Thursday, November 06, 2008
On our second full day in the Philippines, we went on a boat tour to some nearby islands. The trip was organized by our hotel, Amarela Resort, and for two persons the cost was 3,500 pesos for five hours.
Since I am not a big fan of early mornings, particularly when I am on vacation, I was pleased to learn that the trip would start at 9 AM. Notwithstanding the late starting hour, we managed to be late as we had to change rooms in the morning. I had booked a slightly more luxurious room for our last night at the resort.
The boat that took us to the islands was a tiny vessel, and I was surprised to see a crew of three people. However, their job was only to steer the vessel to its destination and back, and we were not serviced in any other ways. When we reached the first destination, Balicasag Island, after a trip of about 45 minutes, we were approached by a man in an even smaller boat that offered to be our snorkeling guide.
The concept of a snorkeling guide was to me quite new, and the price was just a couple of hundreds pesos, so we went for the rather silly proposal. After getting into his tiny boat, he paddled for about 20 meters, then we all got on our snorkeling equipment and started looking at fish. The marine life around the island was actually quite stunning, so the trip to Balicasag Island was more than worth the trouble and price we had to pay to get there.
After snorkeling for an hour or so at Balicasag Island, our snorkeling guide brought Yuka back to our original boat while I just swam back, then our three man crew brought us the second destination. The latter was a stunning but unpopulated little island, which main attraction was a long beach simply referred to as Virgin Beach. The main attraction is that the beach stretches out into the ocean.
Now to a couple of negative comments about this trip, which the otherwise great Amarela Resort organized. The snorkeling equipment that they lent us was either old or did not fit, thus we had to separately rent equipment from a couple of the snorkeling guides. My snorkeling mask broke when I tried to adjust its size, and although the mask was quite old, the resort asked me to pay 100 pesos for its repair. Luckily the reception staff withdrew this demand after a discussion with their manager.
Also, I do not quite understand why our vessel needed a crew of three, and also why not one of them could have acted as a snorkeling guide (if this was truly needed). While we helped employ four people that day while on a short snorkeling trip, there certainly is room for some more efficiency and entrepreneurship in the Philippines.
Since I am not a big fan of early mornings, particularly when I am on vacation, I was pleased to learn that the trip would start at 9 AM. Notwithstanding the late starting hour, we managed to be late as we had to change rooms in the morning. I had booked a slightly more luxurious room for our last night at the resort.
The boat that took us to the islands was a tiny vessel, and I was surprised to see a crew of three people. However, their job was only to steer the vessel to its destination and back, and we were not serviced in any other ways. When we reached the first destination, Balicasag Island, after a trip of about 45 minutes, we were approached by a man in an even smaller boat that offered to be our snorkeling guide.
The concept of a snorkeling guide was to me quite new, and the price was just a couple of hundreds pesos, so we went for the rather silly proposal. After getting into his tiny boat, he paddled for about 20 meters, then we all got on our snorkeling equipment and started looking at fish. The marine life around the island was actually quite stunning, so the trip to Balicasag Island was more than worth the trouble and price we had to pay to get there.
After snorkeling for an hour or so at Balicasag Island, our snorkeling guide brought Yuka back to our original boat while I just swam back, then our three man crew brought us the second destination. The latter was a stunning but unpopulated little island, which main attraction was a long beach simply referred to as Virgin Beach. The main attraction is that the beach stretches out into the ocean.Now to a couple of negative comments about this trip, which the otherwise great Amarela Resort organized. The snorkeling equipment that they lent us was either old or did not fit, thus we had to separately rent equipment from a couple of the snorkeling guides. My snorkeling mask broke when I tried to adjust its size, and although the mask was quite old, the resort asked me to pay 100 pesos for its repair. Luckily the reception staff withdrew this demand after a discussion with their manager.
Also, I do not quite understand why our vessel needed a crew of three, and also why not one of them could have acted as a snorkeling guide (if this was truly needed). While we helped employ four people that day while on a short snorkeling trip, there certainly is room for some more efficiency and entrepreneurship in the Philippines.
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