BACOLOD Travel Tips

This would be my first ever "travel blog" (so to speak).

Last October 17-18, 2011, Kay and I had the privilege to attend the ALLT National Conference, which was held at the University of St. La Salle in Bacolod City. Aside from the tough times we had trying to prepare and "polish" our presentations, finding our way going to Bacolod was equally challenging (but it was fun!). The internet proved to be a very helpful source of information for novice travelers like us.

Similar to how we got to Pagudpud, Kay and I also browsed a number of websites and travel blogs to get some directions and tips. This post is somehow a "pay back" to those very helpful information that we got.


AIR TRAVEL


Despite Kay's occasional persuasion for us to travel by sea, I was able to insist that we travel by plane since it would save us a lot of time and energy. It was our first time to travel this far so I kinda "played" with Cebu Pacific's Online services. (Check out http://www.cebupacificair.com/ and try playing with it too! It's not that complicated.) At first, I thought this online service is limited to those with credit cards but I have discovered that we can buy tickets even without credit cards; we can pay through ATMs or through bank deposit. However, since we're not so good in this online and traveling thing yet, we didn't get the best price for the airfare. Nevertheless, it was a learning experience. Getting cheaper tickets requires booking early, a lot early!

From NAIA, we landed at the New Bacolod-Silay Airport.

LAND TRAVEL


At Silay Airport, travelers would be greeted by the famous Ilongo smiles. We didn't have a hard time figuring out where the shuttle services were. FX and Vans going to Bacolod city are available right outside the airport, so there's no reason to be lost. (TIP: If you can't speak Ilongo like us, better speak in English. A professor from USLS mentioned that Ilongos prefer speaking in English than Tagalog since English is their second language and Tagalog is usually L3 or even 4.)

Fares range from 100-150 PHP ($ 2-3)

From Silay, we were dropped at ROBINSON's Mall. Yeah...malls look the same so you wouldn't feel any tinge of "alienation". From there, we asked a guard who was very generous enough to instruct us that we should take the Jeep (which looks like bigger multi-cabs that we see in Buendia-Mall of Asia) with the signboard "SHOPPING-LIBERTAD". Jeepney fare is just 7 pesos since it's just near.

From Robinson's we were dropped at a Jollibee (and had our breakfast there...duh). USLS is just a few steps away from that Jollibee store.

BACOLOD-MANILA


Going back was a bit more difficult. Taxi is very expensive, about 400 PHP ($9.5) so we decided to take the more difficult route. We took a jeep going to SM and walked to the FX/Van Terminal. We arrived just on time because the FX and VANS have a time schedule. 4:20 PM is the second to the last trip and 6:00 PM is the last trip (according to a travel brochure handed out to us). Our flight was at 7:00 PM so we squeezed ourselves into the 4:20 van (luckily, we were sexy!)

We arrived at the Silay airport earlier so we still had time to talk and reflect about our brief but memorable stay in Bacolod. We weren't able to roam around the city (and visit the Ruins, poor us!) but we definitely learned a lot!