Steemspots: We Fed Giraffes Mangrove Leaves in Calauit Safari Park, Busuanga, Palawan

Another week has passed, it is just time for Steemspots to showcase what Busuanga can offer because again, every spot has something to offer. Let @panoramicview and @junebride show you the beauty of Calauit Island in Busuanga, Palawan.

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@panoramicview and @junebride feeding giraffes with mangroves leaves at Calauit Safari Park, Busuanga, Palawan, Philippines.

Part of our Coron-Busuanga tour was a visit to Calauit Safari Park. We should blog about Coron first but this is just right because not all who visits Coron would choose to visit Busuanga. This town here is where the airport is located but it is not just known to be the airfield spot but it also has a lot of places to check out and one of them is the Calauit Safari Park.

Busuanga is around two hours away from Coron and it requires a private van to take us there or we also have the option to hire a motorcycle but that would be strenuous for us so we ended up hiring an agency to take us to this tour. So for Php 2400 per person, the tour includes:

• early breakfast
• Calauit Safari Park tour
• lunch
• Busuanga Island Hopping

Our day started as early as four in the morning, our van came to fetch us from our home-tel. We got to reach Calauit early so we can catch up with the feeding time. Calauit, by the way, is a whole island made into a Safari Park during the Marcos regime. Unfortunately, the government had somehow lessened its support to the said park thus caused some negative effects to the animals and most especially to the workers. That saddened us but by that time, we were really excited going to the island.

An early breakfast was served at a stop prior to reaching Busuanga. They served us fried fish, sunny side up and free coffee! It was still a bit dark but the coffee kept us awake until we finally reached Busuanga!

Wooden docking port of Calauit Island, the entire island turned into a haven for some Safari animals.

A local rowing his boat towards the island.

We went down the van, took a short motorboat ride going to Calauit. As per the boatmen who were locals in Busuanga, during the 1970s, these animals like Giraffe and Zebras were transported from Africa to Calauit Island which is 3800 hectares to prevent them from extinction. Twenty giraffes, along with dozens of zebra and antelope (Impala, Gazelle, Bushbuck, Eland, Waterbuck, and Tobi) were shipped but most of them died so these ones living here are all those who were born and raised here. Currently, they have 24 giraffes, 38 zebras, and around 1000 Calamian deer which are endemic to Calauit. They got some other animals like crocodiles, local pythons, a civet cat, a wild boar, a seagull, and turtles too!

A registration was required, our lady tour guide who is also a local showed us the way to the huge park where gazebos and shelters were randomly distributed around, we passed by some interesting trees and plants too, can you imagine how many photos we took prior to meeting the animals?

Awesome clouds and this dried S pathway.

There are lots of these types of trees around.

Amaryllis at Calauit Island.

@panoramicview posed under this blossoming tree. Was this a Sakura Tree? LOL

Anyways, the sun was not harsh yet so walking in the shadeless ground was not an issue. A worker hit the gongs and in just a few minutes, we spotted the gigantic long-necked giraffes gracefully walking their way into where we were standing! Our kind tour guide reminded us that we can go near but we should stay away from their back at a distance where they can't kick us, giraffes can kick really hard and it will be painful. Also, these animals can't walk backward, even those zebras so we better be extra aware of that.

What you lookin' at bro?

Giraffes are tall and majestic but graceful at the same time.

We then proceed to the feeding area where the fun started. A worker carried a huge pile of mangrove leaves, Calauit Island, by the way, has been surrounded by these and giraffes love them. The tour guide showed us how to feed these creatures but it was just too scary to do so until our companion bravely volunteered.

This giraffe looked at me while filming it.

It wasn't too scary after all, we said. Giraffes have dark and long tongues which they use to pick the bunch of leaves! We somehow were stunned by the beauty of their eyelashes! Those who are fans of fake eyelashes would be very jealous of them, they actually look like wearing one!

Zebras are polygamous, don't be a zebra!

Watch the zebra glanced at the camera while walking.

As soon as we got over the feeding part, we went to the shady tree so we could observe the zebras and Calamian deer from afar. We learned that zebras as Polygamous, a male zebra can be with two or more females and they go together like a pack! That explains why there was no lonely zebra when we were observing them.

Isn't she pretty?

Calamian deers chilling at the grounds.

Calamian deer, on the other hand, were chilling and eating far away from us, their horns are really interesting! These are considered endangered species of deer found only in the Calamian Islands of Palawan province, thus the name. It was nice to see them wild and free.

Watch the video summary created by @panoramicview via YouTube.

So far, Calauit Safari Park offers a close to the African Safari experience and I definitely recommend that those who visit Coron would also support it. The animals are free here and they can just roam around but the island is huge and there had been issues of hunting too because locals here are not anymore being paid properly and they resort to hunting these animals for meat! So supporting the park through its tourism would be very helpful to the locals and to the animals so they can still continue to live free and produce more newborns.

But more importantly, we hope the government could also support them, the workers had complained about delayed salaries, most of them left the grounds and went to Coron to find better jobs. It is just saddening to hear stories from the workers themselves that they are not properly paid.

To our next spot,

Jean & James

@junebride | @panoramicview

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