Exploring Camiguin (Day 1)

I’ve always wanted to go to Camiguin so together with my sisters and my boyfriend, we grabbed a voucher from Ensogo and a seat sale from Airphil Express to put this plan into action. Our voucher included the following:

3D/2N standard room accommodation with daily set breakfast for 2 at Sabacajan Beach Resort Beach Front.
Round trip port transfers (Binuni Port at Camiguin) and vice versa
Complimentary entrance passes to Arden Spring, Sunken Cemetery and White Island with boat transfer.

I did some research while waiting for the day of our trip. I read several blogs, took note of their routes, itineraries, expenses, and other tips when they got to Camiguin. I also scoured through forum/threads for more info about Camiguin. Just wanted to be really prepared before doing anything.

So on the day of our trip, our flight was at 7:55am, we were up really early in the morning. To no surprise, our flight was delayed by an hour. I planned some activities for our Day1 but I also had a back up plan in case something like that happens. My backup plan was to do the the day tour around Camiguin in 1 day. So I wasn’t really frustrated or anything when we didn’t get to do anything on our Day1. I read in the forum that you could actually do the whole tour in one day so I was complacent even if our flight was delayed.

I also read that we would have to travel for almost 2 hours from Cagayn de Oro (CDO) to Balingoan Port and ride a ferry for 2 hours to Benoni Port in Camiguin. I planned to commute our way from CDO to Balingoan (taxi-bus) but when we got there a taxi driver told us he could take us directly to Balingoan. We were already inside his taxi and he was already driving when he said it’ll cost us Php2500! I wanted to get out of the taxi but I guess the delay in flight made me tired of waiting. It would have cost us Php275 if we took the taxi-bus route. In the end, we agreed at Php500/person for the taxi ride from CDO to Balingoan port. The bright side is, even though it cost us, we didn’t have to transfer from one transportation to another or ask around where we could get a ride. We just had to sit there and wait to be brought to Balingoan port. Kuya Rey (taxi driver) was kind enough to give us info about CDO and Camiguin and even offered us his services to tour around Camiguin but we had to decline since the package that we got include the tour. We, however, asked for his service when we get back from Camiguin to drive us back to the airport.

Here’s the timeline of our trip to Camiguin via Cagayan de Oro(CDO):

9:00am left Manila

10:15am arrived at CDO (Lumbia Airport); hired a taxi to Balingoan Port

12:50pm arrived at Balingoan Port;booked a ferry to Benoni Port

1:45pm ferry leaves from Balingoan to Benoni Port

3:15pm arrived at Benoni Port

4:30pm arrived at Sabacajan Cottages

Since we can’t go on any tour as tourist spots close at 5pm, we had an early dinner and prepared for a full day ahead of us.