The Cebu, Negros, Panay, And Masbate Islands Ride

This was a ~12 day, trail finding \ verifying ride over these 4 islands... We were looking at both Panay and Masbate islands ESP and their ferry routes as both are totally new to us ...

Just to refresh everyone's memory, a friend and I are trying to start a dirt bike touring company here, so we need dirt roads, trails across the islands .. We try to use maps as much possible for planning our routes but you gotta ride it out to verify roads, trails, ST, ferries, lodging, ETC ...

No real issues happened other than my Filipino guide had to return early, so I had to explore Panay and Masbate on my own ... And I had to return just last week to ride my friend's 03 wr250 yama-hammer back home ... I also explored Panay again when picking up the bike ... Return trips are very good to see previous made friends and you have a working knowledge of an area and that helps a great deal ..

~2100 pics taken so I'll try to present some in a manner that is sort of like the ride progressed .. I'll pretty much skip Cebu as I've shown many pics on it already ... Negros will have some pics and Panay and Masbate will be the focal points ...

Panay had many types of riding to include very cool beaches all along the coast line ... I can see spending more time there in the future and maybe living there ...


Cebu

I'll be using a 80\120 Metzeler Sahara 3 rear tire ... A little small but all I could find ...


Kanlaon Volcano in the distance on Negros island ... We'll be seeing more of it as we'll be taking a southern route around it ...



Our ferry ...


Bikes loaded ..


Cebu coast line in rear view mirror ... I can see me maybe owning a small pump-boat like that one in the future to move between islands ...

Negros

We stopped over to check the MX track at San Carlos ..


Early morning view of Cebu from Waddy's Mountain Resort over looking San Carlos ....


Some pics of the volcano and surrounding area ...


This was about as close as we got as we were focusing our time on Panay and Masbate .... The locals always get a big kick out of having their pic taken ... I like to have some printed and return and give them a copy sometimes if possible...

Ray_Ray, being a filo myself, what is the dirtbike scene like over there and the riding like....l don't particular like riding 30c and 80% humidity!!

How far do you have to ride out of Manilia and availability of bike's plus security....must be millions of single tracks???

PS. My mum's from Bulacan and the old man from Pampanga but the 'house' is in Malolos.

Family oriented detour


The detour!


West side of the volcano after we have crossed over the entire island ...


Bacolod port and off to Panay from here ....


Negros in our review mirror...yep, same volcano on the right side of that ridge line ..

Once out of any city, the entire country is an enduro track for riding ... Either true ST or just dirt roads that are not maintained and look like ST (but are wide enough for trucks) are everywhere ... Most places have rider clubs or at least known locations where riders meet once a week (Sunday) for trail rides .... Anywhere from 3-30 riders go out together .... You just gotta know who to ask ...

I don't see alot of big bikes (> 150 CCs) here for renting and if buying one, they are expensive .. Usually only the small underbone models that are ok for streets are rent-able ... The best you will find for renting is a 200 xr honda most likely ... You can buy 125 2T machines fairly cheap for trails...

Security here is OK ... There are still some rebels here but not on a big scale and in small, isolated areas ... I have ridden 2 yrs here, lots in the second year alone, and no issues ... The average person will provide endless help when in their area and will warn you of any issues there ... I only hear of big issues in southern Mindanao ...

Manila is a little out of my area of operation (AO) but I did do some riding outside of Makita City in the KA Vergels Trail Stop area.... Very cool place and riders(1-30 of them) show every Sunday to ride the place I was told .....and some riding in the Mount Pinatubo area ... Pinatuba was cool and we only stayed there a few hours ...We were told you can ride up towards the summit but we only rode in one of its lahars ...

It can be hot here in places, like in ST and no air blowing but as long as you are moving on the bike, no real heat problems ... And the rain is warm ...You can keep going in the rain most times and not fear freezing later from the wet ...


This thread talks about the Bicol, Luzon areas ...
http://www.cafehusky.com/threads/the-four-island-ride-cebu-to-leyte-to-samar-to-luzon-islands.21327

Panay (east side)

Panay has a large MT range that blocks east\west passage of the island unless you go to the far north or south end of the island ... We're looking at this river created by drainage from the MTs you see in the distance (westward) as a possible way to the west coastal road ..



These white Carabaos are pretty rare here ...

Panay (West side)

No luck crossing west here so we street ride over to the west side and look at some dirt roads\trails and ST for moving north and south to keep off the hardtop roads ...

here are some examples of what was available ...




Some local help with directions..


Small BRGY ...

You can see here that I'm down in a valley behind that small mountain on the left (west) of the pic ..


More views of my AO...


Many times the creek was the road ...


My guides... they ran through these trails for 2-3 miles pointing out the way for me to go to the next BRGY ... I couldn't believe they kept following me for so long and they only stopped after they knew I was at a place where I would not get lost ..

After rolling out of the the mountain roads, this place is where I landed, making it ~easy to find it on a map ...


here is the western, coastal road ... You can see the rice planted there ... Lots of rice over here ..


Found this big ~a$$ tree and had to park under it and take a pic ...


The guys on the small bikes made crossing this one look easy ... my crossing was not so graceful ..


Same area but a terrain change ...

More ST ....


This will be a hard step-up outta this creek so I'm gonna get one of the guys living there to remove one of the big rocks at the bottom side to allow easier access to the upper part ..


The family living here was very helpful to me ... gave me water and more directions ...


That big coconut tree, slightly off-centered to the left in the pic over past the field, marks the trail and way out ....If rice is growing there when we return next month, we'll take the creek that is also marked by that same coconut tree back to that gnarly uphill out of the creek ...

Back to the coastal hiway and heading north around the NW tip of Panay and then back eastward along the northern coast to the port for the ferry ride to Masbate ....

These bridges are at a friend of mine named Kevin in the Calasi BRGY area ... I rode across the last one only and regretted that after I was started ...

Panay (North coast)

This side of the island was very windy and the ocean was quite a bit rougher due to this ... Very good sandy beach riding in many places ...



Very high bluffs also in some places also ...


Blue Starfish was a very nice and reasonably priced lodging house ...

Napa huts are just down the road also ..


And this cool water fall just across the road ....


More sandy beach..


I was gonna drag race this 737(?) but he was only taxiing around ....


You can see the force of the wind in this one ...

Small river crossing in the rain on Tupas Ferry... only 40P cost ...




The Captain


We head off in this direction I think ...

Loading for the trip to Masbate ....


A better look at this pump-boat ... Not very big for a 4hr trip across the ocean ... but we never really loose sight of land on any side of us so it feels pretty safe ...


Local refreshments ...


We head out to the open ocean after going ~2 miles up a small river ...

More on Masbate later ....

I can see how you regretted the bridge crossing...super nice country though...good luck with your company...

Thanks and my boots are rubber soles also and it was raining so even pushing the bike was scary ... I don't think the side rails would keep the 250 lbs bike from going over in most places ... I'm not crossing them again even if dry ...

Wow.... what an adventure. I don't think I would like any of the the small bridge crossings.