Chocolate Hills

The Chocolate Hills is a famous tourist attraction of Bohol.  They are unusual geological formation in Bohol province, Philippines.  There are at least 1,260 hills but there may be as many as 1,776 hills spread over an area of more than 50 square kilometers (20 square miles). They are covered in green grass that turns brown during the dry season, hence the name.

The Chocolate Hills are conical karst hills similar to those seen in the limestone regions of Slovenia, Croatia, northern Puerto Rico, and Pinar del Río Province, Cuba. These hills consist of Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene, thin to medium bedded, sandy to rubbly marine limestones.

These limestones contain the abundant fossils of shallow marine foraminifera, coral, mollusks, and algae. These conical karst hills, called mogote, are created by a combination of the dissolution of limestones by rainfall, surface water, and groundwater and their subaerial erosion by rivers and streams after they had been uplifted above sea level and fractured by tectonic processes. These hills are separated by well developed flat plains and contain numerous caves and springs. The Chocolate Hills are considered to be a remarkable example of conical karst topography.

Four legends explain the formation of the Chocolate Hills. The first tells the story of two feuding giants who hurled rocks, boulders, and sand at each other. The fighting lasted for days, and exhausted the two giants. In their exhaustion, they forgot about their feud and became friends, but when they left they forgot to clean up the mess they had made during their battle, hence the Chocolate Hills.

  

A more romantic legend tells of a giant named Arogo who was extremely powerful and youthful. Arogo fell in love with Aloya, who was a simple mortal. Aloya's death caused Arogo much pain and misery, and in his sorrow he could not stop crying. When his tears dried, the Chocolate Hills were formed. 

The third legend tells of a town being plagued by a giant carabao, who ate all of their crops. Finally having had enough, the townsfolk took all of their spoiled food and placed it in such a way that the carabao would not miss it. Sure enough, the carabao ate it, but his stomach couldn't handle the spoiled food, so he defecated, leaving behind him a mound of feces, until he had emptied his stomach of the food. The feces then dried, forming the Chocolate Hills. 

The last legend is about a gluttonous giant named Miguel that eats everything in his path. One day he came to a plain. He saw a beautiful young woman named Adrianna. To win her affection, he needed to lose weight. So he excreted everything he ate. In the end, his fecal matter covered the land and he won Eng's affection. 

Suggested reads:

The Seven Natural Wonders of the World

TripAdvisor: Chocolate Hills

*

Weekend Reflection

SkyWatch

* * *

Please note:

I very much appreciate my articles and photos appearing on fellow bloggers' sites, popular broadsheets, and local broadcast news segments, but I would appreciate even more a request for permission first.

Thank you!

*