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April 2009 - Spent four days and three nights at Discovery Shores in Boracay Island, Panay. Babatar proclaimed it the the "best-est vacation ever!", ranks next to our stay at the Shangri-la resort in Mactan, Cebu.
What planning? You think I learned from our previous holidays to the Philippines that reservations in the Philippines is not 24/7? No! It is not as easy as in the States where one can make trip arrangements on whim...to think, there are a lot of call centers based here!
I booked a last minute package deal with Seair. I was lucky to find an open travel office on a Saturday afternoon at the beginning of Holy Week. I was even luckier to find plane tickets and a place to stay. If you are not queasy about riding small airplanes, Seair has good deals to Boracay, Batanes, Palawan, etc. I think our plane was a 19-seater and we arrived in Caticlan in about 40 minutes. The boat ride from Caticlan to the jetty at Boracay was even quicker...no longer do the boats stop at the White Beach. Thank goodness!
Our first and last trip to Boracay was in January 2000. We are lucky to say we saw Boracay before it became commercialized. So when I say "before", I'm comparing it to Boracay in 2000.
A sea of advertisements in the form of banners, flags, tents and sails on boats welcomed us to Boracay. The White Beach, blue waters and coconut trees were my last pictures of Boracay not advertisements. I left Manila to get away from that and here I am being bombarded with it again. It was sign of the changes in Boracay. The drive from the jetty to Discovery Shores was short but we stopped a lot. There are so many motorcycles and tricycles on the narrow two lane road. A lot of times there is no place to park (to load or unload passengers or supplies) or walk. So walking on the road is not a pleasant experience, its hot, sticky, dusty and not safe. There are no sidewalks in some stretches. If you've been to the Catalina Islands in southern California, its not at all like that. I wish Boracay will learn from Catalina.
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When we arrived at Discovery, the staff was welcoming and friendly. They provided as with an ice cold wet towel and a refreshing lychee drink. They immediately directed us to our room. I did not go to the front desk until the evening. What a relief! All we wanted to start off was freshen up and check out our beds. They read our minds.
I love our room! It is very spacious and well appointed. The bed is comparable to the bed in the Presidential Suite in Shangri-la at Mactan. It had a pillow top and fluffy pillows and comforters. Discovery does not charge for extra comforters. We had two queen beds in the middle of the room and a day bed by the window. The bathroom had handheld and rain shower heads; a bidet (Babatar loves to use it!); floor to ceiling glass windows (The upper three quarters of the window is frosted. The bottom quarter is clear. Discovery planted bulbs amongst river rocks right outside the window). The sink is situated right outside the dressing area. They provided a sturdy metal rack (sort of looks like a shoe rack) under the sink where you can place your shoes or dirty towels. Babatar used the rack as her stepping stool when she brushes her teeth at the sink. Discovery provided two cotton bath robes and slippers. If you are on the heavier side, the robe might not go around the waist. What's the average size of a Filipina, 4?
The room had the usual amenities: safety deposit box, refrigerator, tv, coffee maker, AC. Extra amenities? Yes - a reliable, fast wi-fi internet access and a 32-inch flat screen tv and a DVD player, iPod docking station, radio-CD player. Papatar and Babatar enjoyed the TV! Discovery loans out DVDs for free. We borrowed children's movies twice but did not get to watch it because we were happily turning into prunes in the pool or burnt coconuts at the beach.
I forgot to mention as part of our warm welcome to Discovery, they provided us with pandan water. Its sugary water infused with pandan which is a shrub with long fragrant monocot leaves. The pandan provides the green tint on the water and a fragrant "smell" when you drink it. There were also three jars of goodies on the table: dried coconut strips, banana chips and a variety of cookies. You know which one was emptied first - the cookie jar! That takes me on a side note about cookies at Discovery. There's a jar of cookies at the front desk where my daughter and I would get our fill of cookies until we discovered there's another jar by the pool bar. Imagine swimming and eating your cookie at the same time. (By the way, the front desk is actually at the back by the beach.) We were chatting with the pool boy and mentioned that the cookies were yummy. After a quick dip, I decide to read my book on the lounge chair and lo and behold a shiny silver bowl of cookies (no charge) was awaiting the sun(burned) goddess! Bliss!
I now realized why the bath robe was too snug; its the cookies!
Discovery also gave me a foot scrub. Note that its not foot spa or massage. Its just a scrub, but relaxing in any case.
On side note, don't be surprised if the pool (and beach) boy suddenly and continously takes your clothes and starts folding it up neatly for you. He even lines up the slippers and tucks in the towel.
The breakfast and dinner buffets were nothing to get excited about. Sorry, Discovery Chef...can't remember his name. He is one of the chefs featured on the Selecta-brand ice cream commercial. Breakfast was included in our vacation package. On hindsight, we should have tried other restaurants in the area for dinner. The buffet price was not worth the selection, especially the Asian dinner buffet. However, I did enjoy the coffee. If I do take coffee for breakfast, I usually just drink a cup. While we were there, I had more than the usual. We ordered from the menu a few times. We were not disappointed - baked oysters in the shell on a bed of rock salt (must try this! The taste of the diced onion and the cheese reminded me of Macy's french onion soup in the iron kettle...remember the Macy's at Union Square, San Francisco had a small cafe at the lower level?), spaghetti bolognese, lechon kawali, Vietnamese chicken sandwich (had a creamy Srirachan sauce as dressing), grilled ham and cheese sandwich, macaroni and cheese (used a different type of cheddar).
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Boracay's White beach truly has the white powdery sand. It was perfect for building our mermaid. The beach is not as wide as it used to be and a green wispy algae was present at the shoreline. Because of the algae, we did not spend as much time in the water as we planned to. The algae was very thick in some locations of the beach such as the Boracay Terraces area. I heard that the the algae gets thicker during the summer months - April to June.
During our trip, Lolo Benny (no relation) celebrated his 88th birthday there. From the "R" stamped on the sand castle, the guests attending and the splendid fireworks show after dinner, we figured he must be the big wig of Rustans department store. (Rustans is like Nieman Marcus, Harrod's). My daughter and I enjoyed the fireworks display. It was a special welcome treat on our first night. (BTW, Discovery, please clean up after each fireworks display. The fireworks casings were all over the beach the following morning.)
Babatar also enjoyed herself with the kids activities each afternoon. She looked forward to it each day. She made friends with a five year old boy and they made arrangements to meet each other during the kids activity. The activities were simple but enough (paper bracelets, paper flate sea creatures, face painting, mosaic, etc.) for the kids' entertainment.
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We will definitely go back but maybe not during summer when the algae is abundant.