Not all tourist visit places to see the scenery.
Dapitan is a sleepy historical and very tidy town of the Zamboanga Peninsula. It boasts of the beautiful sunset that drapes the city’s boulevard at sundown. It was once home of our national hero, Jose Rizal. It also embraces on its periphery a popular all- year destination, the Dakak Park and Beach Resort.
The city is accessible by plane if you come from Manila through Dipolog which is just less than an hour away. Or you can take the Manila to Cagayan flight and enjoy the 6-hour ride passing through a number of provinces and tourist destinations. Or you can take a ship from Manila to Cebu and Cebu to Dapitan. Either way you can reach the destination.
The Sunset Boulevard is a local and tourist destination of the peaceful town. Actually it is a city with a character, a personality and a natural ambiance of a rural town. The stretch of the boulevard faces a wide stretch of clean beaches on one side and restaurants, pension houses, hotels and foodstalls on the other side. This latter side turns into a party zone at night. The boulevard offers a good walk for both locals and tourists early in the morning or in the afternoon or if you don’t mind the sun, even at midday. The locals in Dapitan love to walk or otherwise ride on their motorbikes around the expansive town. The boulevard’s side that is hanging by the beach holds a picturesque scenery of benches lined with trees, coconuts and some cottages for picnic areas. Well, not actually just for picnic because my wily companions hit the cottage right after our first sumptuous meal at a sea food restaurant just right across the cottages.
The cottages were not only for picnicking it is also for singing. There was a videoke machine in the cottage that eats five pesos per song. The coins are to be dropped in the hungry coin slot before a song is chosen and sang. So instead of going around, to see the sights we were trapped in our companion’s passionate and obsessive singing for a few hours. It was not a pain listening to them because we were distracted with the waves rolling and rushing to shore. But it was not for long because while the machine got fat and heavy with the five peso coins, our companions were heated up in a mini concert of their own oblivious of us, who were itching to move to start and complete our itinerary.
We left our two companions who cannot be weaned from the microphones and hit our historical destination, the Rizal Park. I have been to Rizal Park many times, but it never fails to teach me a lesson or two, each lesson different from the subsequent ones. Rizal stayed in Dapitan during his exile a hundred years ago and has built for himself and the community several structures of historical and scientific importance such as his mini-hydroelectric reservoir and a school among others. It is said that this is where the national hero met one of the loves of his life, Josephine Bracken. My favorite structure is Rizal’s bedroom for no logical reason except that I love sleeping and I love wooden beds. The historical experience is balanced with a leisurely walk in the area by the bay, similar to that of the Sunset Boulevard. There was also a light tower behind the park on top of the hill which is worth exploring to, to get a wider view of the place.
Leaving our companions behind, we hit straight ahead to Dakak. Dakak is a park and beach resort located in the outskirts of the town and hidden behind huge picturesque cliffs. The surrounding entrance to the park is strewn with cages of wild and exotic birds, as colorful as the rainbow. There is no way that anyone could not be tempted to take photographs with the birds. The official entrance is located a few kilometers away. That is how the park lures the imagination of its visitors. The park is surrounded with lots of trees. It has its own golf course, a beautiful semi-stone chapel hidden in the outskirts and cottages for overnight visitors. There are bridges, actually a number of them and a wishing well which gives it a fantasy-like appeal. The bridges connect one corner to the other or one pool to the other. Their pools are numerous and clean and blue and very tempting. It’s actually a huge area to explore and there are lots more to see.
The beaches are white that is one of its many attractions. Plus there are hammocks hung on the shady Talisay trees, which gives visitors a perfect respite from the heat of the sun but not taking away the sight of the white sand beach and the perfectly quiet movement and sounds of the people and staff, altogether. A cozy restaurant is located by the beach but at a friendly and considerable distance from the place. There are rides of course, kayak, banana rides or whatever you call it, jet skis, snorkels for rent and of course scuba diving gears.
We swim and ate and relaxed and slept on the hammocks and benches while our companies are left in the town under the cottages singing to the videoke. When we got back, the companions were exhausted like real tourists who turned a day into a night partying by the boulevard. That is what actually happens every night at the boulevard.
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