This time last year we sought sunshine in southern India. A month in Tamil Nadu in a wonderful fishing community. That provided us with one of the most memorable travel experiences we have ever had. This time of year in UK is really nothing to hang around for!
Mrs NHSontheRun is wonderful for many reasons, not least of which indulging my ambivalent relationship with the word retirement. She has been saintly in tolerating my tentative steps away from work, followed by my mad panic rush to find work again that the last year has seen. What can I say, apart from sorry? I missed working too much. But our passion is travel and she is correct, this is the window. She is a meticulous travel planner, and to my great shame I turn up and get shown around!
Old enough to take weeks off at a time, young enough to want to.
We are travelling for the next 5 weeks and have landed with a big sweaty aromatic bump in down town Manila. BA to Hong Kong and then onwards same day to Philippines. A long but uneventful day to get here.
We scythed our way confidently through the airport smog and jumped in a Grab taxi headed for our Hotel. Chosen because of its price point, 9.1 rating on Booking and the "top Manila hotel" recommendation in The Lonely Planet's Guide, we felt sure it was the place for us. Bumping past a line up of giggling ladies of skimpy attire, we rounded the corner and stopped beside the fashionably wrought iron facade of the Elements Boutique Hotel. Disconcerted to note that it was unlit and that the front windows were boarded over. Our scam detector went into overdrive. Our taxi driver nervously went to the door, more in hope than expectation, and was met by a security guard who explained the establishment closed down a year previously. Thanks a bunch booking,com !
Small problem resolved within minutes by settling in comfortably to pretty much the next door hotel. No great harm done but it took a public posting on X to get Booking,com to arrange a refund!
Venturing out for food after 10pm was enlightening . Imagine that there is virtually no residual need for a barber amongst the predominantly European gentlemen. That beer and chronic airways disease are ravaging the entire group. That the clothes are not the freshest but are fitting snuggly enough to reveal at least the lower tip of the soft underbelly. That the men are pretty much all alone or in pairs. Chuck in a handful of street pharmacists supplying, I would imagine, much needed viagra+. And of course a string of smiling ladies young enough to be their grandchildren. You get the picture. Neon, ultraviolet, screeching mayhem. We had arrived in wonderful mad Makati, central Manila. Way more 'in your face' than expected.
Day two we venture up market. The Ayala museum for cultural orientation. There is a stunning display of gold relics on level 4. When you first get here, we would highly recommend.
Suitably educated we joined Venus for a street food tour. As always this experience armed us with enough local street vendor knowledge to hopefully allow us to be more adventurous . Although Venus ended her trip with a visit to an American Diner for shakes and cakes. Weird but how else would we have discovered that Elvis is alive and well and living in Manila?
Day two we took a backstreets tour next to Chinatown, followed by a trip through the Spanish remnants known as Intramuros. The backstreets were slums, and the tour was eye opening and deeply depressing. Dental decay, illness and poor education are a feature. Also incredible happiness and resilience in the face of adversity. The packed local homes were tinderboxes and we saw a home that had burned to the ground killing two locals just days before. Tears in the eyes of the aunt sat in the shadow of her next door home explaining what had happened.
Intramuros were touristic and worth a quick look if you are here.
We are happy to be heading for the islands today. Specifically Palawan. Porta Princessa.
Manila is mad. Dwarf boxing, cock fightingly mad. Crazy, hot, weirdly Asian but retaining something of each of its conquerors. Sky line is spectacular and sunset is special. Our trip to the hotel pool lasted 4 minutes and would have been more comfortable with high dose Ventolin nebulisers due to the smog.
All guide books suggest Manila is not a place to linger, and it's hard to say after two days that we scratched the exterior, but we would certainly recommend staying a couple of days to decide for yourself.
*(I have used the term dwarf boxing here. I am highly conscious that this might be considered offensive. The venue described the activity as midget boxing, and I have refrained from using that term. I do not approve of the activity and do not endorse it in any way. We did not, and would not attend such an activity. There is at least the possibility that persons of short stature or little people may be exploited here. I report it only because it's happening, and I am hopeful that it may cause healthy debate.)
I’m late to the party here as my trusty NHSOTR publisher alerts don’t seem to be coming through. I assumed you were either off-grid and living in the moment, or taken all the pleasure there is to be gained from making the rest of us sick with envy in February. I’m delighted to see neither is the case. I’m now in bed with 3 weeks to catch up on. *reaches for the tissues.