The proper way to insert an ear plug is to hold your arm over your head and insert it into the opposite ear, to get the right angle. This technique has been practiced several times in the last few days as our current accommodations consist of bamboo huts complete with night time barking and crowing from our fellow animal neighbours. As we look to budget around $20 CAD per night on accommodation, this means partial outside living, forgoing air conditioning, and embracing the mosquito nets. For now, aided by the island breezes, it's all good! As for the animals, well, we'll see how we all get along.

The highlight of the island of Bohol is the Chocolate Hills formation, which sees over 1000 "chocolate drops" scattered across the landscape. The hills were formed from coral deposits millions of years ago, and when the grass is parched in the dry season, turn brown to resemble chocolate. We are a couple months early for fully chocolate-y hills, but still managed to see a few of these splendid chocolate drops. Bohol's second claim to fame is the ongoing conservation of the tarsier, the teeny sweet nocturnal primate that possibly inspired the character of Yoda. We arrived just in time before the centre closed for the day to view 5 sleepy tarsiers curled up on tree branches, and also managed to escape all the crowds and noise which is a top criticism of these sanctuaries. And although we were happy with the place that we chose after plenty of research, we did still wonder about how contented the tarsiers were since people are coming to view them during their sleepy time. We are back to the same old ethics dilemmas about whether or not to visit endangered animals that are not living freely, while at the same time sensing that it is the best and maybe only option to help preserve their species. Thoughts??