The Island Escapades tour (also known as Coron Tour C), came recommended as a way to see glittering turquoise waters, sandy beaches and some underwater sea life. This is a pic heavy post!

At 8AM sharp, our tricycle arrived to pick us up for our tour. We were able to get some beach towels from the front desk of the hotel before setting off. We reached the port and waited a bit for everyone to arrive, then we left port at 9AM. So far, so good. The Island Escapades tour, as the name suggests, would be taking us to three islands with beautiful beaches. This was to be a bit of a slower paced tour, especially because the islands were quite a distance from Coron town and our boat (called a bangka) was not very fast.

The boat was fortunately not full today, with about 20 guests and around 4 crew, so it was rather comfortable. It helped that there was a large “table” in the middle of the boat where people dumped their bags so we could all prioritise our bums on the bench that ran alongside the sides of the boat. Overall, it was a pretty basic and crude vessel but I did appreciate that there was approprate amount of shade for everyone. Our fellow tourists consisted of a large Filipino family, some couples and a solo tourist, who I was seated next to. She was Filipino-Greek; lived in Greece all her life. It was interesting to share stories.

Bulog Dos Island

The first stop was Bulog Dos island, which was a tiny island linked to two islands via sandbars on each side. The sandbar that was supposed to link the island to the larger Bulalacao Island was unfortunately submerged at the time we were visiting, due to high tide. This was disappointing as this sandbar was the main attraction! The other island linked to Bulog Dos was called Cauayan island, and it was here, on the western side, was where we disembarked from our boat.

The tour guide gave us 60 mins here to have a look and to take a dip in the water. The water was beautiful. We crossed the sandbar, north-east of Bulog Dos Island to do some snorkelling. We found clownfish very quickly, and very close to the surface! Unfortunately A DID NOT take a video What is the point of having a Go Pro?????

Unfortunately the coral here was not the best.

After snorkelling, we walked around Bulog Dos Island and walked to the top of it (which consisted of a small hill). There was a vantage point here of the aforementioned sandbar that we could hardly see from ground level.

Banana Island

Next stop was the nearby Banana Island, where we would have lunch. It was called Banana Island because it was shaped like a banana leaf, not because it was shaped like a banana. I can’t really see it though, can you?

The boat landed on the north side of the island, where there was a shop selling snacks and a resort. The boat crew set up our food (which was cooked on the boat!) and we all dug in.

Lunch was quite a spread, consisting of:

• Grilled fish
• Cucumber slices
• Eggplant
• Pancit
• Chicken Adobo
• Mango
• Watermelon
• Rice
• Coca Cola

I ate everything except the cucumber. The food was average, but not awful, I did like the eggplant and lol the mango. Everyone was shy about the fish until A stabbed the thing and fished out big pieces of it for us. Unfortunately, it was overcooked and underseasoned. The dish had a bunch of seagrapes which were interesting to eat.

We were hopeful that we would not get sick from this… I skipped the rice as I knew it would be cold.

Aside from the food, it was nice to chat with the other tourists who seemed friendly enough. We learnt that one of the couples were Portuguese/German and another was Mexican/Italian living in Adelaide! The former were disappointed with the Coron Super Ultimate Tour, which was what we planned to do the next day. It had “too many lakes” and not enough beaches or relaxation, so this tour was perfect. I was so intrigued by the couple living in Adelaide, but was glad they were happy living there.

Overall, Banana Island did have a nice beach and was good to relax on.

Malcapuya Island

Our last stop was Malcapuya Island, which boasted a large wide beach with more clear blue water, palm trees and powdery white sand. Personally, as an Australian I am partial to coarser sand as it seems more… substantial, shall we say. But this is just me nit picking.

The boat came ashore on the western side of the island, where we all disembarked and walked 100m to get to the beach. I finally understood why they dumped us away from the main attraction - it was so the boats wouldn’t pollute the beach, which was a good thing. This was the best stop by far. It was such a nice day out!!! Take a look:

(Best viewed on desktop and in full screen mode)

We had one last opportunity at snorkelling so we jumped right into the nice clear water. I noticed a small boat that was allowed to be here, on this side of the island and remembered that the tour guide had mentioned a “sightseeing boat”. To my horror, it was a small bangka with wooden beams that was perpendictular to the boat (as opposed to parallel). Tourists would hold on to these beams with snorkels and life jackets on whilst the boat made its way away from the beach. They were cheating!! Not only this, the boat people were FEEDING the fish!!!! I was so disgusted.

The snorkelling was kind of mid. The coral was not great. There was a lot of fish, because they were being fed I suppose. I missed a brain coral and a sting ray.

And… that was the tour. It ended around 3:30PM, because we had a long trip back to Coron port on our slowwww boat. On the way back, the crew fed us hot banana turons which A actually enjoyed. It was a good tour; a good start to our island hopping and time in the ocean adventures. I always wish these things were longer though. The tourists we were with were nice and orderly enough and the crew were fine. It was a simple tour with three stops after all. Obviously, the only criticism I had was that we could not see Bulog Dos Island at its best.

A van dropped us off back to Charms hotel where we showered and got dressed to go out for dinner. We agreed to continue following the plan, which was to do the Coron Ultimate Tour. Everyone did it for a reason, right? This was what we were here to do. How bad could it be, right? We did consider getting a private tour (as this was suggested to us by one of the couples) but it would be 3x the price per person. A private tour meant you dictated where you wanted to go, and left spots if you didn’t like them. You would not be beholden to other people.

We took a tricycle back to town, to a couple of tour offices. There was a SUPER ultimate tour but we only wanted the Ultimate tour. Eventually, we decided to go back to JY Tours, where a guy was handing our fliers for them. I took one and used it to purchase our tickets, which was lucky because it turned out the fliers were old fliers with the old price. The lady dealing with us revealed this when I asked for a discount, saying we had just taken a tour with them today (and produced an invoice as evidence). We did manage to get a tiny discount regardless.

Playa Restaurant

For dinner I was too tired to google and had noticed a place across the road that looked nice. Meaning it would be pricy. A agreed to go, because he was tired too. Playa was actually a rooftop restaurant so we climbed a few flights of stairs and was greeted with a nice summer-y vibes. Think rattan, lots of green, leafy plants and rows of bare light bulbs strung up.

For an entree, we ordered Buffalo wings (PHP 395). These were ok and and were satisfying but the sauce was like a sweet chilli sauce; it was far too sweet. I wasn’t super happy with A’s choice of a pineapple daiquiri (what is it even? There is only one type of daiquiri in my books), but he enjoyed it well enough, so that was fine by me.

For main, I ordered a Fruti De Mare pasta (PHP 450), which was not half bad. There was sufficient seafood and the tomato sauce was fine. The spring onion garnish was a bit weird and the bread was way too dense and kind of horrible, however. My mojito was adequately boozy and minty and not too sweet.

A originally ordered a Camaron Binagoongan, Shrimp cooked in Shrimp paste, but was later told it was unavailable, so he chose Sinigang na Hipon sa Pakwan (Sour soup with prawns and watermelon). Elaborate please

Overall, it was a nice meal but yeah, it was quite expensive, as we popped two grand pesos (PHP 2095 / AUD57.82), not that I was doing maths when we were ordering. I was acutely aware that we were paying the tourist tax in a touristy town and not many Filipinos would be spending this much money for a meal for 2… It is quite depressing to think about the inequality. 6/10 #ipinions