Philippines: 🏝, 🇵🇭, 🚣

Would you believe me if I said one day in the Philippines cost me more than one day in Tokyo? Well it’s true! How do you figure? Well, let’s find out! First off, this was not the typical trip as about a dozen of us split an island, yes a whole island! That actually wasn’t the expensive part, as the entire thing only cost $360 each for three nights on this exclusive resort. For a closer look at Floral Island, Google away. "How soft is the sand?"

Due to my distrust of the timeliness of intra-Philippines air travel, I decided to fly to El Nido first and spend the night there, thus ensuring that I would be able to meet up with everyone else the next day — with no risk of getting left behind if I had a delay. As it turned out, I was spot on as my flight from Taipei to Manila was on-time but the flight from Manila to El Nido was not.

Anyway, I spent a night in El Nido by myself, staying at the very comfortable One El Nido Suites — booked for two nights, so I could hang out there past checkout till 4PM when everyone came in. That luxurious AC and wait time was $175 for two nights. Throw in the lovely condo-hotel we stayed in Manila for two nights ($90), split among many of us, and total housing costs for the trip was $640 for six nights.

And here with the killer: flights! Pricing for short term hauls don’t get cheaper, and for once I actually bought tickets semi-early, but the bill was still $730 for three ticketes, four jaunts: TPE-MPH-TPE ($440), MPH-ENI ($135), and ENI-MPH ($155). If you want to get to an island destination, there’s no choice but to fly!

So overall the cost to get to a lovely Philippine island getaway was $1,360 for housing and flying.

• Flights: $730
• Floral Island: $360
• Hotels: $275
• Shopping: $280
• Transportation: $160
• Food: $150

So where did the other money go? Well, food was pretty much covered on the island -- my personal bill came to $60 for various drinks and extras ordered -- and then our friend’s family was kind enough to take us out to two fabulous dinners in Manila. So overall food costs was $150 for the whole time, with the biggest meal I personally paid for a shot of Ippudo ramen ($12) I had at SM Megamall in Mandaluyong. When in the Philippines, 🍜!

I also watched a movie at $5 admission with $3 popcorn, because of course I wanted to check out a local theater. And I’m sure glad I did as I discovered that there are bathrooms in each individual theater! It’s a genius move and halfway to the dream of having one-way glass window in individual theater bathrooms so you never miss anything. Way to go Philippines, being so advanced! There was also one night of karaoke ($22) which was glorious, and also a night at a speakeasy bar but I didn’t get anything so that was zero expenditure.

Oh, transportation was cheap, especially local taxis. Like maybe $5 per ride to downtown El Nido from their airport, and even from the Megamall to the Manila airport. My only expensive rides were to/from TPE airport, which averaged about $40 each. As for other transportation, we had a van rented in Manila, which cost $45 each for the driver and car for a few days. And there was maybe $20 in shuttle/boat transport from El Nido an hour-and-a-half south to Floral island. So overall $180 spent on transportation, with the bulk of that getting to and from the Taipei airport.

And then finally I spent some money shopping. Yes, in the waning hours of hanging out in Manila, I went to Massimo Dutti and dropped $160 on a white linen jacket that I just had to have. Once again, shopping in other countries is a dream and the amount of linen in the Filipino stores was fantastic. Give. Me. All. Your. Linen.

Before that I had also spent about $110 on various totes, a shirt each from Forever 21 and Zara, and also a scarf from Kultura -- a store selling Filipino-made stuff. Basically if you’re gonna put me in a mall, I’m gonna buy stuff.

Oh and SIMs are super cheap, like you step off and grab one in five minutes -- I used Globe as the provider -- and I spent $20 on seven gigabytes plus extra for Spotify. Because you know, island dance party.

Overall the week trip to the Philippines cost $2,050 total, with the bulk going to flying and housing. So really, short trips cost a lot because flights are the big killer when spread over a short amount of time. It cost $340 per day for this trip -- versus $255 per day in Tokyo, or $175 in Vietnam and $145 in Bali -- and even taking out the shopping and some of the transportation costs, the daily bill would have been somewhere around $260 I think.

So the lesson is to vacation for a long time, or go hit a beautiful private island with all of your friends! Either or.