Vacation In Maasin City

I recently had my grand vacation in my hometown, Maasin City. As I previously posted my travels on my way to my final destination, I havent got a chance to post all the details that was happening in Maasin. Here are some of the highlights of my vacation in Maasin.

Me and my friend Willie actually spent 5 days in Cebu. I met my former officemates while I was working in Fairchild Semiconductor. These were my closest friends in Cebu. We also attended Gayle & Cesar's church wedding. On the 6th day we moved on to Maasin where we stayed in Villa Romana Hotel for the next 10 days.

It was fiesta time for Maasin City so there were a lot of invitations and activities that were going on. We had our feeding and gift-giving project dubbed "Pamistang Gasa Sa Pamilya 2" sponsored by Kaba-Maasin Las Vegas, a group of Maasinhons in Las Vegas where I belong. I also had a chance to have dinner with my former high school classmates. It was kind of a mini-reunion for us. The day after the Maasin fiesta, we had our Paloma Clan Reunion. This is a family reunion on my mother's side. We had a blast as we got to meet our relatives that we had never met before. We had also a chance to tour the southern part of my province. We stopped from one municipality to another and checked on what they can offer to visitors like us. I can see that the province of Southern Leyte is now doing something to improve the tourism industry. I hope this would go on and the government would not stop supporting the programs being started. Willie requested that we should also visit and tour the northern part of Leyte so we went to Tacloban which is around 3 hours drive. Noel, my brother was kind enough to render his services. He's a doctor but he didnt mind at all to be our driver and tourist guide at the same time. While in Tacloban, we visited the MacArtur Park where they depicted the Leyte landing as being promised by Gen Douglas MacArthur to free the Philippines from Japanese occupation. Who would forget Doug's famous line of "I shall return!" We also went to see the famous San Juanico Bridge, a major link between Samar and Leyte. With this bridge, it is now possible to travel by land from the northern tip of Luzon to the southern tip of Mindanao. The highlight for Willie during that visit to Tacloban was the Sto. Nino Shrine Museum which was previously owned by former first family, the Marcoses. Lastly we also celebrated my mother's birthday whith the whole family before we moved on to Manila.

We spent 2 days in Manila. We got the chance to meet our friends there. We went to Batangas to meet a friend of mine but we never stayed overnight. After our short stint in Manila, it was time to depart for the United States. While in flight, that was when we discovered how exhausted we were. Going back to Las Vegas is a huge counterpoint to our excitement when we were still on our way to the Philippines. We spent 3 weeks in the Philippines but I still feel it was not enought. There were so many places and people to visit but too little time. Looking forward to the next round.