Zamboanga City came as a surprise in terms of food. Its history as a former stronghold of Spain in Mindanao has indeed taken root in its cuisine, with Spanish dishes going alongside more local flavors from the Zamboanga Peninsula, the neighboring Sulu archipelago, and even Malaysia. It also helps that the area is near the sea, with harvest coming in abundantly—the city isn’t dubbed as the Sardine Capital of the Philippines for no reason.

During our weeklong escapade in the city, in between Zamboanga tourist spots, the Zamboanga Hermosa Festival, and an Once Islas island hopping adventure, we tried various restaurants serving everything from traditional Filipino and Moro cuisines, to Hispanic dishes, and even unique and tasty street food that can only be found on this part of the country.

On one of my visits to Zamboanga City, I passed by a small eatery with a mee goreng sign. My mouth immediately watered—my favorite Malaysian (or Indonesian) noodle dish, available in Zamboanga City! I was on a media trip with a fixed itinerary at the time, so I was unable to try it out.

It was with much trepidation when I said yes to a month-long backpacking trip across three countries. My wife and I have certainly done this multiple times before on even longer time periods, but this time, the deal breaker is we're lugging a three-year old kid along with us. A very rowdy three-year old kid.

But what's done is done. I agreed, the flight tickets have been booked, hotels lined up, activities and itineraries were planned. So, I guess it's a go.

We're actually revisiting places we've already travelled to years back during our ASEAN Summer Loop, Beach Hop Asia, Same Same Summer Trip, and SEA2Africa trips. A comfort zone of sort—testing the waters, if you will. Just to see if we could really pull it off.

So, for this trip, which we dubbed Backpacking With A Kid 2023, we're traveling to three countries—the Philippines included—spanning eight cities for thirty six days. A bit of a disclaimer, we initially planned on just bringing backpacks with us—hence the name—like in the olden days, but the kid really just needs so much stuff that we eventually gave in and switched to rolling luggage. So, the better name for this trip would have been, Luggage Trolleying With A Kid 2023. Har. Har.

With that out of the way, here's what our elementary route looks like:
Manila ➤ Kuala Lumpur ➤ Penang ➤ Langkawi ➤ Singapore ➤ Johor Bahru ➤ Kuala Lumpur ➤ Manila ➤ Siargao ➤ Surigao ➤ Dinagat Islands ➤ Surigao ➤ Manila   
   
From Manila and back, we’re flying via Cebu Pacific Air. From Kuala Lumpur to Penang to Langkawi, all the way to Singapore, we’re taking a really cheap multi-city AirAsia flight (around ₱800.00++ per way per person), including the Johor Bahru to Kuala Lumpur flight. The trip from Singapore to Johor Bahru would be done via bus, since getting out of Singapore via plane is quite expensive. From Kuala Lumpur to Manila, we’re heading straight to the provinces of Surigao Del Norte using our CEB Super Pass.
   
The only three destinations we considered for this year’s route was Penang, so we can visit the kid’s grandma and grandpa; Johor Bahru, so he can run around Legoland; and Kuala Lumpur, so we can eat mee goreng on our favorite stall in Jalan Alor Food Street. The rest of the places we included were incidental, lol.

And yes, we also included a few Philippine destinations for this trip as well. From Manila’s airport, we’ll head straight to Mindanao to visit three provinces in the region. And to lighten our load, we’ll cheat a bit by sending our big luggage full of stuff we’d be buying along the trip to a friend who lives near the airport via Grab or Lalamove, lol.    
   
This year’s trip may not be as grand as our last The Eurasian Summer Bump which had us flying to Mongolia and Russia, but baby steps first. If we can somehow pull this off without losing our mind and all our hair out of frustration and pure exhaustion, then we’ll probably move to a grander stage next year.

Every afternoon after our kid wakes from his nap, we’d quickly go out of our hotel, ride a jeep to pueblo, walk along the old downtown area of Zamboanga City, and be transported back in time. In our mind, this was probably how Manila looked and felt, back in the day. The view would then open up to the sea. We’d buy some snacks, sit beside the breakwater, and along with school kids out with their friends, and wait for the sun to say adios. Those are my memories of our trip to Zamboanga.

We spent four days in and around the city, exploring not only its downtown area, but a few of its outlying islands and islets as well. It is, surprisingly, very walkable, and more importantly, very safe. Besides our usual afternoon jaunt to Paseo Del Mar, we were able to do quite a lot of things and were able to visit more than a few sights in Zamboanga City. With its numerous tourist spots, a weekend trip is definitely not enough to see everything.

“How much?” I asked my wife in disbelief for the second time, unable to believe just how affordable the hotel she booked in Zamboanga City is for our trip. “820 pesos a night at Two Seasons Executive Suites.” She replied for the second time. Unbelievable. Less than a thousand pesos for a room for us three, complete with an en suite toilet and bath. And the hotel name sounds expensive, is it really one of Zamboanga City’s budget hotels? Two Seasons! Suites! I kept wondering what the catch was.