Dolphin watching on negros oriental

I think this may be the top spot for watching dolphins in the Philippines now here on the tanon straight between negros oriental and Cebu.
We have had many trips out with our friend on his boat and I don't think we have missed them once! We even had a whale shark swimming around the boat once. You can also see pilot whales and melon headed whales if you are lucky.
At the bottom of the steps to the sandbar cottage and around the pillars you can often see banded sea snakes along with all types of other sea creatures.
We have stayed at the cottages out on the sand bar a couple of times roughing it as there is no electricity or water out there so you need to bring you own water and food but well worth the effort,total peace and quiet.
You will need to bring high factor sun cream also as I remember the time we were all snorkelling and forgot to bring,I suffered a lot :(


                                                     dumaguete4x4tours

                               

Just some picture of recent trips

Fishing at zambongita.

Cashew nuts

Rich dark soil in the mountains

Food and shopping

When it comes to shopping for groceries it is always an experience even in the larger supermarkets. If you come across something you like you wil need to buy as much as you can when they have stocks as the thought never comes into their mind if stocks are getting low to put in an order to keep stocks up! So quite often you can go and so many time you hear this "sorry sir no more stocks" come back next month or even three months.
There is also the philippine guarantee for larger goods like electrical stuff which usually has a one week returns guarantee and a one year break down guarantee, just try any of these and you will come up against a very large brick wall and the excuses.
The larger company's are all run by Chinese nationals as the locals can in no way manage any large amounts of money as the families will bleed them dry of any excess cash.
It's the same with the cell phone and tv company's, starts off well and when it's up and running they think that's it, now we dont have to do anything else so again we are stuck in the dark ages. As customer services and common sense do not exist here in any form.The only company I have found here who are sort of efficient is fil products cable tv, they will also give a 20% discount if you pay yearly and of you have a problem they usually there the same day if not the next day!

There is another interesting phenomenon called the blank stare and this is when you ask for something that is alien to them but common in most places in the world, this also generates a lot of staff activity as there are usually at least 20 staff doing nothing as all the stores are over staffed.
Also you can ask a member of staff for a certain item, so off they go and look only to come back a few minutes later to say sorry sir  "no more stocks" so off you go and there on a shelf is the item you asked for, they just don't care. But if I were paid p250 day I do t think I would care.
Security guards are another Bain of my life especially in hypermart on the way out of the doors with groceries,why do they just love to check my bags and receipt? The guy packing the bags at the till has already marked the receipt as paid,it drives me nuts. Now they leave me alone after I asked the guard "are you checking my groceries incase I am stealing" this shocked them :)
Anyway enough said on this subject,it will never change.

It's been nearly 3 years now.

It will be 3 years this July I will have been here in the Philippines and believe me you learn a lot very quickly here, it seems to me that there are two distinct types of foreigners here, the ones who come here to retire and live a peaceful life with their Filipino wife and then there are the others!
Now we come to the others which make up more than 50%, they are here because they are not accepted socially in their own country or even worse if they stepped off a plane in their own country they would be arrested straight away.
The one I will mention here is a guy called m--c a-------r a British guy who we bought our apartments from, he is one of the lowlife who would not be excepted in the uk.  He owned a bar in Cebu once and when he sold the bar it was sold with everything included, when the new owner came to take it on it was bare, so who took the rap for this? Of course the girlfriend did as he could never own up to any responsibilities.
Then it came to selling the apartments to is and guess what, yup you're right we got screwed also, we paid him the asking price which included all the taxes etc, and little did we know the lawyer he recommended was a con woman also,the taxes were never paid!
We then realised he built the apartments to sell so cut every corner he possibly could,inc drains, septic tanks, electric, plumbing and much more.
He is a drunk and has a young kid he cannot take care of, we have seen him on a bar and running around on a pool table at all hours of the night whilst he was sitting getting drunk. I remember when he lived here the kid used to come out in the morning and take a shit in the garden or somewhere around the apartments as he was too lazy and drunk to take care of him, when we approached him about these problems he would get aggressive.

Then after he left he decided to build three small houses about one km from here and yet again  it was another bodge job with many corners cut,I just feel sorry for anyone who buys these places as I know they will regret it and cost them a fortune to put everything right!

So as a last comment be careful here in the Philippines when you buy from a  foreigner especially this one.