Boracay (9/8/15 - 11/9/15) - Day 3

3rd day in Boracay, we continued our exciting adventures. I happened to google up for popular activities in Boracay, and this particular activity caught my attention. I believe many people tried zipline before. The most common zipline is whereby one sit down on the safety gears and decent from a height to lower ground. In Boracay, their zipline is a little different. You lie down horizontally and set off from a mountain and land on the opposite mountain.

So from the same tour operator we followed on the 2nd day, he came and pick us from drove us to a mountain. We climbed up several flights of stairs and reached the top and were given consent forms and "queue numbers". The moment i reached the top, my feet turned jelly and looking at the view at such a height, a sense of regret came to me so strong. "Why did i agree to do this?" i thought to myself.

After much preparation, we were ready to set off! What makes you even more nervous was the suspension and anticipation waiting for the staff to say say " 3, 2, 1, release!". Anyhow after much wait, we set off. The moment we set off, i no longer feel any nervous. Looking at the awesome view from the zipline, there is no time for you to waste on feeling nervous. Loving everything about this. Highly recommend anyone who goes Boracay to try on this activity!!

When we reached the opposite mountain, we took a cable car back to the mountain we set off. This is when we can truly the view of Boracay.

After this activity, we head back to long beach for lunch. We found this fish and chip restaurant while roaming around the walking street. It services very filling fish and chips at a very affordable price. I couldn't remember how much was it but its lunch set was approximately $6 or less.This restaurant is located on opposite side of the walking street towards the main roads.

What is visiting Boracay without a dip in Long Beach? So after lunch we hit the beach directly for a good swim. The weather was so good that no filter is needed for the photos.

While walking towards station one of walking street, you will come across the very famous smoothie stall, the Jonahs Fruitshake Snack Bar. They serve different flavours of fruitshake in bottles. It tastes really refreshing and yummy in the hot weather. best fruitshake i've ever tried :)

So that was how we spent our afternoon in day 3. In the evening, we went to the sunset Paraw sailing. Paraw is the beautiful traditional boat in Philippines. Same, we book this tour from the same tour operator. Just a reminder that this Paraw Sailing will make you wet cause you will be sitting on nets, literally just above the waters. Thus when the waves get too high it would actually wet your clothes. So just an advice, don't wear too fancy for this activity. This ride was around 20mins just before the pretty sunset. For the experience i thought that it is worth it to go for it. 

For dinner, there are many choices of alfresco dinning restaurants along Long Beach. You could have a good meal in the sea breeze with your feet touching the sand, while  listening to live band and performances. How good would that be? In Boracay, there is also this popular thing that everyone is doing, which is getting a Hannah tattoo! There are many stalls long Long Beach that does braides and hannah tattoo. For people who doesn't have the courage to do a real tattoo, you could choose your ideal tattoo design from your mobile phone and get the person to do it for you. I did a butterfly cause i can't decide on which design to choose. Do make sure that the hannah tattoo gets really dry before heading to bed. My hotel left a reminder for this as i believe many tourist stains the bedsheets with the Hannah tattoo.

So this sums up our awesome 3rd day in Boracay :) 

Boracay (9/8/15 - 11/9/15) - Day 1 & 2

I visited Boracay in August last year. August isn't a good time to visit Boracay as it is their monsoon season. However the air ticket is usually really cheap during such season. Therefore i guess its really a bet on how the weather might turn out to be arriving Boracay in such season.

So my friend and i took tiger air, it's a 5hrs flight to Kalibo Airport, with a short transit at Cebu Airport. Upon reaching Kalibo Airport, it's approximately another 1hr30mins - 2hrs coach ride to a jetty , and from there catch a ferry to Boracay. We book the coach transfer directly via Tigerair Philippines as we believe this would be the most trusted channel rather than booking through some private tour company. The transfer took longer than expected on that day because it was raining really heavily. Upon reaching our hotel, we were told by the staffs that shortly before we arrived there was a mild typhoon that hit Boracay. But we were really lucky that the weather got so much better right after we check in the hotel

We stayed 4 days 3 nights in Boracay Mandarin Island Hotel. Say frankly, the hotel is not cheap, but its location, hospitality and services, tight security, facilities make it up for the cost. There is nothing that i would pick on and i would definitely recommend to anyone who is going to Boracay.

So this is the kind of seaview we woke up to on the 2nd day. The 50 shades of blue you get in Boracay is just too rejuvenating. Very blessed for this awesome weather during monsoon season.

Boracay Long Beach

Boracay Long Beach

Our initial plan is to go for water activities on the 3rd day, but we thought that we should just embrace the good weather and go for the water activities right away in case the weather turns out bad on the 3rd day. Along Long Beach, we were stopped by many tour operators promoting their tours and activities. After we asked a few and had a good feel of the market rate, we decided buy from 1 of them and book all activities from this particular tour guide to bargain for better price with economist of scale.

We went for snorkelling half day tour on private boat, lunch at D' Talipapa Market and Para-sailing. We choose the private boat for snorkelling instead of group snorkelling as we do not like to snorkel with a crowd. Sometimes it really spoils the whole snorkelling experience. And it is more flexible as you could choose to leave the snorkelling spot as and when you wish rather than waiting and accommodate to the rest of the people in a group.

Our own long tail boat

I've been to countless snorkeling trips and this was by far the best experience. The visibility of water is very high. On this snorkelling trip, i've seen marine creatures that i've not seen on other snorkeling trips like the water snakes, blue huge star fishes and other species of tropical fishes. After approximately 2 hours of snorkeling, the tour guide took us to Illigan Beach, a less crowded beach on the other side of Boracay. As there are much lesser boat activities on this beach, the waters are extremely clear. We spent so much time on this beach taking pictures as the beach is too breathtaking. No filter needed for the photos, these so true to the eyes.

We spent approximately 1 hour or more on this beach. Couldnt bear to leave this place but feeding our stomach with food is more important. So we returned to Long Beach and the tour guide brought us to D' Talipapa seafood market. This is the famous seafood market in Boracay, you buy seafood from the market and bring to any restaurants beside the market for them to cook for you. You can choose how you want the dishes to be done. BUT! i wouldnt recommend to eat here as they would mark up the prices by alot. Our tour guide was really nice, we went to various restaurants and asked for the price but he rejected as felt that that it was to pricey. So eventually we went to a restaurant that offered a lower price. In total the seafood and preparation of food cost up to approximately SGD60 per person. The most expensive food we had in Boracay. We asked the tour guide why is the seafood so expensive here, he told us that Boracay has very limited supply of seafood. Most of the seafood in Boracay were imported from other places in Philipines like Cebu and other bigger islands. Now we learnt that not every island offers cheap seafood.

After lunch, we carried on our water activities. We went for Para-sailing! We took a boat to a floating platform in the middle of the sea. On this platform everyone was waiting for their water activities, they have banana boat, jet ski, flying fish, para-sailing etc. We waited quite awhile for our turn but we had fun watching other people falling into water on their flying fish & banana boat ride. Finally it was our turn! We told the para sailing operating to raise us high, we told them" Up up up!" And eventually they really release the rope so much that we were the highest among all the other Parasail.

So this sums up our activities on first day. At night we roam around the walking street. Walking street is so lively at night and great that our hotel is right smack on the walk street. It has many restaurants, souvenir shops, merchandise shop, pubs and mini marts. Boracay serves really good mango smoothie! Any restaurant you go, it is a must to order their mango smoothie, you will never regret. This is this long queue mango smoothie/ice cream stall. It is really yummy and refreshing!

We bought their handcraft souvenirs as well. There are many shops that sells handmade key chains at a very low price (less than SGD$1). Some don't offer free customise service. We look for those that we could get the shop owner to write names on the back of they keychain for free. I bought a whole lot for family & friends. So don't rush into buying souvenirs, slowly shop around and look out for those cheap and worthy-to-buy ones.

Koh Lipe

My friends and i love going beaches/islands for holiday. Me particularly prefers a warm holiday than a cold holiday. And i love busking under the sun and dipping into the crystal clear waters exploring the world under the water.The holid ay trips with my friends, i would always have the advantage of planning what to do and where to go and all according to my liking :D anyhow, my friends doesn't plan so they just gotta flow with my big plans. And often my itinerary is a hectic one. i've got nice friends :D

So, while googling for what to do in Langkawi, me being me, i will consistently looking for places or things that are worth my time and money. Not saying Langkawi has nothing much, but this was my 2nd visit and most places and things there i would say that i've done it else where. And i began googling for places in the proximity of Langkawi. So i found this beautiful island called Koh Lipe (Thailand). Yup, the idea of hopping from Malaysia to Thailand sounds a little insane to me and my friends at first. But oh well, i just love this kinda idea.

Koh Lipe is a tiny island found southern part of Thailand. Bear in mind that it is not close to Thailand mainland, but its closer to Langkawi, Malaysia. A ferry ride of approximately 1 hr would take you from Langkawi to this beautiful island. Its white sandy beaches and crystal clear waters gives itself the name of Thailand's Maldives. Very laid back, there isn't any car on this island and the main mode of transport would be motorbikes, long tail boats or bicycles.

We visited the gorgeous island end May this year, which is also the monsoon season where the seas get rocky and with higher frequency of rainfall. Tourist can get really good rates for accommodation in the low season and at times practically gets the whole beach to yourself. We were really very blessed that the weather turned out to perfect when we arrived in Koh Lipe. So the ferry from Langkawi cost us around 200RM which is around $80. Yes it is a a little pricey but that's cause during low season there is only 1 ferry from Langkawi to Koh Lipe each day but i guess the affordable accommodation makes it up?

Upon reaching Koh Lipe, we were transferred to longtail boats to the Pattaya Beach. The island welcomed us with different shades of blue. It was so captivating. Note: all pictures are uploaded without filtering.

The humble immigration house @ Koh Lipe

Pattaya Beach

Pattaya Beach

We made our way to Wapi Resort at the Sunrise beach via the motorbikes. Their motorbikes are kinda cool, they improvise it with a "L" shape seat to carry passengers. I love Wapi Resort, the staffs are really friendly, the room rates are reasonable, the bungalows are on beachfront. You could just walkout to the beach just steps away. Awesome location, just few minutes walk to Walking Street. Nothing much to be picky about, probably just weak Wifi that humans could possibly survive without it :P

Wapi Resort - Family bungalow

Wapi Resort - Family Bungalow

Sunrise Beach - Rooms just steps to the beach

So we rented a private longtail boat to do some snorkeling and island hopping at 1400 Thai Baht from Wapi Resort, approximately $56 SGD. As shared by 4 person, so per person is roughly around $14. Private boat is on per boat basis. Therefore the more people to a boat the cheaper per pax. The boat trip is very flexible, the boatman will bring to some popular snorkeling spots. You could tell him to bring you some some private beaches that has no other people besides youself and your friends. And you can spend time sun bathing or just snorkeling off the shore. This is a private beach that boatman took us too. Simply breath taking.

Private Beach

Crystal Clear waters 

Snorkeling in the deep sea in Koh Lipe was alright. Similar to places like tioman, redang, phuket. Until the last snorkeling spot, the boatman left us on a tiny winy island just opposite sunrise beach. This tiny island is an island of jem. Not expecting much, we snorkel off from the shore without the life vest as the water is very calm. We snorkel alongside the rocks and to our surprise the marine life behind the rocks are amazing. Probably the most species of tropical fishes i've seen at all other snorkeling spots that i've been to be it  Malaysia, Thailand or Indonesia. And i saw a handful of live colourful corals down there, which are really rare in shallow waters nowadays. Totally love the snorkeling spot. Did not took photo there are gopro went out of batt.

Snorkeling in deep sea - not so fascinating

Deep sea snorkeling - probably the deepest snorkeling spot i've ever snorkel.
Couldn't even see the sand bed at the bottom.

It's a cutie hermit crab

So basically the island hopping tour was not too bad, having to rent a long-tail boat of our own and to pick on our own snorkeling spots and further more being able to snorkel under the sun during the monsoon season was already a great blessing. Nothing much to pick on :)

Here comes night time, we made our way to the Walking Street, which is probably the most happening place in Koh Lipe itself. It houses many restaurants, bars, shops, massage palour etc. Because we went during the low season, the Walking Street seems quieter than what it was shown on websites. Many shops were not open but there were a still handful that was opened catering to the off peak tourist crowds.

So what's the best thing to eat on an island? It would definitely be seafood. On an island you get the freshiest and the cheapest seafood.

Each person was around SGD$10 or less for that amount of fresh live seafood and thai food. It was really good deal.