Located very near the previously featured Gapusan Beach is the Cuyo Fort in the town of the same name in Palawan. This fort stands very prominent in the history of Palawan because Cuyo was once the capital of Palawan from 1873 till 1903. This is according to the official website of the Provincial Government of Palawan, which gives a somewhat contradictory account in their history page. It seems that after Taytay, Cuyo became the capital of the province of Castilla, which covered the northern portions of the present-day province of Palawan. In 1903, the three provinces of Castilla, Asturias, and Balabac were constituted by the Americans into Palawan and designated Puerto Princesa as the capital. Cuyo became a capital because the island’s location was strategically located between Panay and the mainland of Palawan.

Photo by Thopz Perez, from the Flickr photostream of Cuyo Press.

The Cuyo Fort was completed in 1683 (the National Historical Institute marker on the site gives a date of “about 1680”) and served as the town center of Cuyo and a primary means of defence against enemies from the sea, usually Moros. The fort houses a church on one side and a convent on the opposite side (which is now located perpendicular to the church). In 1827, a belltower was added on one of the corners, or bastions, of the fort.

Some more information about the fort can be found on this blog post (and it has a couple of pictures), while this other blog post contains several seemingly cut-and-pasted information about Cuyo itself. Finally, check out this photo gallery, which contains a lot of pictures of the fort.

Download KML file (for Google Earth)