Samal Tourism office eyes of developing more in-land tourism sites

By Jean Duron-Abangan

                ISLAND GARDEN CITY OF SAMAL : The Inland beauty of this island city now becomes the focus of tourism development of the city government while it  also sustains its beaches as major tourist attractions.

                In an interview, City Tourism Officer Jennifer Cariaga revealed plans of sprucing up the barangays,  creating pathways to the city’s caves and mountain peaks,  and developing a botanical garden to provide tourists with options to go during their visit to Island Garden City of Samal.                    

                Aside from the Guinness Book of World Record-known Monfort Bat  Cave, part of  the city’s tourism development plan is to establish pathways leading to entrances of caves. She said the island city has about 70 caves, and that four of which already have trails.  

                The city can also be a good place to spend mountain climbing especially at its   White Peak   where the city government is spending efforts on environmental protection activity such as tree planting at the peak’s area.

Cariaga also revealed  the city’s on-going development of its  botanical garden located in Bandera, Kaputian District where the city government is  giving each department of the city government a 1,000-square-meter lot to cultivate a particular type of plant or tree.

                Meanwhile,  the plan to spruce up barangays is integrated in the “Barangays in Bloom” project which is part of the “Islang Maanyag” (A Beautiful City) program aimed at projecting the city as a garden city, indeed.

                “We are encouraging every  barangay to make their respective place beautiful,” Cariaga said as she revealed that every barangay will be massively planting a  particular type of flower through which it will be identified.

                On the other hand, Cariaga was  looking forward for people  to participate in realizing plans of providing tourists more places to see in the island city other than beaches, and for them to also benefit from  the growth of the city’s tourism industry.

                Along this line, there are plans of training community folks to enter into souvenir-making as an enterprising activity of community folks, she said. (PIA-11/Jeanevive Duron-Abangan)