What part of the long hot walk looks like. You start out on a nice path with great views of palm trees and in general, the island, before descending some scary jungle stairs to the water.
The tour is all day with 2 different iteneraries with pick ups around 6-8 AM and getting back a little after 5. It includes the gear you need, a private tour guide, entrance fees, all transportation, and lunch at the falls.
There are 2 canyoneering routes Badian and Algerian. Since there were many more tours offered and information about Badian, that was the one we choose. There is also this page to compare them if you are interested in the jump heights.
After about an hour we got to the meat stick spot where if you are hungry, you can buy pork/ chicken?/ etc kebabs for 40 pisos. This is also the site of the first “big” jump about 20 feet. It looked like you could walk a little further to a smaller jumping spot but where is the fun in that?
Once you jump, you can see the caves under the cliffs you were just standing on and they are full of stalactites and fun formations. Then it’s another hour or so of adventure with the jumps getting bigger and bigger.
We passed a beautiful DAM waterfall and did a few smaller jumps before reaching an optional 30 foot jump off a suspended bamboo walkway. This is the EASIEST 30 foot jump. No pushing off necessary, so your form for hitting the water is a lot better (for me at least) making this my favorite jump of the day.
A little more walking and wading through water, and you get to the last jump of the day: and it just so happens to be right into a waterfall. Again it’s about 30 feet but if you could do the last one, you can do this one right? RIGHT! This one requires a little bit of a shove off meaning my form wasn’t great, my land not pleasant, but hey it was still exhilerating and awesome and I regret none of it!
After the last jump you’re in the first picnic area and it’s lunch time! We got 2 choices of meat with rice and coke to drink. We soaked up a bit more sun and hung around the area though we could tell our guide was kind of ready to go.
We started to head now to the parking area where we passed the ACTUAL Kawasan Falls and things clicked into place a bit more. The waterfall we jumped was still an upper fall and we had further to go before getting to the main recreation area. It was a lot more crowded and a bit shady so we didn’t stay and swim more but it was a beautiful area and if we’d done the earlier itinerary in the day, this would’ve been a fun place to be in the afternoon sun. It was another 5-10 minutes from Kawasan Fall to the parking lot where our van was waiting.
Next up we took our van up to:
The ride took almost an hour from Kawasan Falls and seemed to go on forever. Just as we thought we couldn’t get any higher in the mountain ranges, we’d dip down for a bit, and continue on up. The scenery on the drive was stunning. The mountain road up was bumpy at times, and VERY windy.. If you are prone to motion sickness, you’ll definitely want to pop some Dramamine. Finally we were parked and had a short climb ahead of us. While you don’t need to hire a guide to hike to the peak, you DO have to stop in at the entrance to pay a 30 piso fee if doing it on your own (our fee AND guide were included in our tour).
There are a couple photo spots to stop at on the way but once you are at the top, that’s when the real view starts.
Word to the wise, the peak is often CLOUDY in the morning so better schedule your trip to the peak in the afternoon for best results.
There were a few other people at the peak (some wearing fashion sandals… cue eye roll) but for the most part we were able to hang around and enjoy the peak without feeling too crowded. There was even a cat lazying around at the top!
After we hiked back down, we had another hour van ride down to the mountain side and back to Oslob. Our driver wasn’t the most talkative but he really lit up when we pointed out a buff looking chicken and then preceded to regal us with facts and stories about Cock fighting on the island. Oh boy.
We also found out the city of Mantalongon (that we drove through on the mountain) is the capital of lettuce production in the Philippines. There were giant heads of lettuce everywhere! That was an fun thing to learn about. Our drive dropped us off in Oslob town (a bit from our resort) and recommended a restaurant and food stands to try for dinner. With that our tour was over and our dinner adventure began.
We again tested the small town ATM, but were once again denied funds. I’m serious people, get yo money out at the airport. So with that in mind, we economically chose the food stands. Tippe tried some squid (which hadn’t been cleaned out at all so fair warning.. prepare for some blackened fingers if you try this) and I just got more BBQ’d pork. I mean 3 sticks and a soda only cost $0.85! Then I got a fun fruit smoothie in a water bottle and some bakery snacks for dessert. Our hotel was an easy 5ish minute walk from the street vendors and we happily settled in for another early night in preparation for another early morning.
Day 5 Costs:
Skipped Breakfast
Kawasan Fall Canyoneering Tour $75
Street Food Dinner: $0.85
Street fruit smoothies: $1.00
Bakery breads for snack and next morning: $0.50
Water: $0.40
Lodging:
Sascha’s Resort Oslob: $9.50 pp
Total Day 5 Costs: $87.25