Operation: Guam: Bay Leaf Hotel

Our first full day in Manila was loosely planned since we could not find any tours that were operating that day. So we did our own tour instead! Rizal Park is a very large (140 acres) and is filled with statues, sculptures, gardens, and other items of interest. It is a popular place for people to hang out on their lunch break or after work/school. Since it was only about a mile from our hotel, we opted to walk there and then walk all around the park exploring it and nearby areas.

We started at the Rizal Monument which holds the remains of one of the best known heroes of the Philippines, Jose Rizal. He had a very interesting but short life...he was executed by firing squad at the age of 35. He was already an accomplished author, artist, and an ophthalmologist! If you haven't heard of him, you should read more here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Rizal.

Located near Rizal Monument is the Independence Flagpole which is the highest flagpole in the Philippines. It is 150 feet high and is the sight where Truman declared the Philippines to be independent.

Flagpole with Rizal Monument

You can see here how tall it is.

Rizal's Execution site

Front of Rizal Monument

Tourist selfie!

Mini fountain

Chinese Garden

Students studying

Confucius

Path of enlightenment

From there we made our way through the park to the Chinese Garden. There is a nominal fee to get in and many people were inside. We saw students studying and some people sleeping in this park. It was a nice area with a few gazebos, a statue of Confucius, and a path with several sayings from him. There was also a lily pond and a couple fountains.

One of many sayings on the path of enlightenment

Ceiling above the path of enlightenment

Fountain

Lily pad pond

More pond

Musical Dancing Fountain

Continuing through the park we came to the musical dancing fountain which does nightly shows. Around the fountain are busts of various men who were executed on the grounds of Rizal Park, they call it the Pathway to Glory. I think there were about 20 of them around the fountain.

Pathway to Glory

Open air auditorium

Pigeon condos.

This is the open air auditorium where they have a lot of free shows and cultural programs.

Flower Clock

This is the Flower Clock. Basically the flowers make up the face of the clock and there are mechanical hands of the clock that actually work. Kind of hard to see from the ground though.

Chess plaza

There is a chess plaza in Rizal park where they have special tables with chess designs on them. According to the tour book, people will call out to people passing by to see if they might be interested in playing. We did not experience that since no one was there but it was a nice little area.

Very decorative planters

Jeepney

Lapu Lapu statue

Walkway with metal heart frames.

Selfie with the hearts!

This small pond holds a giant relief map of the Philippines. We could not photograph all of it - I bet an aerial shot of it would look great! We walked around and took a few pictures of it so you can kind of get an idea of the size.

Next stop was the Orchidarium which unfortunately did not have many orchids in it. But it was a lovely garden!

Lily pad pond & waterfall

Koi pond

Fig tree

Roots hanging

Root tunnel

New Growth

Replica of horse drawn cart

Flower tunnel

Tree bridge

Tree bridge with kids on it

Peek a boo!

My handsome sailor!

Tree bridge with a submariner on it!

My turn!

Yep, it's a kit kat bench

Soul waves

Korean Filipino sculpture

See no evil, etc.

We continued walking through the park and saw more sculptures. From here we walked into Intramuros which was a walled city when Spain occupied Manila. Now it has schools, hotels, and restaurants.

Heading into Intramuros (walled city)

Cooking school

View from Bayleaf hotel

We went into the Bayleaf hotel which has a rooftop cafe and some great views!! It was a nice break from the heat (we ate lunch inside) and our feet needed a break too.

Cannons for defense on the wall of the city

Mini amusement park

On top of the wall - little girl begging

Archer's spot in the wall

Wall with a hotel in the background

Me in front a lookout tower

After walking around Intramuros for a while, we decided to check out the walkway along the water. Unfortunately for our feet, that meant retracing our steps back through Rizal Park and walking past our hotel in the opposite direction. The walk along the water was very nice and had some sculptures along the way.

Very old church

On pedestrian bridge to get to walkway by the water

Ahhh....so pretty!

Manila Vice!

Love the water!

Christmas tree by Cultural Center of the Philippines

More bayside pics

Amusement park

Coconut Palace

The Coconut Palace was hard to take pictures of due to all the foliage around it and we were outside the fence. It was not open to the public so we couldn't get closer. There is an interesting story about it and if you are interested, here is a link for more information. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coconut_Palace

We did do our first and only ride in a Jeepney for part of our trip from Intramuros to the Cultural Center of the Philippines. We had no idea that we did not get on the correct one and it did not take us to the area we were aiming for. It cut down on our walking a little bit but we ended up being a little out of the way. Crazy tourists!!

Selfie in the tricycle!

We had dinner at a restaurant near the Cultural Center of the Philippines and by then we were so tired! We did not want to walk back to our hotel. We attempted to hail a taxi but that area was very busy and every taxi that came by was already full. So we ended up hailing a tricycle instead. It is basically a motorcycle with a sidecar that has a cover on it. It was interesting!!

Here is a video I took while we were riding the tricycle. Please forgive the quality - this was taken with my phone! :-)

We ended our long day at the Hobbit House which was just down the street from our hotel. This tavern was opened in 1973 by a former Peace Corps volunteer and college professor. Apparently he was so inspired by J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy that he opened this bar and staffed it with "little people". It has been very popular ever since and now has a second location in the Philippines. It was pretty dark inside so the pictures aren't great but you can see that it is decorated with all kinds of LOTR paraphernalia. Although the bartenders are not "little people" (they wouldn't be able to see over the bar), the wait staff are all "little people". They were very nice and happy to pose for pictures with us "crazy tourists".