Chocolate Hills and Tarsiers

Mar 26, 2025

Gee, they smile lots. At breakfast we had two toasters broken. After I tried every possible remedy, I waved at a likely looking waiter who came across, put my toast in with the flourish and pushed the button. Silly old white guy he thought. Nothing happened of course. He then pushed and prodded and pulled every lever, smiled and walked away. I thought he might be going for help but no. I summoned another waiter. He promptly pushed, pulled and tweaked every lever, smiled and then walked away. I bet you can guess what happened with the third waiter. Yep, smiled and walked away. Toaster never got fixed, and it will still be broken tomorrow. Completely ineffectual, but they sure smile a lot.

Breakfast was a lovely spread. They almost had an American breakfast. Plenty of coffee, loads of bacon, but no doughnuts. However, they did have cassava cake, so that will keep them Americans amused for the day.

Today was our day touring the island of Bohol. We are now in the south east of the country, not far from Cebu, and the three major tourist attractions on the island were on our hit list.

Amongst all the poorer and half built houses along the way, which were obviously the homes of the not so well off, there were numbers of big, well made houses which, we were told, belonged to families with one or more of the kids being an overseas worker.

Being a Christian country with over 85% of the population being catholic, there are a few peculiarities. One of which, on the island of Bohol, is a local ordinance that requires tuk tuks to have a Bible verse displayed on the back of the cab before they can get a registration permit. Another is, with no divorce, no abortion, no contraception, and (until recently) no internet for entertainment, many families have 10 or so kids. One gets educated, one gets sent overseas to earn the money, and the rest share the labour, raising the kids and caring for the elderly.

First stop was the Tarsier sanctuary. Tarsiers are primates, but not monkeys, about the size of your fist that live between six and 10 foot up in the trees. They are insect eaters, and nocturnal having eyes like owls, ears like bats, and tails like rats. Their eyes are bigger than their brain, but their eyeballs are fixed so they have to rotate their necks 180 degrees to see.

A guide takes you on a walk through the forest, as they have done an early morning scout to find them, knowing that there is no chance that you would spot them if you just wandered. Saw three curled up in their trees.

They are socially introverted, which led to some discussion about mating habits. Turns out that they aren’t monogamous either. However, they are territorial and sleep in the same tree, so the guides can guess where they are likely to be.

There are five major islands in the central Philippine region of Visayas. Each one produces a different type of grain. Bohol is the rice island, and there is rice spread out along the sides of the roads drying as we drove on. There are five types of rice grown – white, brown, red, pink and black.

Next up was the major attraction – the Chocolate Hills.

Around 1400 small hills from 30 to 100 m tall. They are made of coral and, because we are on the ring of fire, over time they have been raised up due to seismic activity. During the dry season they dry off and turn brown, giving them their name, but at this time of the year they are just green.

The most recent earthquake raised one of the hills around 50 m, so volcanic activity and tectonic shifting is certainly a thing here.

Walked to the viewing area at the top of the biggest hill, and had a spectacular view of the area.

Off down the hills along the ‘free massage’ road destroyed in the most recent typhoon to our lunch stop, driving through the man-made forest of mahogany trees, planted close together to stop erosion which had been a perennial problem during wet seasons and typhoons.

A very late lunch as the boat we were going on wasn’t ready for us until 2 o’clock. Seems they do two lunchtime sailings, and our bus driver crawled along, much to the annoyance of everybody behind us, as we had time to kill. Great buffet.

Endured karaoke up the river, and again down river. Had ABBA, YMCA, and just to make sure we paid due penance – Sweet Caroline. Couldn’t avoid it the whole trip. Paused at the turn around point to have a short traditional filipino concert complete with dancing between the bamboo poles.

Back on the bus, and back to the hotel, arriving just before dinner. Given that we’d just got up from a buffet lunch, nobody seemed in a hurry to try for an early reservation.