Cebu Island in the Philippines is often referred to as "The Queen of the South", and we could see why as we pointed our Toyota southwards in search of our breakfast coffee.

Here in South Cebu the atmosphere is a little different to everything else we had experienced in the Philippines, the verges were more orderly and sported lush tropical vegetation, the streets were cleaner and more inviting. Even the air seemed crisper than before, or maybe that was the coffee. We found a quaint, rather rudimentary guesthouse that served coffee and offered a restaurant style menu that had a few items we could choose from. It was right on the water with its own little harbour and everything, delightful. We enquired about a boat to take us out on the water for a day and lo and behold, within minutes we were talking to our captain who bartered a great deal on a boat ride the following day.

We were excited, we didn't know where we would be staying that night, but the sun was shining and the world was vibrating at a wonderful frequency and we trundled, South, with the music adding that extra little influence to the ambiance. Oh the joys of freedom and travel.

Soon it dawned on us that we would need to fill up with fuel and find accommodation for the evening. As it happens when travelling, we had almost run out of Peso and would need an ATM before we could do anything else.

Well we soon found out that on South Cebu Island, on that day, none of the ATM's we could find were internationally connected and so we could not draw from the local network, We went from town to town and got the same response form the ATM. The apologetic message did nothing to calm out nerves, we even went into one of the largest banks, only to be told "Sorry."

So as it turned out the ATM network South of Carcar City was of no use to us, as we backtracked the rejection from every ATM we came across became more and more difficult to bare. Then on arrival in Carcar and at the Chinabank ATM we had success.

Now the sun had passed its zenith and we set off South again in search of our adventure. Eyes peeled for a decent place to stay we cruised and cruised, feeling the freedom and the thrill of the unknown. Signage for places that offer accommodation on South Cebu Island is not the best. If anything there is a lot that could be done in this area, so while one of us drove, the other searched on the various accommodation websites. Soon we spotted a place that we thought would be acceptable and we went through the motions of viewing and negotiating the rate. It was dingy, make shift and the price was way out of the value-for-money range that we could accept. By this time the sun had set and it was dark, however we still turned down the offer and set out again in the dark. After repeating this process a couple of times we recognised the little place that we had coffee at that morning and we both agreed that for just one night, we could rough it and stay in the rudimentary room with a shared bathroom, we would clench our teeth and bare it, just for that one night.

The German proprietor greeted us with the unfriendliest guttural throat clearing that sounded as though he was about to spit. We ordered some dinner, shooed the cat and the dog away as many times as we needed to so as to finish our dinner and headed to bed.

There is so much to see and do in South Cebu, roadside signs point to one waterfall after another. Canyoneering beckons from bright signs with smiling tourists. Picturesque bays offered tranquil turquoise waters where snorkelling is as easy as breathing.

The next morning we woke to the weak coffee and the smiling faces of the staff at our guesthouse, with the expectant boat captain waiting to take us out onto the water. It was a perfect morning, the sea was as smooth as glass.

The English language is prolific in the Philippines, but some, like our boat captain, still struggle with it. This we found out only after we had crossed the Cebu straight, but more about our adventure in a tiny boat, almost not big enough for the four of us, and an ocean crossing that was not for the faint hearted. Till next week.