On Travel: Davao, Mindanao

Davao, Mindanao.


Four days after arriving in Manila, it was time for me to head to Mindanao and the city of Davao. Out of 7107 islands (depending on high tide or low tide) that make up the Philippines, Mindanao is the second largest island yet also the poorest clearly making it the top destination for someone in my line of work (international development).

Waking up at crack hour, we headed to one of the many national airports that would take us to Davao City. In most countries that I have visited, the international airport is the airport, but that is far from the case here. As I mentioned there are more than 7000 islands meaning a lot of local folks need to get around. For our 1.5 hour trip, a double decker full to capacity was required and my boarding pass with row 95 as my seat kinda had me scared. Should anything that weighs this much really be all over the "friendly" skies?!? Nevertheless, one safe take off and landing latter, we arrived in Davao.

If I had thought Manila was warm, Davao proved that things could get a LOT warmer and about a 100% more humid! Luckily, I had braided my hair down prior to leaving Manila otherwise the beast would have been in full glory! That said, I loved my first take of Davao. It instantly had that island feel that metropolitan Manila just can't quite offer. Even though we were inland, the promise of water felt so close and the lush greenery and clear blue skies (and did I mention humidity), just screamed ISLAND.

A quick ride into the city center revealed a small modern-ish city with tons of people hustling around on motorbikes, bikes, and every single variety of transportation combining the two.

The main hotel that we were hoping to stay in was allegedly fully booked so we checked into another hotel. As someone who has lived in and stayed at every variety of accomodations including the good, bad, and bed-bug ridden, this was clearly not the worse. But let's suffice to say that these images reflect best views of the hotel and that within 24 hours we had check-ed in to the "allegedly" full hotel that was actually very much vacant with better everything, especially better internet connection!

{Photos: Brandie for Out & About Africa}

P.S. Sorry if the formatting is a bit wonky today...will have it together for a new post tomorrow.