Hello, we are Chris and Carol from Jumping Places. Thanks for checking out our El Nido travel guide. Carol was born and raised in Rio de Janeiro and Chris was born in Manchester. Since his mom is Brazilian, he went to Brazil when he was 19 for a gap year and ended up living there for six years.
We met at work in 2013 in Brazil and that’s when our relationship started. We moved to Houston because of work and in 2016, on one of our road trips to California, we got bitten by the highly contagious “travel bug”. After that trip, we decided we wanted to try to escape the 9-5 life and travel full time.
At that time we saw a few YouTube travel vloggers basically living the life that we wanted. We realized then that they were not millionaires, they were normal people just like us. That’s when we decided that we would save up and try to travel continuously for two years and give vlogging a go.
Our Journey as Travel YouTubers
We started making videos in 2017 while we were still saving money to quit our jobs and travel full time. We used to practice making videos in Houston and in the places that we went during our yearly vacations.
Commencing the channel before starting to travel full time was definitely something that helped us a lot because we were able to build a following. It was small but it was enough to make us keep on making content.
The beginning of a channel on YouTube is the hardest part because you usually spend hours and hours creating videos and then you get less than 50 views. We tried to keep posting as many good YouTube videos as possible because we knew that consistency was key in this space.
Now that it’s been over three years and that we’ve reached over 100,000 subscribers we think that being YouTubers has many ups and downs that most people don’t usually see. Besides the haters and crazy viewers (that you’re always going to have) there are a few other cons to this job.
Sometimes we work too much, sometimes people cross the line of our privacy, sometimes people negatively judge us for being YouTubers. But we try to focus on the pros. We are grateful for what YouTube allows us to do.
We are able to have amazing experiences traveling the world and getting paid for sharing these experiences on our channel. We are not getting rich but we are living the life that we want to live, without being stuck in a regular 9-5 job. It’s not perfect but it has been an adventure!
Our goal is to inspire people to travel, respect locals and nature, and have authentic experiences. We think that that’s the path to becoming a better person and being more open-minded. Once you get to know other cultures you see that there isn’t just one “right way” to live.
Inspiration to Visit the Philippines
The Philippines was the first country that we traveled to after quitting our jobs in January 2019. We spent a month and a half there but we loved it so much that when we left we were already making plans to come back.
People are friendly, the culture is not so different from the Latino culture and the beaches are beautiful (we are beach lovers). So we decided to go back after visiting other Southeast Asia in the beginning of 2020.
Stuck in El Nido during Covid
We arrived in the Philippines in mid-February of this year and we were traveling around some non-touristic areas of the country when the covid crisis started. The locals of the village that we were at recommended us to leave because we were the only tourists there and there was no Internet.
That was a difficult moment because we didn’t know what to do. Flights from all over the world were being canceled and we were frightened of getting stuck in some random airport in a bad situation.
After thinking it over we decided to get on the last flight to El Nido because we knew that there would be other tourists there and we also knew that the town had better infrastructure. We spent almost seven months there.
In the beginning the lockdown was very strict, especially for foreigners. We couldn’t do anything other than stay home and we spent those months making some different kinds of videos from what we were used to.
We filmed our routine and we also made some videos trying to cook some Filipino dishes. When things started to reopen we slowly started to go to some beaches and waterfalls. We felt superb being able to visit so many beautiful and empty places and filming our regular kind of vlogs.
Favorite Place in El Nido: Papaya
We think the place that we loved the most was a beach called Papaya. We could only get there by kayak so it was always empty and the crystal clear water and awesome limestone cliffs made it very special for us. We made a few videos there and our viewers also fell in love with Papaya Beach.
5 Best Things To Do in El Nido
Our number one experience in El Nido was the island hopping tour. There are four different tours but all of them are impressive. Another great experience is kayaking to Papaya since the boat tours don’t go there.
We recommend people stop on a beach called Lapus Lapus on the way there from the main beach of Corong Corong. It’s an awesome beach as well and it’s a good spot to rest a little bit before arriving at Papaya.
Our third favorite experience in El Nido, Palawan was doing the helicopter tour around the many beautiful islands of El Nido. It was truly an unforgettable moment seeing those amazing huge islands from above.
Another great experience on our Top 5 was staying on an exclusive private island called Brother Island. The place is so beautiful and unique – great for honeymoons. And last but not least, we loved going to Nacpan Beach. It’s considered to be the best beach on the mainland of El Nido.
People, Culture & Food of El Nido
Filipinos were colonized by the Spanish so their culture has many similarities with the Latino culture. Most of the locals are catholic, everyone speaks English and the most remarkable characteristic is their hospitality.
They are one of the most friendly people we’ve ever met during our travels. We did meet some Filipinos during our time and they were always trying to help and made us feel at home in their paradise of El Nido.
Since we were there during the lockdown we weren’t able to try many restaurants. We pretty much stuck to the ones that were open and we liked them a lot. El Nido Boutique Artcafe was always a great option when we wanted some Western food, but they also served many local options.
For an affordable experience with great views we used to go to Happy Home. They also have Western and local food. Our favorite pizza place was one called Bella Vita in Corong Corong. We also love Indian food so we used to order from Biryani Kitchen – very tasty and affordable.
The main local dishes that we used to eat and even cook at home were Vegetarian Pancit (Filipino style noodles) and Fish Sinigang (Filipino soup).
Best Places to Stay in El Nido
Our favorite accommodation in El Nido was at an exclusive private island called Brother Island. It’s an all-inclusive Airbnb in a dream location.
For beachfront hotels on the mainland we loved Qi Palawan (native luxurious style) and Reef Strand (infinity pool and great location). The resort that we spent the majority of our period in was RC Villas and Resorts.
We loved RC Villas and Resorts because it’s modern, it’s located in a calm area near Vanilla Beach and because it’s on the top of a hill with amazing views. For a unique experience we recommend staying in a sailboat called S/Y Kalayaan. We stayed there for four nights and it was amazing.
Cherished Memories from El Nido
The most unforgettable moments were when the restrictions of the lockdown became less strict so we were able to explore El Nido. We used to take a kayak and go to multiple beaches that are only accessible by boat. When we arrived at the beaches it always felt like a dream.
We felt the happiness of being able to go out again and we also felt the awesomeness of seeing beaches (some of the most beautiful in the world) totally empty. In normal times they would be packed with tourists.
So it was almost like we were Adam and Eve exploring empty paradise. We’ll surely tell our kids and grandkids about those memorable days. The good thing is that we filmed pretty much all of those moments so every time we miss them we’ll be able to re-watch those scenes on our channel.