Manila and Mount Pinatubo

For us, Manila was the gateway to the picturesque islands of Palawan and Coron. Of all the cities in South East Asia, this one seemed to have the worst reputation; we met someone in Coron who had a necklace snatched off her neck while here. However, we did also want to trek up the nearby volcano ‘Mount Pinatubo’ so had to spend a couple of nights here when we got back from Coron.

We had to take a local bus to Capas, the little town near Mount Pinatubo. The bus station in Manila was a hive of activity, but not too chaotic and we didn’t have to wait long. On board, American basketball was playing on the TV, and would you believe it the bus had its own free Wifi connection.

The wide road out of town was almost gridlock, with an ill-placed railway sat in the middle of the carriage way, meaning we had to crawl for a mile in the opposite direction before the bus could make a U turn onto the other side. Town planning at its finest.

The city seemed to go on for miles and miles, with fast food outlets all along this road, the same chains (McDonalds, KFC, Jolibee) literally every quarter mile. I had never seen such ‘McDensity’, not even in the USA. At one point I could see golden arches to my side, up in front, and just behind.

It was a 5AM start in Capas in order to get up Pinatubo before it got too hot. The first part was a journey in a 4×4 across what used to be a lava flow, but was now a wide, dry riverbed of volcanic ash. Luckily our vehicle was not open top, so we didn’t get coated in the stuff like some others did. It was a pretty bumpy route though and we had to hang on tight the whole time to stop us rolling around in the back.

After about an hour the 4×4 arrived at the point where the trek began; the rocks were too big to drive any further. In the old days vehicles could go much further up, but too much of the fine ash had now been washed away.

It wasn’t too steep, but you had to keep well away from the sides of the ‘canyon’ since the ash is not very stable at all and can collapse at any minute.

Pinatubo used to be a pointy mountain until it suddenly blew its lid in 1991 and, with the help of a coincidental typhoon, showered chaos all over the region. Once things had settled down, the mount had lost 200 metres of height, and a crater lake formed at the top – the summit of our trek.

The lake is very deep, and swimming in it was recently forbidden after somebody drowned. Little tents had been provided for us to eat lunch while sheltering from the midday sun.

The walk back down was fairly easy, with a few stops along the way.

After another hour-long workout in the back of the jeep, we were soon on the bus back to Manila. The young man selling the tickets on board the bus said he would return with my change but didn’t. I reminded him again just before our stop. He got off the bus with us, took our bags out of the hold, then handed me a wad of folded notes and immediately jumped onto the bus, which was mysteriously already moving off. Of course, by the time I unfolded the notes and realised I’d been short changed, the bus was way down the road. It would be nice to write this off as an isolated incident, but it wasn’t the first time people had tried to short change or overcharge us in the Philippines.

We were staying in Makati, supposedly one of the safer neighbourhoods, and took a cheap taxi to the historic centre of Manila (or what’s left of it). Apart from an old fort, some citadel walls, and the odd colonial era building, there didn’t seem to be a great deal to see, bar some posters for very specific services.

Although a bit of a dump, this area was quite a colourful place, and some of the ‘Jeepneys’ were real works of art.

While in the centre we ventured into an outlet of the omnipresent ‘Jolibee’ restaurant chain to see what all the fuss was about. It was basically a cross between McDonald’s and KFC, at next to nothing prices. It was heaving with people, a fair few of whom looked like they could survive a famine or six.

We headed back to Makati before it got dark, the taxi seeming to wait endlessly in traffic. Makati itself felt safe enough, even at night, and the locals seemed very friendly. There wasn’t a great deal to do though, so we tried to get some sleep before our outbound flight in the middle of the night.