Island Hopping Tour – Greg and Mandy's Travels

Mar 23, 2025

Breakfast on the rooftop overlooking the boats preparing for the day’s hoards.

Today was our island hopping day, so after breakfast and a quick run for coffee because our hotel didn’t have any (they pitifully proffered us a sachet of Nescafé and pointed to the hot water), we headed off in some minivans to the local beach.

We were told that the choice for today was getting wet or very wet. So far we’ve been blessed with just getting wet, as the seas were calm when we waded out through the coral and clambered onto our boat. Headed out to sea, enjoying the natural beauty of the limestone islands until the guide decided to turn us into a party boat and cranked up the boombox. There we were enjoying the pristine natural environment of a world class heritage site whilst listening to Saturday Night Fever, and being encouraged to act out YMCA. Only needed Sweet Caroline to make our morning complete, but don’t worry there are still five hours to go. Turned out we had to put up with ABBA’s Greatest Hits instead.

Somebody described El Nido as Bali on the shore and Halong Bay offshore, and that’s fairly accurate description. Lots of small, limestone islands dotted everywhere. Our first stop was the Big Lagoon where we all clambered into two man kayaks. I’d love to say we did it gracefully but we’re all retirees. It appears that nobody drowned, and hundreds of kayaks from the many boats headed into the lagoon to enjoy some solitary nature exploration.

Our second stop was about half an hour away at a small beach where the offer was some swimming and then lunch. The water was chest deep, so you had to wade or swim to shore, and once we were sorted the crew started unloading tables and eskies, carting them over their heads to the beach to set up for lunch.

The tide came in during lunch, and by the time we had to wade back to the boat it was about neck deep.

Our third stop was only a short distance away at the beach with nice snorkeling. Not quite Great Barrier Reef standard, but the people who went in again enjoyed it. We were told that if you were very lucky you might see a turtle, and if you were very, very lucky you might see a shark. Turned out that the crew needed to be very, very, very lucky to find the anchor that actually came off the rope, and they were all diving around the boat trying to find it.

And on to our last stop which was a rather nice beach, that really had nothing to do but stand around. As our guide put it, normally this is the stop to sunbake, but today we will just bake. Up until that point the weather had been fairly benign, but clouds were gathering and we are all standing on the beach watching the rain approach, so they decided to pull the boat in from it’s mooring, and head off earlier than expected.

Arrived back at the dock next to the hotel around 3:30, and made our way back to our room to dry and get all the sand off. A lovely day.