Liwayway Sa Bohol — Hotel in Pamilacan Island

Okay so let me start by talking about the island. If you have booked with Elvira then you will be met at the airport and driven for 10 mins to the dock. There you will board the Banca and head across the water for 50 mins. Elvira's staff will take your luggage to your room. So the island is small you can walk around most of it in 2hrs. The main road which is nothing more than a very narrow road with some concrete you follow this up through the village to near the school 25mins then head left for about 15mins to the beach then 35 mins along the beach (Nothing special about this beach its white sand covered in lots and lots of broken coral ) then cut back through fields to the main road and back to Elvira's. The village is nice to see as its very simple and rustic.||Now for the snorkelling. If you head out of Elvira's and toward the Dive shop you will see a way down to the beach. You snorkel for about 100m out across sea grass and sand and then you come to the reef beautiful coral with hundreds of thousand of little fish but nothing bigger than 12 inches. This is classed as a marine park. They say you need a snorkel guide and have to pay 250 peso pp. This is not true its just a way to get more business. You are not supposed to wear fins although most people do and you have to wear a life vest to stop you damaging the corals. Again at least 50 percent of snorkelers wear no life vest. Supposedly you can get fined about 20 USD although I never saw anyone being stopped over our 3 days there.||Now to Liwayway. So the rooms are very simple. Nice and clean with your own bathroom. Please note there is no water in the rooms so you have to use a tub of water and a bucket for washing, using the toilet and showering and of course the water is not warm. But it's fine. You are not here for 5 star accommodation you are here to chill and you will. The food from the restaurant is good and wholesome but can take up to 1 hr to serve so order well before you want it. The staff are really nice and extremely accommodating and you will relax whilst you are hear. Please note you must bring cash with you either Filipino Peso or USD. They take no other form of payment. We worked on 100USD per day and had change left. They also do in room very cheap 10 USD massages which are very good. Also there are several pet dogs on the property who have free range and do howl a bit at night but you get used to it. As you will to the Cockerls crowing at 4.30am ||There are no TV's here but wifi at reception is very good||||A great little break away from the civilised world. Well worth a 2 -3 day visit to...

We really like our original room. On the 2nd day, there was a foul smell. I'm not sure if it was near our room around the resort or if it was their neighbor. It smelled like a dead animal. We needed to change room, but they moved us to a smaller room, but let us pay for using the AC.

On the 2nd day, I ordered their filipino breakfast cause of the fried rice. But when they served it, it wasn't fried. The cook said, "Yeah, you can also get steamed rice," I said, I specifically ordered filipino breakfast cause of the fried rice. They use cheap rice, so if it's not fried, it's not good. At night, their staff was singing KARAOKE the whole night. We went there to relax, not to hear drunk singing people. They can do it at their home and not at the place where we pay for to relax. They could have asked their guests if they could do karaoke as a courtesy.

On our last day, i needed to order breakfast ahead (cause it takes them 1hr or more to prepare ANY MEAL) since we need to leave at 7AM. I spoke to the cook and told he that we need the breakfast prepared before we leave, so most probably, it should be served at 6AM. And she said, "i can make sandwiches for you and your partner," so i asked, is it part of the breakfast menu? She said no. Got me thinking, SHE'S LAZY. They do not have other guests. Take note.

I was also advised by their staff a day before that their food cost from PHP150 - PHP300. It's not. It's from 350-450 and very small portions. The rice is not even worth it. Even...

Overall im very satisfied with the stay - the island was perfect to spend a few days and unwind. I was prepared for the lack of luxury and in fact that's the charm of it. There are several accommodation compounds on the island next to each other but I believe this one was the best since people congregated to it the most. The staff were really helpful with everything and a nice eating area made the place looking comfortable. THe food is good and varied. if you're bored you can try eating somewhere else for lunch. The fact that you can go swimming with the turtles on the right and enjoy a world-class coral reef on the left, it's a massive winning point!! The island itself is also great to walk around and meet the friendly locals.

The accommodation compound is fairly compact, almost crowded. There's dogs that patrol that area and they can be noisy. Also the walls of the bungalows are thin, so just be prepared. Finally, the beaches on the island are slightly underwhelming - not easy to swim or be lazy around them, I was hoping for the other beaches around the island to be more remote and idyllic, but Im afraid they were just average. Still worth spending the time on the island even if the views are not...