Cebu and Bohol: The Philippines Trip That Needs No Internal Flights

The Philippines is more than seven thousand islands, and most itineraries spend a day of every three in an airport. Cebu and Bohol are the exception. You fly into Cebu, cross to Bohol by fast ferry, and fly home from Cebu again.

Nights

3 in Cebu, 2 on Panglao Island, Bohol

Cebu to Bohol

About 2 hours by fast ferry

Drier months

December to May

Typhoon season

Roughly June to November

Language

English is widely spoken

Cebu: a city day and a waterfall day

Cebu City is the oldest in the country. Magellan's Cross, the Basilica del Santo Nino and Fort San Pedro are within a short walk of each other; the Temple of Leah and the Taoist Temple are up in the hills with the view.

The second day goes south, about three hours by road, to Kawasan Falls: a walk through forest to a turquoise pool you can swim in, with a bamboo raft that takes you under the water. Moalboal, nearby, has sea turtles and vast shoals of sardines a few metres from the beach.

Bohol: the countryside and the sea

• The Chocolate Hills: more than a thousand grassy mounds. They are green for most of the year and turn brown towards the end of the dry season.
• The tarsier sanctuary. Tarsiers are tiny, nocturnal and easily stressed, so visitors are asked to stay quiet and keep flashes off.
• Lunch on a floating restaurant on the Loboc River.
• A morning of island hopping from Panglao: Balicasag for snorkelling, and the Virgin Island sandbar.

The one thing to plan around

The ferry. On your last day you cross back from Bohol to Cebu before flying, so the flight home must leave in the evening.