Category: Travel

Shangri-La Mactan 5-Star Vacation

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It was a dream of mine 20 years ago to stay in Shangri-la Mactan. Back in 2005, I experienced having dinner there and it was not just relatively expensive for me since I’ve been so used to just doing budget trips (from what I remember, it cost P15,000 for a group of people at that time) but it was all worth it because the food was really scrumptious!!! I’ve been wanting to go back, maybe have lunch or breakfast. We attempted to try the breakfast day tour at Shangri-la Boracay instead before the pandemic  during our Boracay summer vacation in 2019 but the cost of P3,000 per person was still too expensive for us at that time considering that we were on a one week or so budget Boracay vacation. Then the pandemic hit so all travel plans stopped. 

Recently, we were in Boracay for 15 days and we did want to try the breakfast day tour again in Shangri-la Boracay but they weren’t offering it anymore. Our budget for hotel stay was only about P40,000, perfect for our 2-week stay in Paradise Garden and Resort Hotel, a nice enough 5-star-looking resort on the famous island. I’ll be blogging and vlogging about that too. At least we were able to do Crimson Boracay during my birthday! Plus, splurge at OM BAR! Maybe, on our next Boracay trip, we will be able to check-in at Shangri-la. Still, I’m grateful we were able to stay at Shangri-la Mactan! 

Come to think of it, I noticed that ever since I’ve been with Mahal, a lot of my wishes have started coming true — having a baby, having a family to call my own, having my very first Apple Macbook (it was Mahal’s first grand gift to me back in 2016!), my beautiful cloffice (which I still need to blog/vlog about), my dream beach wedding proposal, my upcoming dream beach wedding, having our own mini resort and restobar, being together 24/7, traveling to exotic places, checking in at 5-star resorts… And my Shangri-la wish did finally happen! So I want to share a vlog I made about our 5-star Shangri-la Mactan vacation including the prices and what-not. Check it out below. Enjoy!

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Our OM BAR Experience in Boracay

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Whenever we’d go to Boracay, we always pass by this fun and happening place called OM Bar. A few years ago, before the pandemic, when we toured Visayas with Mahal’s elder sister from Belgium, we were able to experience it. Mahal’s sister took care of the expenses so we were lucky. We went in and just had a cocktail.

Then just recently, as we were doing our 2-week Boracay vacation (where we celebrated Valentine’s Day, my 45th Birthday, and parts of our honeymoon), we noticed that OM Bar looks bigger now and more exciting. So we decided to experience it once again, but this time, we’ll order a lot of food, try some of their cocktails, and shisha too! They usually require an entrance fee of about P500 or so I think from 7 pm onwards so we decided to come in early just before sunset so we can parteyyyyy to the maxxx!!!!

Here’s the vlog I made about our OM Bar Boracay experience. Enjoy!

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Dumaguete Day Trip

Dumaguete Day Trip

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Dumaguete is just a 25-minute boat ride from Liloan Port in Santander which is about 30 minutes away from Oslob by car. So it’s faster to get here than to go all the way to Cebu City (which is 3-4 hours away from Oslob depending on traffic) for a little errand run and shopping. I just want to share here what usually happens whenever we go to Dumaguete from Oslob for a little day trip. Here’s my vlog:

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Crimson Resort and Spa Boracay – My 45th Birthday

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It’s been a whirlwind of a ride since we got married in a civil ceremony… one celebration after another and constant traveling. We’re actually in the middle of our month-long (or so…) honeymoon trip in the Visayas, part of which is my 45th birthday celebration in Crimson Resort and Spa here in Boracay. I just want to share the vlog I managed to create while vacationing. I’ll try to come up with more posts once this busyness is over. But I think with our beach wedding looming in the horizon, it will really be a challenge to keep you updated here as much as I want to. Anyway, you can always check my Facebook and Instagram for more current updates. For now, here’s my birthday vlog I wanted to share here:

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Oslob New Village Christmas 2022 Celebration

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MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

How’s everyone doing? I hope you’re all having a wonderful holiday season!

It’s been a year since Typhoon Odette hit us and just remembering that makes me feel all the more grateful because this Christmas, the weather has been good to us. Though it’s a bit cloudy and sometimes windy here in Oslob, at least so far, there’s no typhoon in the horizon. Thank you, God!

And so, we decided to celebrate our Christmas here at Oslob New Village. The original plan was actually to check in at a nice resort like what we used to do before in Cagayan de Oro but then we figured it would be more fun to celebrate it here at our own mini resort because we have Jona and Wenie (our staff at Oslob New Village) to celebrate with.

I created a vlog about it. Enjoy!

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BEHIND THE SCENES – The Making of Our Engagement Photoshoot and Teaser Video

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This is the making of our engagement teaser video. If you haven’t watched it yet, you can check my previous blog post here: Our Engagement Teaser Video

Or head straight to my vlog. It’s a beautifully done romantic and fun video, and Mahal and I never get tired of watching it. This is connected to my Shangri-la Mactan 5-star vacation post.

Before, I used to envy couples who get engaged and share their pre-nup videos and I kept wondering if something like that could ever happen for me. I wondered how they had done it? What preparations, sacrifices, situations did they face to reach that blissful phase in their life? Now that we’re doing it, and we’re doing it just the way we want the whole engagement and marriage done, I couldn’t be any happier! My time has finally come! Hihihi!

Actually, I had no intention of sharing the raw videos of our photo and video shoot but when I watched them, I realized how “bungisngis” we were, meaning, we were really just laughing all the time, enjoying each moment of the shoot, and just appreciating this wonderful time in our relationship.

Anyway, you’ll know what I mean when you see the video. So without further a do, here it is:

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Our Engagement Teaser Video

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Mahal and I have been best friends since 2012, have been life partners since 2014, and have been formally engaged since April 24, 2022. Our lives have changed since then and with the hustle and bustle of running our businesses, homeschooling Tuz, and enjoying our lives to the fullest, it’s just now that I’ve had the time to share this beautiful engagement teaser video with you. Between the two of us, I am the more open one… like my life has always been an open book to the public. But because I want to also respect Mahal’s more introverted and private nature, I’ve slowly adopted this demeanor of his. I don’t immediately share now some stuff going on in our lives. But eventually, I do find a way to make them come out to the public… lol!

We’ve already watched this video a gazillion times and now we’re ready to share it with you guys. After all, our beach wedding is in 5 months and we really need to get things going.

By the way, this is just our post engagement video. It is not a pre-nup shoot yet so to speak. We just wanted to have a remembrance of how we got engaged at Shangri-la Mactan and how lucky we are that two of the best photographers and videographers in Cebu City (in my opinion + they were featured at Sugbo.ph) were the ones who did this for us. They will also be the ones to do our Pre-Nup shoot this coming summer and we are so excited about it!

For now, enjoy our engagement teaser video.

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Best Outdoor Activities in Vancouver

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Vancouver is one of those cities I would love to visit someday. Based on what I hear and what I’ve researched, it is one of the most incredible cities you’ll ever find.  From the amazing mix of art and tech industries to the fantastic food and amazing people, it’s no surprise that this is one of the most popular cities on Earth.

Getting outside in the city is lots of fun too!  So if you’re also interested in going to Vancouver to experience its many adventures, read on to find out more. I’ve listed the top outdoor activities we can all do in Vancouver that make the city even more exciting.

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How We Celebrated Valentine’s Day Throughout These Years

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I was planning to have a repeat of how we celebrated Valentine’s Day last year because I really liked it so much. But because we are in Cebu City today (we’ve been here since Feb. 11 doing a different kind of shopping spree and running some important errands), and we won’t be traveling back home until probably evening of Valentine’s Day itself, I just thought of sharing with you here some of the things we did to celebrate the love occasion throughout these years. 

This post is actually a long dedication to my Mahal, who stuck with me throughout all these many years (we’ll be celebrating the 10th anniversary of our best friendship this March and we are now on our 90th month of being together as life partners); who loved me and continue to love me through thick and thin; who, despite all my flaws and craziness, continue to show his patience, dedication, and commitment to me and our little family. I just want to declare to the whole world how much I appreciate everything he does for me and our son, and I thank God every day for him coming into my life…

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Typhoon Rai (Odette): Nightmare Before Christmas 

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Just when you had everything planned out for the remainder of the year — your tasks, projects, finances, celebrations… the biggest typhoon of your life hit you — metaphorically and literally. 

We were minding our usual business… I was working and finishing my deadlines for the week and getting ready for client meetings. Mahal was busy with the resort. Everyone was working. Though we were getting news reports about an impending typhoon, upon checking, the eye of Typhoon Rai or locally known as Typhoon Odette won’t be hitting us but instead, it will head straight to Cebu City which is 3-4 hours away from where we are. We had plans of doing our Christmas shopping there that weekend so we figured that we just had to reschedule. Plus, we’ve already experienced so many kinds of weather conditions here that we became complacent. We felt confident that it’s just another one of those storms. There could possibly be a brownout (electricity getting cut off) that will last for an hour or two, or at the most overnight, but that was it. We didn’t do any kind of preparation at all — we didn’t save water; we didn’t charge our phones and electrical devices; we didn’t check if we still have enough gas; we didn’t buy supplies… nothing. It was as if it was just another day in our beach kind of life. 

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