Manila, Philippines (June 8)

Manila, capital of the Philippines, the self-proclaimed “Pearl of the Orient”,  and home to almost 15 million, spreads around a bay of the same name on the island of Luzon, one of over 7,500 islands in the western Pacific that comprise the Philippine Republic. Manila is one of Asia’s mega cities, sprawling, chaotic, and vibrant. (Translation: traffic is a nightmare!)

On the hot humid day we were there, we each took a pedicab around Intramuros, the walled colonial city that remains the heart of Manila, and marveled at how our biker-drivers could keep pedaling in the heat. Happily, Intromuros is relatively small, so the trip lasted only about an hour with several stops for photos including the Manila Cathedral, Fort Santiago, baroque San Agustin church, Casa Manila (an old house now a museum established by Imelda Marcos), the old fortified wall itself, and the Manila Hotel built in 1912 and noted as MacArthurs headquarters during WWII.