PANAY ISLAND TOUR OF BEACHES AND CHURCHES. Part One: Concepcion and Gigantes Islands

For the Holy Week of 2017, I decided to go around the island of Panay (excluding Boracay) to visit all the parish churches of the towns along the way, at the same time touring the beautiful beaches and islands that the four provinces of Iloilo, Capiz, Aklan and Antique had to offer. (Although I already visited Iloilo, Roxas and Kalibo before, but I have not been to Antique and have not made a round the island trip.) I started in Iloilo going up north to Concepcion and Carles then to Roxas and Kalibo rounding up the northwestern part of the island in Malay and Buruanga then down to Culasi and San Jose de Buenavista in Antique, going round the southwestern part of Panay to Anini-y and back to Iloilo in nine days. The islands I visited included the Concepcion Islands, the Gigantes islands in Carles, Mararison in Culasi and Nogas Island in Anini-y. Two friends from Tacloban accompanied me on this trip.

This Panay Island trip will be divided into five parts: 1)  Concepcion and Gigantes Islands, 2) Churches of Capiz and Aklan, 3) Churches of Antique, 4) Mararison Island in Culasi and finally on 5) Nogas Island and the Rafflesia of San Remegio. 

We arrived about noontime in Iloilo on a Saturday before Palm Sunday. After our lunch at Ponsyon resto which served local cuisine at the SM in Mandurriao we visited right away the Molo Church and then the Cathedral where I had to meet a priest friend,  Fr. Jayr whose family car I asked that I will use for the trip around the island. Fr. Jayr would be with us for two days  until Higantes island. We would be having our first long trip that afternoon as we had to go to Concepcion about a hundred kilometres away where we will celebrate the Palm Sunday, the following day. We only passed by the church of Dumangas along the way as we stopped by a bakery in town of a friend of Fr. Jayr which still used a stone oven (hudnoan) for the past 70 years.  Arriving in Concepcion, we paid a courtesy call at the parish priest Fr. Tutana who invited us for dinner at the H.E. classroom of the parochial school, St. Mary of the Anawim of God Academy. When it was founded, the parish priest was narrating, the school was called Anawim of God Institute. They later changed it to its present name because their students were subjected to bullying and derision as the initials of the school was AGI, which in Ilonggo means bakla. We stayed at the Junbee Garilva Hostel in the town.

Aside from its neogothic style, the Molo Church is famous for all the statues in the church, sixteen of them along the aisle pillars, are women saints. Hence it is sometimes dubbed as the "feminist church". 

The Blessing of the Palms

We concelebrated at the Palm Sunday mass at the parish church of Concepcion then off we went for an island hopping at the Concepcion islands. We visited first Agho island, then Tambalisa island at the Pan de Azucar beach resort of JunBee where we had our lunch. After lunch we went to the Lumpatan Beach, a pebble beach with some rock formation on another part of the island. Balubadiangan Island or Sandbar was our last stop.

CONCEPCION ISLANDS

Excited to see the clear blue waters with the beautiful white sand of Agho, I immediately jumped into the sea only to find out that my cell phone was still in my pocket. It went dead right away. I was not able to use it anymore. Good that my companion brought along an extra phone which I was able to borrow. 

The JunBee Pan de Azucar Island Resort had some native cottages for overnight stay and cottages for day excursion. 

 Some of the rock formation at the Lumpatan Beach

We were back in the mainland of Concepcion by late afternoon. We packed our things as the next stop was to the town of Carles which is the jump off point to the Higantes islands. We stayed overnight at the Palm Garden Resort in Carles. 

Palm Garden Resort in Carles, Iloilo

We took the passenger boat from the Bancal Port in Carles for our trip to Gigantes. The boat left at ten and arrived 11:40 in Langub port of Brgy. Granada of Gigante Norte. From the port we were met by motorcycles which would bring us to Rosewood Resort more than a kilometer away from the pier where we were staying. Our lunch consisted of buttered scallops called  tikab and crabs which are abundant in the island. Then we had our island hopping right after.  First stop was  the Tangke lagoon, then Cabugao Gamay followed by Bantigue sandbar where we ate freshly cooked tikab which tasted really sweet. Our last stop was the Antonia Island Resort situated at the south easternmost tip of the South Gigante island where there was some beautiful coral reefs just by the side of the resort. 

GIGANTES ISLANDS

                          Our bahay kubo cottage at the Rosewood Place Resort. 

The small limestone island where the Tangke Lagoon is found.

The docking area for the boats near the Tangke lagoon. 

Tangke Lagoon

Approaching Cabugao Gamay Island in the Gigantes Islands of Carles

  The most photographed spot in the Higantes Islands at Cabugao Gamay.

Snorkeling at the Cabugao Gamay Island

           The famous tikab shells of Carles. Freshly cooked just with water they were soft and tasted sweet. 

The last stop was Antonia island where a beautiful coral garden was found at the left side of the island. 

The coral garden at the Antonia Resort

          It was already six in the evening when we left the Antonia Island Resort to go back to Rosewood Resort in Higantes Norte with the sun just about to set.  

Saw this beautiful sandbar near the Langub port in Brgy. Granada of Gigante Norte as we were waiting for the boat to depart for Carles the following day.

Although it would be a nice experience to go to the two groups of islands if you have the time, but between the Concepcion islands and the Gigantes, the latter was much better. In Concepcion you have beautiful islands with white sand beaches. But there are varied sites to see in Gigantes aside from white sand beaches.  There is the Tangke Lagoon where you first dock on a wooden flatform in order to climb over some rocks to the lagoon. (It is best to visit when its high tide as the water inside the lagoon becomes deep enough to swim.)  Some islands had beautiful coral gardens and of course you have the most photographed of all Gigantes Islands in Cabugao Gamay. And there are plenty of the delicious tikab shells in Gigantes which are very cheap. Since there are more tourists in Gigantes, the boat service for tourists are already much systematized unlike in Concepcion because of fewer tourists there are not many boats which can be availed of. During our trip to Concepcion, our boatman trying perhaps to get more income invited another group of tourists to join us. Since some of the islands we were going were not in their itinerary the boatman had to drop us off in one island then bring his other guests to another island. When we were in Lumpatan, the boatman said that he will ask the JunBee boat which might already be at the Pan de Azucar to fetch us, then just as when he was about to depart he shouted from the boat that he will come back which he didn’t. We ended up hiring a small boat to bring us to Pan de Azucar resort. It was good that the boat of the JunBee was there which brought us back to the main town of Concepcion.