Two in the morning in a van, and turtles by lunch
A first joiner tour: the long ride south, a night on Onuk, and the sand flies nobody warned her about.
Mara T. is a made-up traveler. We wrote this from what real visitors report, to show what trip stories will look like here. The photos are real, but they aren't this traveler's own.
Photo: Hanna Zapant / CC BY-SA 4.0 
Photo: Hanna Zapant / CC BY-SA 4.0 
Photo: Marcreation / Unsplash
The van picked me up in Puerto Princesa at 2 a.m. I thought the schedule was a typo. It wasn't. I slept through most of the five hours south, woke up to sunrise over the rice fields, and by 8 a.m. we were at the port in Buliluyan, waiting for our bangka.
Nothing prepared me for the water. Every island was a different blue. On the second day we reached Onuk, and the turtles were right there, grazing in the shallows. We stayed two meters back like the guide asked, and they didn't care about us at all.
We'd paid a little extra to stay the night on Onuk, and I'm so glad we did. The day-trip boats left in the afternoon, and after that it was just our group, the sunset and a sky full of stars.
What I'd tell a friend
- Bring a strong insect repellent with DEET, and keep reapplying. The sand flies are worst at dusk.
- Ask your operator whether a night on Onuk is included. Not every tour has it.
- Camp toilets are basic, and there's a queue in the morning. Wake up early.
- Pack everything in a dry bag. The boat rides get splashy.
