davao you have traveled to? Or if not, were you able to visit this province?

I had been to Davao several times because of work and it was just once when we travelled there with my family. I only got to see GAP and the Philippine Eagle and the crocodiles with my two kids, @gailbelga (or Johanna Gail) and Jose Alfredo. I admit, travelling for work has always been pretty tiresome and boring for me especially when you are out of town for seminar and training. Meanwhile going out of town for a weekend getaway will never be boring especially when you are with your loved ones. You got explore places, take photos of yourself, and enjoy funny and sometimes meaning conversation with your travel buddies.

Before we went out of town, we thoroughly planned to have a perfect weekend getaway with the members of our local family house church that was newly established. We have met for several times to carry out a plan that would not be boring for us and for the kids as well. There were a lot of suggestions made as to where to go. We even tried to calculate the length of travel to come up with an itinerary. This is what we came up with:

For a budget of Php49,000.00 with 15 people including our driver MJ, we were able to travel to a lot of places. It includes the accommodation, food, and travel expenses as well! Our itinerary includes a travel from Cagayan de Oro City, a short stop-over at BuDa (Bukidnon and Davao), and some wonderful spots in Davao. After reading this blog entry, you can say that the money we had allotted was well spent!

Day One : It is quite a long travel, the flying unicorn will take us there.

We planned to travel from Cagayan de Oro to Davao around three in the morning, but we were able to travel at four in the morning. That is pretty normal since there were kids with us and it would normally take minutes to make them alert, awake, and enthusiastic. And around 8 in the morning, we were already in the Valencia, Bukidnon where we had our breakfast. The kids were so excited and kept asking how many more kilometers will it take for us to reach.

Because of the Martial Law in Mindanao was not yet waived, there were still a lot of check points on the road. What usually happens is that they ask us to go down the vehicle and present to them our identification cards (or IDs). When we were in Quezon, Bukidnon, I was the first one to go down the van. But when one of the soldiers recognized Mr. Bararodin, he immediately said that we could pass the check point already and no more inspection needed.

HellowDabaw!

When we were able to reach Davao, it was one in the afternoon. Although we prepared snacks for everyone, the first thing we did was to eat their famous Puyat Durian. It is the tastiest variety of durian because aside that it is sweet, it is also milky. Well, since one cannot get rid of its smell, we made an agreement not to eat durian inside the van. We were then laughing we started to burp because it smelled durian.

The first on our list for Day Juan (One) is the Jose Maria College. It is located atPhilippine-Japan Friendship Highway, Sasa, Davao City. is one of the biggest schools I had been to owned by Apollo Quiboloy. To visit this place, you must be able to have a reservation as early as possible. We had an access, the sister of Mrs. Bararodin so we were allowed to have a short tour inside the school. Wearing of sleepers, shorts, mini skirts are not allowed in the place.

This is the entire crew posing. Unfortunately @gailbelga was not around because she had a vacation in Negros and her schedule was in conflict with us, though I often call her from time to time but she could not respond because the signal strength in her area is not that good. She sends me photos of the places she had been to instead.

Garden of Eden Restored

Varieties of flowers can be found in the garden of Eden.

I could not help but enjoy the scenery and feel thankful for what I am experiencing in the moment. My lovely wife then took a photo of me.

As I walk around the garden, I felt that I am walking somewhere in Europe although I was not able to visit one European country. Hahaha! This place is simply paka.

Of course, we did not sleep in the van because that would be very inconvenient. We booked a place at Green Heights for two nights stay for only Php6,500.00. It made us literally closer with each other as we shared one big room. We had been sharing our snore since night one then.

Day Two

Morning came and the alarm clock seemed to be useless. We needed to travel early because we have a lot of places to go to within a short span of time.
With our van, we traveled to the Port of Davao City to Samal where we experienced nature at its finest state.

We were able to visit the Cave of Bats which costs 100Php per person. It was bat cave found underground where thousands of bats live. It was a fun learning experience to know more about bats and how useful they are in our environment. Because of the experience, I learned that bats’ health would depend on how we treat our surroundings. Out of seven species of bats, only two of them are vampire bats. I also learned that if we infest their surroundings with such mess, then that will deteriorate their health. Although Gotham City does not exist, bats are true heroes for our environment.

Hagimit Falls

Hagimit falls is one of the smallest falls I have ever seen. It is situated at Penaplata, Samal Island.

I wish to visit this place again because my wife cannot stop taking selfies of herself and photos to everyone while the kids enjoyed taking selfies too as a group. While they were taking photos of themselves, I posed in the wackiest position I could ever think of as they laughed at me. They never thought I would do such thing because it was unlikely of me.

Pearl Farm

We also had the chance to have a tour at Pearl Farm. All in all, we paid 3500Php for the pump boat. I heard the accommodation for the place costs a lot, and I hope I could spend a holiday here with my family.

As you can see, we were all so busy wearing our live vests as a precautionary step. We will never know when would the tide be so high. We were supposed to go to Paradise Resort but it was really hot so it was crushed out from our list.

Before the day ends, we were also able to visit SM Lanang and had dinner there. I must say, the place is quite big and spacious. It is a nice place to hang out to. I looked for a remittance center to send money for my daughter because she told me she ran out of cash. Unfortunately, I was not able to find one. I know she will be upset but surely she will understand me.

Day Three and heading home! Yehey!

Our journey seemed to end soon so we all woke up late. Haha! You thought we woke up earlier that what is expected right? But nah! We were all so tired after the places we had been to during Day Two so our bodies wanted to sleep longer.

We had another stop over at BuDa and we were welcomed by kids who sold us bracelets and other handmade items. Liza and engineer John wanted to help these children so they bought some. We decided to have a stop over there to have lunch at Seagull which is found nearby. There were lots of statues hence, we took snaps of it. We also ate at Quezon, Bukidnon (Seagull Restaurant)!

MGM Resort

When we reached Maramag, Bukidnon, the kids wanted a stop there to take a dip on the spring. Hence, we decided to have a dip at MGM Resort. This has been existing for more than ten years and I remember joining a leadership retreat with my family and church mates before

All in all, it was a fun experience. Lyle, who used to be my student before and a daughter of Pare Ner, used her waze app because we were clueless on how to get to the places we wish to travel too. Instead of allowing us to see wonderful spots, it led us to the sanitary landfill. We were all laughing of course. We were also able to share meals without getting hungry. I must say, women really have the capacity to budget not just for a day but for a week without getting anyone hungry. Lastly, while riding the van, it really hurt.

Upon heading home, I realized that I missed our dogs a lot especially my daughter Gail. My wife was so worried of her plants too that as soon as we got home, she immediately watered her plants. My dogs did not get hungry though because my sister-in-law Jean took care of Sky and Sunny.

I am looking forward to more wonderful trips especially this January. This calls for a paka experience again!

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Photos were taken using Samsung J2 Prime