A Weekend at Borawan – Itinerary

Do you want to escape from the busyness of the city? Its pollution and noise? Well, aside from the destinations found at nearby provinces such as Laguna, Cavite, and Batangas, there is one found also in the southern part of Luzon... and don’t worry, it is not that far... and it has white sand.

Have you heard of Borawan? Yes... it is not Boracay... and also not Palawan... but Borawan...

It is located in Padre Burgos in Quezon province and is 4 hours away from Manila. We went to three different islands (or are they coves?) namely Puting Buhangin, Dampalitan, and Borawan.

From Manila, we rode on a bus (JAC liner) going to Lucena. Their buses have free Wi-Fi, but, me and bembem do not have phones that are wi-fi ready so, we just called ourselves "losers". hahaha! And after 3 hours, we finally arrived at Lucena Grand Central Terminal.

We then looked for a jeepney bound to Padre Burgos. We easily saw the signage but not the jeepneys. Since none arrived after minutes of waiting, we decided to eat first because we aren't sure if there are food being sold at our destination.

Guess where we ate? Jollibee!!! haha! We are so adventurous... :-s hahaha!

Okay, so after eating, jeepneys are not yet around. So we looked for other means to reach P. Burgos. We have the option to ride a bus or van. We opted for a van. The fare costs P60 each and the travel time is 1 hour. We asked the conductor and driver where they can drop us off, and suggested Vista Playa.

We thought there would be many options for the island hopping where we could negotiate with the boatmen but there's none. Vista Playa is a restaurant/catering that offers island hopping. They charged us P2,200 when it should have been 1800 only... Okay, no choice. But, it's still ok. We are happy with their service. They also have a comfort room where we took a bath for only P10 each instead of paying P30 per container at Dampalitan.

I’m sure you also want to know how much you need to prepare for this trip. Well, it costs us less than Php1,500 each. We did not bring tents so we rented a cottage good for 8 persons for Php500. Please don’t forget that a mosquito repellent is a must.

You might also want to stay to nearby resorts for convenience but you will need to add another P500 for each person for the accommodation.

Below is our itinerary and expenses incurred for this trip and we hope that this would be helpful to your planning.

By the way, I would like to warn you. Based on our experience, July is not a good season to go swimming to any of these islands. There are so many jellyfishes! According to Mang Noli, our boatman, the best time to go there is from February to May where you can enjoy all of what it has to offer: the sun, the sand, and of course the water.

From the drop-off point to island hopping, overall, we still had a great time.

You can click on each link below to see more of what each has to offer.



Puting Buhangin



Dampalitan



Borawan

Until then!