After 3 exceptional days spent in Coron we take the ferry to El Nido.
The speed boat ride lasts 4 hours. El Nido is THE star of the show when it comes to the Philippines. The city is on the archipelago of Palawan. Here there are endless white sand beaches with turquoise blue water, a beautiful and diverse sea bed, amazing cliffs rising from the ocean, diving spots everywhere, basically heaven on earth. Most people come here to do island hopping tours to discover the nearby archipelago of Bacuit.
We arrive late afternoon and after quickly dropping off our bags at our hostel we run to the Republica Sunset bar, to watch the sunset.
Sunset, is as you know, synonymous of beer…
The view from the bar on the archipelago of Bacuit is stunning.
And the sunset is once again amazing.
It is hard to not take a picture every 2 seconds especially since the colors change so quickly.
No Island Hopping this time
Initially we wanted to do an island hopping in El Nido, just like we did in Coron, and hopefully with a private boat again. Except here the prices are way way higher than in Coron and there are so many more boats. So we decided not to do it.
Unfortunately since El Nido is THE place to be, it suffers greatly from mass tourism. We see it immediately when we arrive in the city, there are tricycles everywhere, travel agencies at each street corner, and people constantly asking if we want to book an island hopping. In summary everything we hate.
Kayak ride
We saw on travel blogs that an alternative was to rent kayaks and paddle along the coast. So that is what we decided to do.
In the morning we leave in our kayaks from Corong Corong beach, a few minutes away from El Nido’s center.
We are super lucky once again because we have an amazing weather.
Quickly we are in the ocean, paddling along huge cliffs where the water is clear blue.
We pass by a first cute private beach.
Before continuing a little further. We are in the middle of a dream landscape.
Not far we find a hidden spot, just before a large beach where plenty of group boats are already present.
So we stay a while here, all alone.
The water is clear.
So we grab our snorkeling gear and go watch what’s going on under our feet.
There are plenty of fishes and nice corals.
We stay a while here in our little private spot before we see all the boats leave for their next destination.
The beach is now empty so we decide to go check it out. Awesome.
The beach is superb.
White sand beach and turquoise blue water (yes this will be a common theme all over the Philippines).
A few locals are playing basketball and some kids are swimming in the ocean. We will stay a little while here.
The locals tell us that this beach is empty between 11 am and 2 pm because at that time all the groups are at the Bacuit archipelago. The tours either stop here in the morning, or they stop here on their way back around 2 or 3 pm. Which gives us plenty of time to enjoy this beautiful beach.
We walk around the beach, taking pictures as we are all alone.
Then Matt will shoot some hoops on the most beautiful basketball court ever.
A kid from the island will join him.
We find a nice quiet spot in the shade of a coconut tree and fully enjoy this beautiful place. The weather is amazing, and the beach is calm and relaxing. We feel like we are living in a dream when we look around us.
As expected the tour boats start arriving around 2:30 pm, so we decide to go back in our kayaks and continue to beaches that are a little further along the coast.
We pass a few deserted beaches, and others with boats. The color of the water is still surreal.
We find another empty beach where we stop to relax and go for a swim.
Late afternoon we decide to return to Papaya Beach where we spent some time this morning because it is definitely our favorite beach we saw today.
We are thrilled to see that all the boats are almost gone, and we take advantage of the last hours before sunset on this beach.
Last snorkel for the day.
We decide to make our way back around 5:30 pm, right before sunset so we can admire it directly from our kayak.
On the way back the color of the sky is magnificent. On one side the sky is cloudy and menacing, on the other it is clear with the sun slowly making its way down.
We stay a moment floating in the middle of the ocean to watch the sun set.
There are only a couple other small boats around us. The scenery is simply amazing.
Since we are in the Philippines the sunsets are all more beautiful than the previous one. We are amazed each time.
We decide to get back to the shore before it gets dark to return our kayaks and go for diner in a restaurant nearby where we can continue watching the sun go down. Superb.
We spent an amazing day avoiding the crowds.
Day at Nacpan Beach
The next day we rent a motor bike to go to Nacpan beach, 12 miles North of El Nido. This is apparently the most beautiful beach in El Nido and one of the most beautiful in the Philippines.
The road is of course terrible in some areas. But we are getting used to that in Asia. Thankfully it is not as bad as in Coron.
We arrive late morning on Nacpan beach, a 2.5 mile long beach. Palm trees, white sand, turquoise blue water… another day at the office !
We walk along the beach looking for some shade to spend the day.
The beach is huge but people seem to like to cram together near the entrance. So after walking a little bit we end up all alone.
We spent most of the day in the water. It is so warm here that you can easily spend the entire day in it without ever being cold. And the view on the beach from here is just amazing.
We end our stay in El Nido on this nice relaxing note. We don’t regret not being able to visit the MUST DO of the area (Big and Small Lagoon). We actually prefer visiting low key places, and aren’t interested in spending a lot of money to spend the day with a lot of people!
We leave El Nido, glad with the program we did there, to go to Port Barton. A small port town, not very touristic, for a few quiet days.