An early start to a fairly drizzly morning! The weather was still pretty bad but not awful. We didn't need good weather for what we had planned anyway. We were off to swim with whale sharks and I couldn't contain myself with excitement. Alex and Rose were a little reluctant to go at first as they weren't sure if we'd be able to see anything but Matt and I were going regardless, we'd come all this way! Philip had offered to take us to the beach at 5.30am and he ...

Waking up to the ferocious sound of heavy rain thrashing down on the room ceiling kept me awake from about 4am onwards. Why was it raining? I thought it was meant to be the best time of year to come?! On realising Matt had thrown away the last of our water the night before but not thought to purchase any more, he sheepishly got ready with all the waterproofs he owned and headed out to find the nearest shop... what was he like?! The weather looked just awful, wi...

Feeling very well rested, we woke ready for the day. We headed into Makati centre for breakfast where the only thing open for breakfast was a McDonald's or pancake house... easy choice for me really! The pancakes looked pretty good and didn't taste too bad either although they were covered in syrup and had a massive dollop of whisked butter on top... just how are Filipinos so slim?! Matt wasn't feeling too well, we were pretty sure he had developed an ear infec...

We arrived safely and excited into the capital of the Philippines, Manila! As soon as we got out of the plane, weirdly the smell of the airport took me back to the first time I was here 3 years ago! I had never actually left the airport the last time, just got a connecting flight to Iloilo city. I'd heard that Manila wasn't the nicest of cities so I wasn't really looking forward to our stay here. We fortunately had another flight out of Manila to Cebu booked the ...