Philippine Travel Notes

VSU Hostel. I mentioned that on the last line of the previous story, right? So there is a hostel, other than the one we stayed at? Yes, and there’s even more! VSU Hostel is at the southern end of the beach. Though the lobby, front office and café are in a single-level building, the rooms are in a multi-level structure (am not sure if 2 or 3 or 4 floors - I did not look closely since there were too many guests). I just chanced upon it during my morning walk, am sure my companions did not know about this hostel too. Otherwise we probably would have chosen this. It sits very conveniently beside a convention building where some seminar was about to start (reason probably why this hostel had a lot of guests). Those are some of the guests going out of the hostel's lobby towards the convention hall and that girl is one of the hostel’s crews. She’s emptying the contents of an unfinished red-horse can that she picked from the sidewalk. Hmm, let me guess who did that last night! To think th...

Letting the morning spectacle go by on its own fantastic time, I continued on with my stroll of VSU’s beach-side area. Wonderful place! Easy to imagine you are in an exclusive beach resort! About 6AM, I already saw students excitedly flocking to the beach for their early morning banter, games, swimming and whatever else they want to do! I did not bother asking if that was a daily ritual for them, lest I die of envy right then and there, after hearing them say yes hehe! Imagine this: you go jogging, swimming then breakfast, then classes, library, read by the beach, swim again, classes again, lunch, classes, meeting, basketball, swimming again, dinner! THE life, ‘no?! Let’s continue my stroll, shall we? Well those in the picture above are some of the students on their morning swim. Ah, to the left, and inside that fence, is the bar and restaurant called VSU Beach Garden Resort. It’s a lovely place. Grassy greens, trees, native furnishings, and ample space everywhere. There is a swimming ...

Good Morning Visayas State University! That’s all I silently said when I woke up and hastily went out of our room to savor the fresh mix of mountain and sea wafts away from the artificial cool of our air-conditioned room. What a profound luxury for a student to wake up every morning to this kind of breezy serenity! I envy them studes of VSU. If I had this kind of atmosphere during college, I would have (probably) graduated Magna or Summa Cum Laude! Eh, I was able to gruel it out rising every morning to the hustle, bustle, honks and shouts of jeep dispatchers at old Balara and Nawasa hehe! How much more this, a beach?! Anyway… At 5AM, I was out and about strolling the beach, even if I knew there would have been no fantastic sunrise view, since VSU (Baybay City in fact), is on the western shores of the island of Leyte. So sunrise is behind those tall mountains we passed by last night. I know and knew too, that what is really fantastic in this place are the sunsets owing to its western lo...

Visayas State University (VSU) formerly the Visayas State College of Agriculture (ViSCA) is in Baybay, Leyte. Not in the middle of the city, a bit far from it actually, towards the city’s boundary with Albuera. But where it is, has become a university town that seems to be another LGU of its own. Much like a UPLB by the beach! Hmm, but I am jumping the gun. We arrived in the darkness of night, remember? So let me get to that part of my story first… Fingers still crossed hoping there’d be good accommodation inside this university (because I was the one who suggested hehe), we entered without much of the asking around. Every way is wide and clear even at night and under big trees. Plus, the DTI Rep with us remembered a bit where the accommodations are as he had seen it some years ago during a conference. And there are clear signages. So we found the “Apartelle” in no time. Nice homey lobby, even at night, with a scattering of students, teachers and others enjoying the free wifi. We immed...

We arrived at this city on the western shores of Leyte via the twisting mountain road from the eastern side. Nighttime. Nothing much to see or do. So we thought of heading straight towards food as we were already hungry, even if we munched many of those delicacies we bought from Burauen. The talk was now on what to eat while driver made his way towards the city center. While most of us are not first timers in Baybay, we were unsure if there was anything “really or rarely Baybay” that we should not miss for dinner. None surfaced and we were already at city center. The DTI representative with us said, we can try a restaurant he has eaten at by the water’s edge near the pier. So we went. Haruuuy mano! It is after all, just an Andok’s Restaurant hahaha. It's new alright, but I don’t know what opened my mouth to literally say “wala bang iba”? Although I was busy with the others looking 360 degrees around. Why? Because, the place we were standing at seem to be something excitingly new i...