Puerto Princesa and St. Paul Underground River, Palawan Island, The Philippines

 Puerto Princesa is in East Central Palawan Island in the Philippines. It is an important port on the Sulu Sea. It was occupied by the Spanish, who brought the Catholic religion to the Philippines.  The first settlers arrived in 1872. There are about 211,000 people scattered over the island, and most are engaged in agriculture or fishing. About a third reside in the city on the shore of Puerto Princess Bay. 

There are not a lot of sights to see in the city, but the St. Paul Underground River is located about 50 miles away. This river which is 8.2 km long is one of the world's longest underground rivers, and is now a protected area in the Puerto Princesa Subterranean National Park.

Our drive through the city on the way to the park passed a lot of old, modest low structures. This was the entrance to the main market.

There are a wide variety of vehicles around, but one of the most popular were motor cycles like the white one in the picture above, fitted with a sidecar that can hold up to four people. 

This one has a nice message on the front!

Once we left the city, our drive took us through some very pretty countryside, with lots of  fairly primitive homes with thatch or tin roofs.

There were many small chapels on the road along the way. This was one of the newer nicer ones.

One of the smaller chapels we saw. It was Sunday, and we saw a crowd standing outside the main Catholic Church in the city listening to the service because it was full inside when we drove past at 10 Am.

After a two hour drive through hilly, winding  roads we arrived at Sabang Wharf .

Each of these outrigger small boats held six passengers for the half hour trip through fairly choppy water to reach Sabang Beach.

The outrigger boats flying toward the beach. It was quite an exciting ride!

Our group arrived safely, but had to jump into the surf to exit the boat. Good thing it was a hot day!

Beautiful Sabang Beach!

After a short walk through the forest, we arrived at  the beautiful calm lagoon which contained the entrance to the Underground River. This was beginning to feel like an Indiana Jones adventure!

Six people boarded each small outrigger canoe paddled by a boatman. He wore a helmet with a light to point out specific rock formations and stalactites and stalagmites as we went through the cave. We went into the cave for about 3.2 km which took abut 45 minutes. There is no other light in the cave in order to protect the nocturnal animals who live in the cave system, and of course no flash photos are allowed. 

A view from inside the cave looking toward the entrance.  Unfortunately there was not enough light to capture photos of  any of the other fantastic formations that we saw in the cave. The water in the river is a mixture of fresh and salt water since at high tide, sea water flows into the lagoon and the river system. Fresh water flows into the river from the rainfall from the mountains above. During monsoon season there is a lot of fresh water flowing into the river.

The lagoon outside the exit from the cave.

This young monitor lizard was wandering by the path to the lagoon.

There were several of these monkeys along the path to the lagoon. They like to steal bags and food!