For those who are following my Instagram account, @thepinkflaregirl, you’d have seen the gorgeous pictures of Boracay (like this one below) that I posted.
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| Roomie, Kay Kay and I on a speedboat cruising into the sunset on our way to parasail. |
I was completely blown away by the beauty of Boracay and fell absolutely in love with it. Almost every picture taken there was completely picturesque and such a dream. Thank you Gushcloud and Tiger Air for sending us there! A big thank you too to our accomodations, The District Boracay for the wonderful hospitality. I’ll recommend this luxurious hotel to anyone who’s thinking of going to Boracay. I loved the contemporary, minimalist design, the staff are really warm and friendly, and the location is superb; it’s right by the beach. The beach is literally right outside its door step. You can trust me on The District Boracay. I’m usually fussy with accommodations.
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| The District Boracay – see what I mean by having the beach right at its doorstep? |
There’s so much to love about Boracay – the soft white sand, clear blue waters, iridescent sunsets, yummy and affordable seafood, delicious fruit shakes (must-try!), beachside cafes…and the people are generally nice and friendly too. You don’t get shot dirty looks when you decide not to buy something from a shop. Water sports and activities are also affordable, the beach not overcrowded and it’s easy and convenient to get around. Most places are walkable, or you can hop onto a tuk tuk (similar to Bangkok’s) to take you to your destination. Oh, and massages are very affordable too! I was getting foot massages everyday when I was there (super happy!). I’ll recommend that you hit ‘Manggo Spa’ located along the beach at Station 2. The spa premise is very clean and the prices are affordable. I paid 490pesos (about S$15) for a foot massage. We tried some dodgy massage shops. Although cheaper, but the experience was definitely less pleasant. Also, as travel time to Boracay is quite long (we took a 4hr flight, 1.5hr bus ride, half hour ferry ride and then 15 min bus ride to get to our hotel), so I’ll recommend a longer stay there – at least 3 full days or more.
These are some activities that I did and recommend:
Snorkling and Island Hopping
I didn’t quite enjoy the snorkling – the water wasn’t very clear and there weren’t many variety of fishes. We spotted 1 rainbow coloured fish and lots of clown fishes. Getting to Puka beach however, was completely worth the trip. Puka beach is absolutely beautiful. I’ll let the pictures do the talking.
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| Kay Kay, Joanna, Valerie, Szes, Jolene, Lucinda and Sheena – before hitting Puka beach. |
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| It reads, ‘PUKA’ if you’re wondering what the sticks are. |
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With Nicole, Serene, Melody, Joanna and Tricia
 Mandatory jump shot at the beach! (we took jump shots at our last Gushcloud trip to Bali last year too) From left to right: Sheena, Rosanne, Me, Kay Kay, Melody, Tricia, Serene, Lucinda, Kife, Szes, Jolene, Valerie, Fiona, Nicole, Joanna, Lydia.
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With the Gushcloud team, Audrey, Xuen, Sheena, Jasmine and Freda.
ATV
This was one of my favourite activities. I was so wishing that I could go a lot faster with the ATV vehicle, but we had to be in one line. We drove up and did a mini hike up to the highest point of Boracay. Again, it was absolutely beautiful.
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| The ATV vehicles |
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| The view from the top. |
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| Left to right: Rosanne, Lucinda, Kay Kay, Tricia, Me, Serene, Jolene, Audrey. |
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| Check out Serene’s hair that completed the ‘E’! Oh why was my ‘L’ lopsided. 😦 |
Helmet Diving
As I posted on Instagram, those who dive for real will probably find helmet diving really gay. But it was my first time so deep underwater – 5m, walking on the ocean bed and feeding fishes. So fun! You wear these huge helmets (that are super heavy) with tubes attached and you can breathe completely normal and not get your face and hair wet at all underwater.
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| The helmets |
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| Us all underwater. |
Here’s a short video to give you a sense of what helmet diving is like.
Parasailing
Definitely my favourite activity. It was so surreal and calming to be up so high and again I say, the view was magnificent. Although Kay Kay and I did have a somewhat physics discussion of what would happen if the parasail ropes snapped and we tumbled into the sea and we were worried about how we were going to land at first because we had no clue and were slightly scared. We eventually found out that we landed really gracefully with the speedboat reeling our line in slowly till our feet touched the boat. Phew! Oh, and you have to do this at sunset! It’s makes the whole experience even more amazing with the view.
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| With Althea, Freda and Kay Kay on the speedboat. |
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| And off we went! |
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| Higher… |
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| …and higher… |
Food Recommendations:
It was superb traveling with Lady Iron Chef because he’ll have his readers recommend the must tries and would have done his homework before helping us decide where to eat.
Mesa
Located at Station 2, the menu had a wide selection of Filipino cuisine with a hint of Asian fusion. I’ll recommend the salted egg rice, seafood platter, and curry pork dish. The pork leg was supposedly recommended, but it failed to live up to its standards. Food was overall good and the ambience was nice.
Talipapa Market
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| Awaiting our food at Talipapa Market. No doubt a bunch of bloggers we are – we whip out our phones at every chance! |
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| A shot with Melody whilst waiting for our food. |
This place has an interesting concept where you have to buy your seafood from the various stalls at the market and then bring it to a separate restaurant to have them cook for you. Seafood is definitely very fresh, but you have to haggle prices.
Cyma Greek Taverna
Located at D’Mall, Station 2. The rib eye steak and crab pasta is a must-try. The steak is super juicy and tender, and the crab pasta is super yummy.
Before I end my post, you can stand a chance to win tickets to Boracay and experience all the wonderful things I did! Tiger Air is giving out $1 million worth of flights in their year-end draw. 100 lucky travellers will walk away with $10,000 worth of flight credits each and every booking you make gives you 1 chance in the draw! For more details: bit.ly/1milliondraw.
Till we meet again Boracay!
-xoxo-
xoxojeneen.com 