Island Hopping in Zambales

Before my Subic Adventure, my colleagues and I, 12 of us, had our backpacking/camping trip to Nagsasa Cove last February 2011. It is one of the many islands in Zambales. There was much planning to this trip mostly because we were all so excited and also because of the conditions that we were going to face there: NO cellphone signal, NO modern-day comfort rooms, NO potable water, NO cooking utensils, NO electricity, and NO rooms or hotels to stay in there. So we really had to prepare for the stuff that we had to carry for ourselves and for the whole group. We also had an itinerary for the whole trip so we’d know what to expect and to make sure that we won’t waste time.

Going there as a group made the trip very cheap for us. We spent only around Php2000 for the whole trip (excluding your fares in Manila). We got way more than we paid for. Here’s a simple breakdown of our expenses:

EXPENSES:
(2) Pasay to San Antonio, Zambales: PHP 346
(2) Trike to San Miguel: PHP 20/head
BOAT Roundtrip PHP 500 (2,000 per boat, 3 boats, 12 people)
FOOD: PHP 500
NAGSASA Entrace: PHP 100
Anawangin Entrance: PHP 50
Extra money (in case of price adjustments): PHP 150 – tent included!

TOTAL: PHP 2,032

: travelling very early in the morning

: sunrise

: our tents!

: we decided to stop by Anawangin first

: Nagsasa

: Real Bonfire!

: The Lighthouse

: Capones Is. where the Lighthouse is

: We had to trek to go to the Lighthouse

: Camara Island

It was incredibly fun! Time went by so slow probably because any kind/form of modern-day technology isn’t present there. However, the restroom at Nagsasa was better than I expected. Running water (through a faucet) was abundant and clean and it was actually tiled.

Your trip to Nagsasa would greatly depend on the boatman that you contacted as he will be the one who’ll help you with almost everything from rice to charcoal to creating a bonfire! Good for us we got a very kind boatman, Kuya Johnny. You may contact him at 09093120345 (if that is still his number).

I’ll definitely go back there but I wanna go places where I haven’t been to yet. On second thought, if I’m really really stressed out and wanna unwind, I might actually go back there. Let’s see…