We thought we’d seen quite a bit of the Philippines in the past 6 weeks. Until we found out that there are actually 7107 islands… of which we’ve now visited 5 (Bohol, Cebu, Negros Oriental, Negros Occidental, Panay, Palawan). That puts things in perspective Even though we have only seen a small portion of this amazing country, I’m very glad we went. The Philippines is a great place to visit with kids and it will remain on our bucket list. There’s so much to see and do!

Map of our trip in the Philippines

Manila: start of our trip

We started our trip in MANILA, where we arrived on Friday November 13th and only stayed for one night. Our first impression wasn’t very favourable, but we later discovered we didn’t stay in the best part of town, so that might have been at least one of the reasons. Then we caught a flight to Tagbilaran on BOHOL.

Alona Beach, first glimpse of the famous Philippine beaches

We stayed in a very nice apartment in Alona Beach, owned by a Dutch guy, for almost a week. We rented a motorbike and discovered a bit more of Bohol, like a very nice waterfall. The beach at Alona wasn’t like any of the picturesque ones you always see of Philippines, but it was nice anyway with really fine sand. The apartment was within easy walking distance of the beach and Jace enjoyed playing in the water. We each did two dives at Balicasag island and one dive each with the owner of the apartment we rented. Unexpectedly food turned out to be quite expensive. Most of the places serve western food and prices for a main course are often 250 pesos (5 euros) or more. There are a lot of things to do on Bohol, but the Chocolate Hills were green instead of brown at the time we were there and we’d already seen Tarsiers up close in Tangkoko NP in North Sulawesi, so we decided to take it easy and in one place for a bit.

Island hopping from Bohol to Cebu

At some point we booked a flight out of Iloilo to go to Puerto Princesa on the 16th of December, so we planned to do some island hopping to get there. We took the ferry from Tagbilaran to CEBU and went on directly to Moalboal. A place that is famous for good diving. There we stayed at Sisters Inn, which funnily enough was again owned by a Dutch guy. We swear we didn’t know upfront! Our first two nights we spend at Sea Turtle House near White Beach, but it was too far away from everything. So we moved to Sisters Inn (read our review of Sisters Inn) in the Panagsama area. The owner and staff were really friendly and we enjoyed our stay there. We rented a motorbike and went to the nearby Kawasan waterfall, which was very busy with local tourists (makes sense on a Sunday) but with beautiful clear turquoise water. I wish we’d known there are many other waterfalls on Cebu as well, I’d have loved to see some more. We also did a few dives there with Cebu Dive Center. The dives were nice, especially the ones at Pescador island, but not spectacular. Diving wise we’re really getting spoiled. The beach at Panagsama wasn’t anything special, but good enough for one of us to entertain Jace while the other one went diving.

Amazing diving at the Dauin Coast on Negros Oriental

From Moalboal we caught a bus all the way down to the Liloan Port where we took a ferry to Dumaguete on NEGROS ORIENTAL. There we blew away a large chunk of our budget by staying 6 nights at Liquid Dumaguete in Dauin. A very nice dive resort and especially the dives on the Dauin coast are among our best so far. Lots of weird critters! You can also read our full review of Liquid Dumaguete. We also went to the famous Apo Island for a few dives, but apart from a lot of turtles on one of the dives and very healthy corals, we didn’t enjoy them half as much as the dives on the coast. We needed to extend our visas, so decided to move to Dumaguete for a few days. In Moalboal they told us it wasn’t such a nice city, but we actually quite enjoyed it.

Noisy, dirty Philippine cities: Bacolod and Iloilo

From Dunaguete we took a loooong bus trip to Bacolod, all the way to the north of the island in the province of NEGROS OCCIDENTAL. We had only three nights there and since renting a motorbike was quite expensive, we didn’t see much more than a bit of the city center and the mall. Apart from Dumaguete none of the Philippine cities we’ve seen so far really impress us, other than by how busy, noisy and dirty they are. From Bacolod we took another ferry to Iloilo on PANAY island. We only had two nights there, so apart from using the hotel swimming pool, walking around a bit and again visiting the mall, we didn’t really see much. We were happy to leave after our two nights there.

Palawan: world’s best island?

From Iloilo we took a flight to Puerto Princesa on the famous PALAWAN island. Palawan was voted no. 1 island in the world by Condé Nast Traveler’s Readers two years in a row. So obviously our expectations were quite high. We stayed at Citadel Bed and Breakfast, which was nice with a good swimming pool, but turned out to be a bit outside of the city center. We stayed there for 4 nights and visited Robinson’s Mall (within easy walking distance) quite a lot (Jace loved the electric carts and all the noise and lights at the game hall!). We would have loved to go to Coron but thought it a bit too ambitious with our little one. So, we’ll just have to go back one day

Wasting our time at the Underground River

We even tried to to a tour to the famous Underground River (you can also arrange your own underground river tour), but unfortunately that wasn’t such a success. Because of typhoon Melor, the sea was incredibly rough and access to the river had been prohibited by the coast guard a few days in a row. The day we booked they said we could go, but after 1,5 hours in a minivan which drove the narrow winding roads with incredible speed (causing our little one to loose his breakfast on the back seat) and 1,5 hours wait the verdict was that we couldn’t go after all. A waste of time. If you’re traveling with small children, make sure you check in advance. We could have saved Jace a nightmare ride!

El Nido: a slice of heaven

On the 20th we had another looong ride ahead of us, which we decided to do by minivan. El Nido is only about 270km away from Puerto Princesa, but it takes over 5 hours to get there. The scenery on the way was quite beautiful though. Jace was a bit sick, so he spend most of the trip sleeping or hanging around on our laps. Which was fine by us. After hearing all the stories about beautiful El Nido I was a bit disappointed to be honest. Our accommodation at Just Inn was one of the cheapest we could find online (22 euro, including breakfast). The Philippine owner and his family are very attentive and the place is clean, but Jace was really not enjoying the cold shower. The town is a bit dirty and rundown and although the view from the beach towards all the islands is breathtaking, El Nido beach and nearby Corong Corong beach aren’t very spectacular. And the food is really expensive, much more so then in the other places we’ve visited so far.

Nacpan Beach and Duli Beach: Palawan paradise!

After a motorbike trip to Nacpan beach and Duli beach we started to understand the attraction of El Nido a bit better. There’s a big difference between El Nido province and El Nido town. A private island hopping tour the day before we left made it even more clear that El Nido was a place we might visit again, to go diving and definitely to stay at Duli Beach with Dutch couple Elma and Marnix who recently started Duli Beach Resort.

From El Nido we took a minivan back to Puerto Princesa, where we spend the night before taking a flight to Bangkok via Manila on the 28th. We had a great time in Philippines and are quite sure we’ll be back one day, but New Years Eve we’ll be celebrating in one of our favourite cities, Bangkok! Can’t wait for some nice Thai street food!




Booking.com

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Our first plan was to go to Dumaguete and dive from there, but people told us Dumaguete wasn’t such a nice city (turned out later we quite liked it…). Also if we wanted to dive Apo Island it made more sense to go to Dauin, a town about half an hour from Dumagete and stay there. So while researching Dauin resorts and especially Dauin beach resorts, I came across Liquid Dumaguete’s website, which looks quite professional and very inviting. Of course as a diver you’ve got to love their slogan ‘Eat, sleep, dive… live’!

Liquid Dumaguete dive resort

I was lured in by the phrase that they are a budget resort for flash packers. ‘Comfort on a budget’ is what their website promises. This made me believe that the pricing, even if a bit higher ranged, would still be within our budget limits. Turns out that wasn’t quite the case, but more about that later.

Update: Liquid have changed their website since we stayed there. It now reads ’boutique dive resort’, which is much more fitting (but would have probably meant we wouldn’t have gone there…) and they’ve added a number of more luxury cabins with aircon, hot water showers and cable TV. They’ve even added a massage cottage with a hot spring bath (with water from their own hot spring!). The only luxury facility missing is a hydrotherapy spa

Comfortable cabins, great atmosphere

The resort is amazing, very nicely landscaped area, beautiful bamboo huts and buildings, great pool and great atmosphere. Very relaxed and tranquil, lovely owners and the staff are all very professional. They really take good care of you. Even though the huts only have a fan and no a/c they were comfortable enough for our son’s naps during the day, with a nice balcony to sit outside for us. Almost all the buildings are either fully made out of bamboo or have bamboo finishing, very nice use of materials. And our little one absolutely adored the pool. He was in there at least 4 hours every day and never wanted to get out of the water. Which was good for us too, because it was easy for one of us to entertain him while the other went diving

Update: the Liquid Dumaguete website now says that the ‘basic’ cabins have only cold water showers. This wasn’t the case while we were there. They’ve also updated the price. We paid Php1600 when we were there, but they’re now Php2000 per night. Baby cots are still free of charge!

Well trained dive crew at Liquid Dumaguete

The diving was managed very well too. They have a big bangka boat, with enough seating space and even a toilet. Dive staff takes care of everything, from putting your equipment on the boat and setting it up to taking if off the boat after the dive and rinsing it for you. All you have to do is listen to the briefing, get on the boat, gear up and enjoy your dive. And unlike some other places where we’ve dived the boat crew are well trained to help you get out of the water too, should you need any assistance. What we really appreciated was that, since Mau had some health issues when diving earlier, they said not to take any chances and gave him nitrox at cost price. My only comment is that even though there is water, tea and coffee on the boat, you only get offered one cup and need to ask if you want more. I think on a dive boat, the crew should encourage you to hydrate, since it’s both important for diving and to avoid sea sickness.

Great diving, but quite expensive

Unfortunately diving in this area can get quite expensive. The base price that Liquid Dumaguete charges (1500 pesos per dive while we were there, lowering to 1300 after 6 or more dives) is not the highest we’ve seen (definitely not the lowest either….), but with the government imposed marine fees, camera fee and Liquid’s own add ons for day trips, a day of diving at Apo or Siquijor can get quite costly. Of course this isn’t such an issue if you’re on holiday, but can take a big chunk out of your budget if you’re traveling long term like us. But diving tends to do that anyway That being said we actually enjoyed diving the Dauin coast more than going to Apo Island, lots of weird critters and heaven for macro fans (see pictures in our post Diving in Dauin). So we could have saved ourselves the 600 pesos for the day trip there. But of course we had to see for ourselves to know that and Apo was still nice.

Overpriced food

Now for the costs and this is why we weren’t completely happy with our stay. The cabins are fairly priced for what you get, we paid 1600 pesos for our nice fan hut, with a free child’s cot. Of course that also gave us access to the great pool, so no complaints there. But the one thing that got to us were the restaurant prices. They serve great food, very tasty and freshly made. But… it’s expensive. We loved the idea of a family style dinner, but not at 350 pesos pp or more. On pizza night I think it was even 450 for a pizza and desert, wow… A refill for a 1 liter bottle of water was 25 pesos (compared to 4 pesos in the city at a filling machine in the street).

Fairer priced options on the bar menu

We did figure out, and other people who stayed there longer did too, that there were a few items on the bar menu that were a bit fairer priced and could serve as a meal, such as the quesadillas for 195 pesos and the nasi goreng for 150. But eating the same every day gets a bit boring. One other thing is that the portions weren’t the same each time, so one day we would get a big glass of fresh juice in the morning, the other day it was a smaller glass. And the same for the food portions. The selection was really good though and we loved the home made cakes and muffins that were available in the restaurant. But for a resort that claims to be ‘budget’ the prices really were too high.

Other options for dinner

Of course the high prices are what happens when there is no competition from other places to eat nearby. If you wanted to go outside the resort for dinner, you first had to walk 10 minutes on a dirt road before getting to the main street and from there you could catch a jeepney or tricycle to either Dauin (we didn’t try this) or to Dumaguete. Of course if you’re not traveling with a child it’s a bit easier to do. One more thing to note is that even though the resort is right on the beach, swimming in the ocean (or snorkelling in front of the resort) isn’t free. There is a government fee of 50 pesos per person. This isn’t Liquid’s fault, but we didn’t know this on beforehand and were quite disappointed when we found out.

Review Liquid Dumaguete – our verdict

All in all we would recommend a stay at Liquid Dumaguete and wouldn’t hesitate to return. Jace was clearly at ease from the minute we entered the resort and loved to play in the pool. We had a really good time there. Everyone at Liquid was incredibly friendly and professional, the atmosphere was really good and the diving, especially at the Dauin coast sites, was excellent. Just be prepared for the high food prices, which, if you’re on a vacation instead of traveling long term like us, might not be an issue for you.

Interested? Check availability & rates of Liquid Dive Resort.

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Spectacular diving

We were getting a bit spoiled about diving, having been to so many great dive sites on this year long trip. Diving at Panglao and Moalboal was nice, but not amazing. But I have to say, my first two dives off the coast of Dauin were quite spectacular. So far we love diving in Dauin. We went to Masoplod South and Sahara. Great dive sites, very healthy corals, amazing macro life, large schools of fish… I really enjoyed it! And I really hope we will be back here one day!

Creatures we spotted while diving in Dauin

• 3 sea horses
• a ghost pipefish
• a tiny clown frogfish
• a few other frogfishes
• lots of shrimps
• a giant cuttle fish (it was HUGE) and a tiny one
• a big patch of garden eels
• a massive grouper
• a school of Yellow Snappers
• ….. and so much more…

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Of course, there are fantastic high-end beach resorts with swimming pools and attached dive centers in Moalboal, Philippines. Sisters Inn doesn’t have any of that. What it does have is a very nice Dutch owner, lovely and very accommodating staff and good sized rooms with hot and cold shower at a very reasonable price. Check latest prices.

Prices at Hotel Sisters Inn Moalboal

The first night we spend in a fan room for 750 pesos, because a/c was not available. The fan room was good and cool enough at night, but because Jace still naps in the afternoon, we moved to an aircon room the next day. For the room with airconditioning and a nice balcony we paid 1000 pesos a night. Actually, we were out diving and the staff moved our stuff for us to our new room. Great service.

Location of Sisters Inn: close but not too close

The hotel isn’t on the sea-front, but only about 8-10 mins walk to the area where the restaurants are (Panagsama). You can also walk to the main road (about 3 minutes) and catch a tricycle to the other side of Panagsama from there for about 20 pesos. It’s not far away from the action, but just far enough to not be bothered by it at night. Moalboal city center is only a short tricycle ride away and will cost you about 50 pesos. You can rent a motorbike at the hotel for only 350 pesos a day. That’s one of the cheapest we’ve seen so far, and they are good and pretty new bikes.

Great flexibility and service

What we really liked about Sisters Inn was that they were very flexible. A mattress on the floor to put Jace’s travel bed on was no problem whatsoever. They didn’t charge us extra for it. Twice we wanted to stay another night, no problem. Leave our stuff in the fridge? No problem. Refill our water bottle from the big tank? No problem and we didn’t even have to pay for it.

Nice communal area to relax

We did feel that at 195 pesos the breakfast was a little bit overpriced, but it was a nice breakfast and we didn’t pay for our drinking water, so that kinda evened it out. A cup of tea was only 20 pesos, so we often went out for dinner and then had a tea back at the hotel. There’s a nice communal area where you can sit and relax and talk to the other guests if you feel like it. The staff loved to play with Jace and usually kept him entertained the whole time we were downstairs with him.

Pretty good wifi for the Philippines

If you’re in the aircon room with the balcony upstairs, like we were, you sometimes have a really weak wifi signal in the room (only on our laptop, not on our phones). More often you don’t have a connection at all. But in the communal area it’s usually pretty good, except when someone is watching an online movie or downloading a big file. Don’t expect high speed internet, but for the area it really isn’t bad.

Booking a room at Sisters Inn Moalboal

We tried to book a room through the Sisters Inn website, but although we received an automated email confirmation that they had received our request and would respond to it, somehow our request never made it through and we ended up having to call them. If you want to be sure of a room, give them a call or book a room at Sisters Inn through Booking.com.

All in all we would definitely recommend Sisters Inn if you’re planning a trip to Moalboal!

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At 8:30 we left for our first dive at Pescador Island South where we saw some massive turtles and the second dive was a wall dive along the coast, where the colours were amazing. The coral is very much intact here and there are some really cool walls, which makes diving at Moalboal a pleasure.

Diving with a toddler

Wondering how we’re managing our diving with a toddler in tow? We’re taking turns! I did two dives yesterday, while Mau was staying with Jace and Mau did two today. Of course, it’s much nicer to dive together, but at least we get to dive this way. When we’re somewhere a bit longer or have a really good feeling about it (like in Bunaken) we’ll leave Jace with a sitter so we can go with the two of us. But that’s not the case here, so we’re taking turns. The great thing about diving is that there’s always a buddy to dive with

Diving at Moalboal: pictures speak louder than words

Instead of a big story, I’ll just show you some of the pictures I’ve taken here and you can see for yourself what the underwater world of Moalboal looks like. My camera kept fogging up because of the huge temperature fluctuations underwater, so they’re not my best pictures and unfortunately I couldn’t photograph the ghost pipefish (but I did see it!) but they’ll still give you a good first impression.

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When we left Sri Lanka we knew we wanted to go to the Philippines next, but because the flight connection wasn’t very good we decided to make a stopover in Bangkok for a couple of days. We checked the flights online and the price difference wasn’t that much so we booked our flight to Bangkok thinking we would book the flight to Cebu when we arrived in Thailand. What we didn’t realise is that the “high season” prices would start on the first of November. So when we finally came around to booking the flight prices were increasing rapidly and we changed our plan. We wouldn’t fly to Cebu but instead we would go to Bohol, an island next to Cebu. We had to fly via Manila because there are no direct flights. Our flight leaving Bangkok was at 15:00pm and we would arrive in Manila at 18:00pm local time. To continue the trip on the same day would mean we had to take the next flight at 1:00am, which we didn’t want to do with Jace after already skipping a night flying from Sri Lanka to Bangkok.

Manila was CRAZY busy. The seven kilometer drive took us more than an hour and the streets were really packed with cars, bicycle taxi’s, jeepney’s and trucks. When we finally made it to the hotel we were happy to see it was good enough or us to stay. The area we stayed in (we later learned) wasn’t the best of Manila but it was for only one night so who cares. We went looking for an atm that would give us some cash. We found one pretty quickly and also managed to find some diapers for Jace. After a quick bite at one of the street bbq stalls we went back to the hotel to get some sleep.

The next morning we had a simple breakfast and got in a taxi early because of the crazy busy roads in Manila. The hotel called a taxi for us and we agreed on a price of 350 pesos (remember the 800 we paid the day before??) to go to the airport. The taxi driver told us there was the APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation) summit coming in the next couple of days which would close off some of the main roads of Manila. We hadn’t realised the APEC was so soon. We were happy with our timing and glad to leave this busy city.

At the airport check-in was easy and we passed the security check in a couple of minutes. The plane boarded on time but because of a delayed plane at the airport of Bohol we had to wait for almost an hour on the runway in Manila. Tagbilaran Airport on Bohol has only one small runway so when a plane is delayed all the flights coming after it feel the pain. When we finally left we had a short comfortable flight and Jace slept most of the way. The good side of being delayed was that I got to finish watching my movie which otherwise wouldn’t have happened (if you’re looking for a nice happy movie watch “Chef” :-))

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