Manado region, Sulawesi, Indonesia

We arrived in Sulawesi after transiting through the domestic terminal in Jakarta.   It sounds funny saying it but Indonesia felt very 'foreign' to us from the food to pretty much everything else.

Anyway we stayed in Manado on arrival in a decent airport hotel and tried the local vegetarian specialities including Gado Gado.  The beer was eye-wateringly expensive, but when in Rome...

Anyway it was rainy season and it was raining:

We were picked up by our guide, and the contrast with our previous trip was immediate and indeed sustained throughout our visit to Sulawesi.  Monal from Sultan Tours was considerate, friendly and helpful for the duration of the trip, our thanks to him.

The first day we drove to Tangkoko, birding at the top of the hills, in the rain:

Helen had a migraine, a post-stress one, at the airport hotel so we needed to keep it gentle.   That afternoon therefore i went into the forest/jungle with the guides while she rested.

The Celebes Macaques are present in Tangkoko in healthy numbers though the adjacent village has people setting off fireworks and occasionally killing the monkeys to deter them from their houses.

During the pause in the explosions one of the younger members of a family group looked confused:

Along the path I saw Green-backed Kingfisher:

Yellow-billed Malkoha:

And a good number of other species, though we did at one point have to shelter from a bit of a storm.   That passed, so enjoying the attentions of the biting ants and mosquitoes we waited until dusk to see a Celestial Tarsier emerge from its sleep tree:

The next day was much brighter, this is the shore in the jungle park and you can see the beach is volcanic sand, remnants from the explosion of Tangkoko volcano in 1995:

Omnipresent after the rain were these millipedes, they are the great recyclers of the forest, covering everything, turning fallen logs to mush, trying to bore into solid trees and reaching along the ground, literally everywhere:

One afternoon after a forest walk to find some key species (we did so-so at this) we took a boat across the open sea (much to Helen's delight) then entered a river channel, to see this, the Giant-billed Kingfisher:

From Tangkoko we headed back to the edge of Manado and then up to Tomahon.   This was the view from the restaurant at lunch,. another enormous volcano:

Apparently of all the various cones thereabouts only 11 are actually active, a huge relief as you can imagine!

The first afternoon in Tomahon we visited Lake Tondano which was very pleasant and good birding too.   Most tourists visit to eat fish from the lake, we skipped that and concentrated on the wildlife. 

Breeding plumage Cattle Egrets flew past:

An enterprising local was growing Lotus flowers, presumably for the seed pods:

The following morning we drove from our accommodation to the forest above Tomahon.  I'd feel nervous with a smoking volcano overlooking my town, just staying:

The forest fragment was very productive, we saw lots and lots of birds including this Citrine Canary Flycatcher:

At one point on a bit of a jungle slog, i put a hand on a tree to steady myself while crossing a river and this tree frog landed on my hand.  I persuaded it onto my lens hood, whipped out my other camera and managed a snap.   The guides were oblivious, but understanding of the delay, especially when i showed them the picture later:

Another morning in the forest was equally rewarding with a dramatic sunrise and landscape:

Our last birding morning was spent in a hide overlooking a communal nesting site of the endangered Maleo: 

We probably saw a dozen of these birds, in pairs, including some egg-laying.   There was major drama after a few hours when a monitor lizard ran in and grabbed a freshly-laid egg.   We told the ranger who ran out, grabbed the lizard and rescued the egg.   We thought it was an iguana and coined  the phrase 'iguana drama'.  Monitor lizard mishap has less of a ring to it.   Anyway the egg was safe and added to the hatching programme they have which is making a big difference to the breeding success of this iconic species.

From there it was back to Manado and the 'volcano view' hotel:

We really enjoyed Sulawesi, the guide and his team were great, the food was survivable and the accommodation significantly better than The Philippines.  It also didn't have the 'edgy' feel of Rhe Philippines either, so we relaxed and enjoyed it the more.  Sulawesi doesn't get many visitors and all of the other tourists we encountered were there for diving, they are really missing out!

The Philippines - second half

From Banaue a longish drive, after you've guessed it, a very early start, got us to Subic Bay, an oasis of calm traffic, strict traffic enforcement, decent restaurants, etc.   It's the site of a huge former US military base and they kept a lot of the infrastructure and habits from when the military were present.

The regrowth forest on the site of the former base hosted lots of good species including this Little Pied Flycatcher:

In the former Officers' quarters a large flock of Blue-throated Bee-eaters had gathered ahead of breeding:

A Dollarbird surveyed the landscape in the sunshine:

Everywhere remnants of the US base were visible.  Some of these facilities remained locked, some had been converted to illegal housing:

We did some night birding at Subic, seeing a few good species including this Philippine Scops Owl:

From Subic Bay we drove through Quezon City to Infanta Road, a place where in January the guide had found two murder victims dumped in a gully on the roadside, almost certainly killed by a government hit squad as part of a programme that has seen some 20,000 Philippine citizens killed by their government so far.  The police tape was still there...

Along the road the birding was reasonable, albeit frequently disturbed by day-tippers and general traffic.  A Brown Shrike had caught something:

Asian Fairy Bluebird:

The dawn on the way up was stunning with views over the hills:

Sunset was equally spectacular with the sunshine cast on the water:

From Infanta and a shocker of an accommodation we headed to Los Banos, finally putting our foot down on the schedule and standards of the tour.   With a now grumpy guide we birded the forest from the back of the university campus, seeing Spotted Kingfisher:

The accommodation was basic but clean, quiet and with a decent local restaurant.   We lost half a stone each on the starvation rations on the holiday and that was with a week of eating properly, starting in Los Banos.

Anyway we drove back to Manila to fly on to Palawan, the last and most beautiful of the places we were to visit:

It's pretty stunning wherever you go on the Island:

Great birding too with many Island Endemics, though this is the widespread (in The Philippines) Yellow-vented Bulbul:

The landscape was accentuated by dramatic sunsets:

One trip we particularly enjoyed was a visit to the entrance to the underground river, a famous tourist location and UNESCO World Heritage site:

In the forest behind the facilities we had close-up views of a Hooded Pitta:

The last bird we saw on our last morning on Palawan was The Philippine Red-bellied Pitta, we'd seen four species of Pitta on the trip.   As a bird guide he was excellent, it was just the rest of it...

Anyway we had a night in Manila to get some food and some sleep before it was off to Sulawesi, Indonesia, we'd never been there before either...

The Philippines - first half

As part of our 'big year' or 'mid-life crisis year', depending on your point of view, having already visited Norway, India and Sri Lanka, we had also booked back-to-back trips in first The Philippines and then on to Sulawesi Indonesia.   First then to The Philippines.    We booked a private tour with a European bird guide, a first for us as we usually use locals.

We arrived in Manila and took advantage of our recovery day in the city to have a look around and visited Rizal Park.   It happened to be Independence Day so the park was very busy with locals:

That evening we watched the sun set over the harbour ahead of our early start the next day:

The following morning with an early start we were collected and driven to the airport for our flight to Bohol, the first birding location on the tour.   We saw many species most of which were new to us given the geography including this Olive-backed Sunbird:

As well as birding we like to see the local wildlife where possible and couldn't resist seeing Tarsiers, the smallest primate, as we passed a reserve for them:

We birded in the forest on Bohol, the highlight species of this section of the trip was an Azure-winged Pitta:

We even squeezed in some touristing, visiting the Chocolate Hills, which are actually deforested hills, but they are marketed as tourist spot and the tourists duly arrive.

Back to the reserve this Macaque was one of a family group passing through the valley:

Down the road in the adjacent river a Northern Silvery Kingfisher basked: 

Just off the road a Rufous-lored Kingfisher:

From Bohol our crazy guide took us on a boat to Cebu to overnight followed by an early start to then fly to the Island of Mindanao.   Mindanao is troubled, enjoying as it is both an Islamic and a Communist insurgency and being under martial law.  Westerners are encouraged not to stay in the towns and cities over night, but being birders we drove a few hours to the base of Mount Kitangala and then walked up to a birding camp halfway up the mountain.   It was rough, very rough, and being run by a family who are making a very good income from the visitors while doing no maintenance on the main lodge.

The birding was interesting and apparently it's popular because you can reliably see the Philippine Eagle which we did.  It rained a lot.  Slowly but surely as everywhere in the world, the forest is being cut down to be replaced by agriculture.   The Eagle view point now overlooks fields in most directions, i wonder how long it'll remain viable, particularly given the total lack of care.

After three pretty rough nights the weather cleared and we were relieved to be heading down, the view en route was spectacular:

We drove directly to Cagyan de Oro and then flew back to Manila, staying in a moderate hotel in the city, flanked by karaoke playing bars, so little sleep ahead of another very early start.  In fact all of the starts were early, our guide got panic attacks from traffic, airports, stopping to take photographs, etc.   We paid a huge amount for a private tour and were put in in mostly awful accommodation, sleep deprived and then moaned at.  The first European guide will also be our last, we'll stick to the locals from now on, they are so much more considerate.

Anyway after said early start and a breakfast box consisting of dry bread and cake (he also didn't plan anything ahead and then blamed us for being difficult for wanting to eat!), we passed some waterlogged rice paddies the way to Sabang Marsh:

Whilst there we saw a bird species i never thought i'd get the chance to see, already the bird of the trip for me, a Siberian Rubythroat:

From Sabang we drove up into the central Highlands to Banaue, a region famous for Terrace farming:

The birding at altitude on Mount Polis was enjoyable, though mostly roadside based.   We saw Mountain Leaf-Warbler:

And a display from the normally skulking Benguet Bush-Warbler amongst a good number of others: