A Tao Philippines Boat Excursion through *Bacuit Bay* is a MUST if you're in the Philippines. Our journey started in Coron and ended in El Nido and was 5 days of boating from one beautiful remote island to the next.
*Bacuit Bay is an archipelago of islands on the western side of the Philippines (north of El Nido / Palawan) and is regarded as one of the most beautiful chains of islands in the world*
The Philippines is made up of >7,000 islands (it's the 2nd largest archipelago behind Indonesia). Getting around by boat is by far the best way to see the country and Tao has been written about on numerous travel blogs and in Lonely Planet as the best company for island hopping. I'm always hesitant of "tour companies" as I usually like to do my own thing when traveling but this trip was unlike any other "tour" I've ever been on and I totally get the hype now. It was the perfect way to start our two week adventure of the Philippines.
What we loved about the trip...
> The Beaches <
The beaches we went to were beyond gorgeous - the best part is that they were completely undeveloped. Sadly, there are major plans to start commercializing the islands and developers have already snagged up a number of the beaches in plans of building resorts :( Go quick before this happens! We slept in the bamboo huts pictured above - waking up to the sunrise over the water (basically on our own private island) was spectacular.
> The FOOD <
The food we ate took fresh, local, and organic to entirely new levels - Tao oversees an organic farm and sustainable livestock operation, run by locals, where all of their food is sourced (we even got to go see it!). Everything was prepared authentic to Filipino style by our boat chef (pictured below left). Snacks in between meals consisted of lumpia (Filipino Spring rolls) and amazingly delicious fried bananas. There was always fresh made ginger tea and coffee available throughout the day which was wonderful both before and after snorkeling.
> The crew <
These guys hands-down rocked. Pictured in orange is Oliver or "Oli" who is a fisherman-turned-tourguide who taught himself English "to share why he loves the Philippines so much with tourists". Oli was the happiest human being I've ever met and was actually one of the first ever Tao guides. The rest of the crew (dubbed "the lost boys") were awesome too and all had super interesting backgrounds and stories to share. They also were always singing as they worked...some of the happiest people I've ever spent time around.
> The Sunsets <
Each evening our boat docked on a new island where we sipped on rum mango drinks and watched the sunset (the rum drinks were made fresh for us every night!). The star visibility in the middle of the night was also incredible (it rivaled my experience of star gazing in the outback of Australia).
> the Fresh Sashimi <
You can't get sashimi any fresher than this! We caught tuna and cuttlefish (a type of squid) off the boat and got to eat sashimi and Filipino-style ceviche. We also caught sea urchins while snorkeling and got to try fresh Uni...very tasty and quite the experience!
> Playing Basketball with the Locals <
Yes, that is a Kevin Durant jersey in the photo above!! The Filipinos LOVE basketball and you can find some version of a court in every town you go to. In fact, basketball is so big here that a lot of American's who couldn't make it to the NBA go to the Philippine Basketball Association.
> our boat dog <
This little guy (who was our guide's dog) was so cute and went everywhere with us! His favorite place to be was at the front of the boat gazing off into the horizon :)
> The Snorkeling <
You'll have to trust me that you will NOT be disappointed by the snorkeling. I've been diving/snorkeling in the Great Barrier Reef, Hawaii, Tahiti, parts of Mexico and Thailand and the coral reef in the Philippines is at the top of my list of most beautiful reefs and marine life I've ever seen. Make sure you bring a GoPro or underwater camera (I did not have one but you can see the outlines of the reefs in the water in the below picture).
Tao Philippines is highly recommended for very good reasons - this was an incredible boat tour and I can't imagine seeing Bacuit Bay in any other way that would compare to this experience. If you go, try to get on Oli's trip!
* Recommendations for the trip *
1. Don't buy a dry bag ahead of time. You do need a dry bag but you can find them for super cheap in the Philippines so no need to buy one before-hand.
2. Bring bug spray. I've been to a lot of places where I've been absolutely eaten alive by bugs...that wasn't the case here but I did still get a lot of bug bites. You can buy natural bug spray that Tao sells but the deet stuff really does work best so I'd bring some of this.
3. Bring a few books and a deck of cards. There is some down time on the boat sailing from island to island and I wish I had a better book than what I had brought (I did have a Philippines Lonely Planet which was awesome to read on the boat though).
4. Bring an underwater camera or a GoPro. The snorkeling that we did was the best snorkeling I have ever done. We saw turtles, eels, cuttlefish, starfish, finding nemo fish and beautiful coral reefs. We even got to snorkel around a couple sunken ships. The snorkeling was a HUGE highlight.
Have an amazing time and adopt the Filipino mindset / phrase "Bahala Na" (loosely translating to "whatever will be, will be!" / "We're happy...everything's ok!").
Because the best photos are taken post-snorkeling with goggle lines on your face :)