Still life at Magalawa Island

Magalawa Island in Palauig, Zambales

I asked my sis in-law to extend my niece's visit in Manila (they live in Bicol) so that I could take her to the beach just a week after our trip in Baguio. I also invited some of my college friends and my aunt who is on vacation from work in Lebanon. My aunt is the one who looked after Nicole (my niece) while sis, brother (Nicole's father) and I are at work. And so my niece was very excited and started to count days.

How we get there?
From Victory Liner Terminal in Pasay we rode a bus bound for Olangapo. From Olangapo terminal my friend has pre-arranged two vans for our group, we were 18 persons. The vans brought us to the port going to Magalawa Island. There are only two resorts operating in Magalawa Island, the Ruiz Resort and Armada Resort, our resort was the latter. We waited for awhile until the service boat of Armada Resort has arrived. Our overall travel time was 6 hours.

about to board the boat - boat ride is just 5 minutes, notice the island is very near from the port

The Resort/Beach
Armada Resort offers accommodation and food packages. The rates will depend on your choice of accommodation. Click to check their rates. The sand is a creamy white that looks so white when your are in the distance. There are so many star fishes near the shore. You also have to be mindful that there are few jellyfishes that might sting you. There's also life guard on duty on the beach.

Our chosen accommodation, fan tree house/room

the shoreline

sunrise

The floating restaurant and food

Armada Resort floating restaurant

If you will avail the accommodation and food packages, food will be serve either at the floating restaurant or at the canteen. True to their advertisement, food has variety of seafoods, meat and vegetables and a small coca-cola every meal. Their food are not much in presentation but taste really good and serving is enough to fill your hungry stomach. (Sorry no food pictures) :)

My niece was just a bit disappointed of their dessert. She asked me what is the cupcake is for. I told her maybe it's for dessert because there's no other sweets around on the table. She was expecting something nicely prepared on a plate or something cold like icecream, halo-halo or even fresh fruits. They only serve us mangoes on our last meal in the resort.

my niece on the bridge going to the floating restaurant

Our last meal (lunch) at the resort)

Snorkeling 

Free snorkeling is included in the package with complete snorkeling gear but you can also bring your own gear. The resort's service boat boat will take you to the snorkeling area and you can snorkel for an hour. On second day the gang went snorkeling but  my nice and I I didn't join them because my niece just wanted to play on the shore and practice swimming. I was surprised that she learns how to float and mermaiding (mermaiding is a term used when swimming like a mermaid) before we went home.

my niece enjoying her pinipig Popsicle

Expenses (Fares are for 2 persons)

2250 pesos - Package accommodation & food (1500 for me & 750 for my niece)
1000 pesos - Victory Liner Pasay to Olangapo to Pasay
  666 pesos - Van Rental (6000/way 2 vans/18 persons) Olangapo to Port
  700 pesos - port to Olangapo Victory Liner Terminal (one of our companions extended his stay in Magalawa so we covered his cost)

Do the math for the total of expenses. (miscellaneous like snacks on the way are not included)

The things they need to improve in my point of view

1. Extra order of food must be available and menu should comes handy. ( I remember one of my companions requested a glass of kalamansi juice because she was allergic to shrimp, kalamansi juice is her first aid. The staffs has panicked and uncertain on how to prepare it.)
2. They should serve fresh juice instead of softdrinks or make it optional.
3. They should put a little effort in preparing dessert.

TIPS
In Armada Resort's website it is written that cooking stove is not allowed but I saw other guests they have cooking stove with them and the resort did not ask corkage fee from them. Maybe you can bring too for 'tipid' reasons. If you are a social drinker, you better bring your own alcohol. Alcoholic beverages, soft drinks and chips are twice the price of SRP in the resort.