- Bacolod - the "City of Smiles"

We love to travel, and we decided to take an overnight trip to Bacolod in neighboring Negros Occidental. Bacolod is easily the largest city on Negros Island with over 550,000 inhabitants. One of the main differences between the two halves (and two provinces) of Negros is that the East/Southeast Negros Oriental where we live speaks mainly Bisaya (Cebuano) and the West/Northwest Negros Occidental where Bacolod is the provincial capital speaks mainly Ilonggo (Hiligaynon). Also, though the land area of the two provinces is a similar size, the population of Negros Occidental is twice that of Negros Oriental.

At the plaza downtown Bacolod

San Sabastian Cathedral

At the City Hall

At the provincial capitol

Is Wendie trying to wrestle this carabao
away from a naked man?

We left home at 4:30am to go downtown to get on a bus to make the 6 hour trip and arrived in Bacolod before 11. We ate lunch and checked into a pension house and then went on a little tour. The most interesting place on the tour was “The Ruins.” 

Over a hundred years ago Don Mariano Lacson, a rich sugar baron (Is that where the term “sugar daddy” comes from?) fell in love with a Portuguese lady in Hong Kong and married her and brought her home to Negros. They had 10 children together, and when she was pregnant with the 11^th, she slipped in the bathroom and fell. It took the doctor four days to arrive, and by that time, she had passed away. (Of course the moral to this story is never go to the bathroom when you’re pregnant with your 11^th child.) Anyway the husband built this mansion as a memorial to his wife. During World War II, the Resistance burned it down so that the occupying Japanese forces could not use it as a command center. Took three days to burn.

A separate memorial at "the Ruins"

"Lawn mowers" in the Philippine

Actually what we enjoyed the most in Bacolod was eating, especially at Kenny Rogers Roasters. It was the most nearly American food we have eaten in any restaurant.

We really enjoyed eating at Kenny Rogers

We left the next day in early afternoon expecting to get home about 7pm, but while we were traveling through the mountains in the middle of the islands, the brakes of the bus failed. We were able to stop safely, but no more riding on that bus. Most of the 50 or so passengers were able to catch a ride on another bus that came by soon afterwards, but they didn’t have room for everybody. We waited over an hour and finally caught a ride on a jeepney to the next town just as it got dark. In that town we waited an hour for a bus going to Dumaguete and made it safely home after 10pm.

Broken down bus in the background

In the middle of nowhere
except for this tiny church
and the resting canopy in front