Ievunia and Mariushki in the Tropics: The Philippines

While we sit, relax and enjoy the view from our balcony in an idyllic guesthouse 'The Cove House' on the Panglao island, it is hard not to get too overenthusiastic over the Philippines.

Before, we came to this insular country we had quite a vague idea about what to expect here. Now, we know that you can expect quite a lot, mainly good things, though sometimes the things can also get rough in here. To start with, the Philippines is the archipelago of more than 7000 Islands, beautifully set in the tropical waters. All the islands lie within the so-called 'Pacific Ring of Fire', which means that it's all volcanic, and the volcanoes do erupt with, sometimes, very deadly consequences. You add to it earthquakes, landslides, flooding, typhoons, tsunamis, you name all possible natural disasters - this country has seen it all, except for snow blizzards. Whereas in our part of the world, the old planet Earth seems to be sleeping like a baby, here it's well awake, -new mountains grow, old volcanoes collapse, some islands sink, other islands emerge, new lakes form - it makes you realise that our planet is a living and quite a dynamic organism.

All the forms of life are very vibrant in the Philippines, including humans. Almost one hundred million people live in this country, whose total land area is slightly smaller than Poland. This density of population, combined with very fertile volcanic soils and a mountainous terrain, resulted in the emergence of one of the most spectacular sites we have seen during our trip - the Ifugao Rice Terraces.

Hard to believe that some of those terraces are more than 2000 years old

They must be all water-tight as rice likes it wet

They stretch several hundred meters up and down and sometimes whole villages are squeezed in between them. Needless to say that these villages are only accessible by foot.