Visit Palawan
Traveling Through Palawan
If you're planning on traveling through Palawan, you're going to want to fly into Puerto Princesa from either Manila or Cebu.
If you're a backpacker, or are looking for the most cost-efficient place to fly into, and if you don't mind spending an extra day traveling to save money, then this is the most efficient way for you to see Palawan, starting in the center of the island, and making your way north, instead of having to backtrack.
Puerto Princessa
You're probably not going to want to stay for more than a day, if even that here. It's really more of a jumping off point.
If you do decide to spend a day in Puerto Princesa though, either because of your flight times or just to slow things down, you can check out the Subterranean River.
If you don't want to spend the 1800 pesos to go see a cave, then I recommend you keep heading north. I personally wouldn't recommend staying more than one night and even possibly leaving on the same day unless you want it to see the underground river.
Heading North
To travel north you've got two options. You can take a bus or a minivan. I highly recommend that you take the bus. It might take you a little bit longer, but you'll be more comfortable. They often overpack the minivans, so you'll be squished next to a bunch of people you don't know for 5-7 hours. I experienced a 7.5 hour drive due to traffic that was not very pleasant. So I recommend the bus, because if you're going to be stuck, be stuck somewhere comfortable. The minivans generally cost about 500-600 pesos. The buses tend to be cheaper, and you're guaranteed to have your own personal space with AC. So you'll be much more comfortable for the windy and bumpy ride to El Nido.
You can check out more about my personal experience on this journey here.
Port Barton
If you have the time to stop somewhere on your way north to El Nido, I recommend checking out Port Barton.
Port Barton is a super chilled out place. It's great if you're looking for a quiet romantic vibe & to get away from the crowds for a bit.
It can be done on the way to or from Puerto Princessa. It's pretty easy to get to, though the roads are some of the roughest I've seen. Hopefully you won't get sick on the way, they're very up and down for about an hour, but it's worth it.
Next stop, El Nido
If you aren't traveling on a budget, and don't mind spending some extra money, and don't feel the need to go to Port Barton, or are at least okay with backtracking to see it, you can actually fly straight into El Nido from Manila.
There's an airline called Air Swift. It's an expensive option that caters to a more affluent group than the backpackers, but they do have nice service from what I've heard. When you check-in, they have snacks and they treat you well, and they have people singing when you land in El Nido. It's made to feel as if the entire time you have here is a stress-free vacation. So I can see why a lot of people are okay with paying for it. You can probably expect to pay anywhere from 5000 pesos to 8000 pesos depending on the season (without luggage costs). It's quite expensive for a short flight from Manila to El Nido, but if you want to cut out the whole bumpy 7 hour excursion, it's definitely worth it.
El Nido
El Nido is pretty much where everyone comes when they come to Palawan. It's the crown jewel of the Phillippines.
Dining & Nightlife
For dinner, one of the awesome things too is that you'll find all along the beach are people preparing fresh foods - lots of good seafood, everything from prawns to different local fish. I highly recommend you try it. It will cost you a little bit as will pretty much all of El Nido since it's a bit of a tourist bubble and is rather removed from most of developed Phillippines.
El Nido has a pretty good nightlife, but it's definitely a bit of an early sleeping kind of place. So by 11 o'clock, you'll find a few bars still open where you can find some music. But this is not your Boracay, this is not your Koh Phi Phi party beach. It's kind of an in-between with a lot of tourists who are looking to have a good time and people who want to get some good night's rest before going and doing their island tours the next day or their snorkeling or their diving. It is a really nice balance. Beers will probably cost you about 60 pesos.
Accommodations
In El Nido, you can find all kinds of accommodations. You'll find hostels, guest houses, and ultra-elite luxury properties that are located on their own private islands with their own private boats to take you to the mainland. I won't be diving into those too much because I've never stayed at any of them.
If you want your own private guest house with just the bare basics like AC and a decent bathroom, you're looking at a base of 1200 pesos/night. If you want anything that's nice, you're probably looking at about 3000 to 8000 pesos/night.
If you really want to go luxury, you can spend $500-$1000 USD/night to stay on the private islands.
This is one of the places that I recommend you book ahead of time. This rule kind of applies to all of Palawan as it's gotten busier as a tourist destination and doesn't necessarily have a great supply of choice. So make sure that you've got your name down on a property because the last thing you want to do is find yourself without somewhere to stay or find yourself staying somewhere you can't afford to stay. Especially if you're here in the busy season.
Getting Around
You can hire tricycles to take you to different places around the area, but that can add up after a while.
You can also rent your own scooter.
This is probably the most expensive scooter rental you'll find in all of Southeast Asia. It'll be roughly 350 to 400 pesos a day.
Things to do
Island Tours
The thing that everybody does once they get to El Nido is the island tours. They have Island Tours A, B, C, and D, and who knows, they might have even added an E. As of right now, tours A and C are generally considered the most popular.
You'll usually see the Small Lagoon and then some other islands, beaches, or lagoons.
For the entire day, you'll be on the same boat as another group of travelers. So it's a really great way to meet people. Often after a day trip, you go back and have some drinks on the El Nido Main Beach.
The tours also include lunch. Typically it's going to be seafood that they caught themselves, you'll see your boat driver actually have his fishing line in catching the next day's lunch, and the food is really good. They also have fresh fruit like pineapple. All of the island tours also include your own snorkels. So when you go to the different spots, you'll be able to borrow a mask and there's pretty good coral. You'll see lots of different fish, sometimes sea turtles, and all sorts of really cool marine life. So it's definitely worth getting in the water. If you don't know how to swim, they have life jackets for you.
Each of the island tours has about three to four stops - from Small Lagoon to little cave stops. I highly recommend you do it. It's probably gonna cost somewhere between 900 to 1200 pesos, maybe even as much as 1400 from what I've been hearing nowadays, I've heard they've been raising the prices even more. It's expensive, but it's worth it. The entire day is solved for you. Basically, you get back and you're generally pretty tired because of being in sun all day.
If you have a big group of four to ten people, it's worth looking into what it would cost to rent a boat for the day. Then you won't have to be with other people, and you can probably tell the driver where you want to go and direct your own day. The cost will totally depend on who you meet and who you talk to, but it could be worth looking into.
Diving
Another great activity for those of you who want to take it a little further than just snorkeling on an island tour is diving. You can book a dive by going into any of the dive shops in town.
I had one of my best dives ever here. I saw sea turtles, a barracuda, and massive schools of fish. They even took me cave diving to a place where I had to dive under a lip. On the other side, there was a little air pocket and on top of the air pocket was a statue of Mother Mary. It was actually really creepy. There were also some poisonous snakes in, but we were told that they would never bite humans. I still as a new diver thought that it was an adrenaline rush. It got me going. I loved it.
Hike
Beach Hopping
Other Beaches
If you don't want to go as far as Nacpan, these are some great options. I have not personally been to these, but these beaches are only about a 10-minute tricycle away. I've heard that they're fairly quiet and beautiful, and easy to access.
If you don't want to pay for the tricycle to take you there and back, you can also opt to rent your own scooter if you feel comfortable driving.
After any one of these activities or day trips, you can head back to El Nido and enjoy a fire show on the beach. Maybe get yourself some freshly caught seafood have it grilled right in front of you, or just enjoy a beautiful dinner while watching and hearing the waves crashing on the shoreline.
Onto the next adventure
If Nacpan is the most beautiful beach in Southeast Asia and El Nido is the most beautiful place, then Coron is the biggest adventure.
You may be noticing that I'm using a lot of extremes to describe this place, because that's essentially what Palawan is. It's a place of extremes. When you're a backpacker, it has its highs, like the daytime when you're going through that magical blue water or driving through a mountain in Coron. It also has its lows, the lows of no internet, your power running out, or it being crazy hot in your room.
After staying in El Nido for a bare minimum of three nights to upwards of five nights, I would recommend that you pack your stuff and get ready for what should be a even bigger adventure to somewhere that very few people have been....
The nice thing about Coron is that even though it's the biggest adventure you can find in Southeast Asia, it still has the comfort of nice hotels and restaurants, and it's not as busy as El Nido, where you're constantly running into other boats or seeing other people at the same beaches. What I love about Coron is that I can rent a scooter and just drive off in a direction and feel safe, and I'll probably get to tell a story that no one else has told before. The lagoons in Coron are equally as beautiful as the ones in El Nido, but without the crowds. That's why Coron is my number one place in all of the Phillippines.
Getting to Coron
Montenegro Fast Ferry or Slow Boat
You guys are very lucky because you now have a new service called the Montenegro fast ferry. It's a boat which will take you from El Nido to Coron in 3.5 hours. When I made the trip, I went through a storm on a 7.5-hour slow boat, which was honestly a pretty cool experience, so if you're up for taking the extra time, I'd try it. It was absolutely phenomenal. The boat ride was one of the most beautiful I've ever done. I was watching the thunderstorm go off on my right. Luckily the waves weren't very choppy at all, so it was really calm. I was relaxing on the front deck.
On the fast boat, you don't really have the option to leave your seat, and I've heard lots of rumors that they overbook it so that some people are sitting on the floor, even though they paid for seats. So that's something to be aware of. The Fast Ferry is going to cost you about 2000 pesos, and if you don't get there early, you might end up sitting on the floor for 3.5 hours. But otherwise, I've heard that the experience is good.
The Montenegro Ferry does a round trip once each day. It leaves El Nido at 6 am and arrives in Coron at 9:30 am. Then it does a return trip leaving Coron at 12 pm and arriving in El Nido at 3:30 pm.
Cargo Ship
If you're an extreme backpacker, you can take a cargo ship that travels through the night and arrives first thing in the morning. I heard it's around 900 pesos, so if oyu don't mind sleeping on a cargo ship, and don't care about the glamour, you can check that out as an option.
Accommodation
Coron is very similar to El Nido in the sense that everything is going to be runnning you quite a bit of money. It will be a little bit cheaper than El Nido, but not by much.
You can expect to see a fair amount of guest houses and medium to expensive hotels. The backpacker culture is not as developed here as in El Nido, so you can expect to find only a couple of hostels on the entire island. So once again, it's a good idea to book your accommodation in advance.
Things to do
Lagoon Hopping
The Lagoon Tour.
For about 1200-1500 pesos, you'll spend a full day on someone's boat. They'll drive you around, give you lunch and snorkel gear so that you can explore the amazing lagoons, jump in the water and see the fish swimming around. It's an amazing time. I actually have some really iconic drone shots that I took out of this place, and it's where I created my most successful Youtube video ever.
Another option...Kayak
We actually didn't do the rather expensive day tour with a boat. We kayaked. We literally took about two and a half hours to get there. I think it was six kilometers with a kayak. I'm pretty sure it was three each way. But nonetheless, it was a really big distance, especially because Laura wasn't carrying her weight. I don't know if I recommend taking the kayaks. But if you're super budget conscious, and you want to have that independence from the boat, it's an option. Personally, I don't think I would do the kayak again, I would probably go with just a typical lagoon tour.
Hire a Boat
If you have a larger group, hiring a boat is definitely your best option to go about seeing hte lagoons. And you'll get lunch, which is always nice.
Scuba Diving
If you're a scuba diver day two is going to be really exciting for you. What you should do is head into town and find a local scuba shop. There are many of them. Find somebody who can take you to do the shipwreck dives.
This is like one of the best places in the world to dive. It's got beautiful warm water, incredible clarity on most days depending on the current, but for the most part, the water is very clear. During WW2, there were some Japanese warships in the harbor and the Americans had an air raid where they sank eight ships. Those eight ships are now great dive sites. So that is a really great thing to do. Unfortunately, we did not have time to do it, but I can only imagine how incredible it would have been. It will probably take up most of your day.
Explore
If you're not a diver and don't have your PADI, then this is what you should do. You should rent a scooter, assuming you're comfortable to do so and just go explore.
One of the most incredible experiences of my entire time in Coron was just renting a scooter and driving through the mountains. It was extremely treacherous going down some of these paths because they were extremely loose gravel. And you know, I was just kind of winging it not knowing where I was going. But that led to the incredible coastlines that we followed. We actually ended up just parking our bikes on the side of a little dirt path and climbing up what it looked like the Chocolate Hills in Bohol, which you'll hear more about in my Cebu travel guide. We climbed all the way to the top and got an awesome shot with the drone.
And that's what it's all about for me. I absolutely love doing that kind of stuff, just adventuring. Having no idea where I'm going, and waving at the locals as I go by. We saw a kid playing with a rubber tire and having the time of his life. It's those moments when you're so far from what's normal back home, that you really realize what the rest of the world experiences. And for me, that's what travel is about. In addition to having those adrenaline moments or those exciting beauty moments, it's also about seeing how the rest of the world lives. That doesn't really happen until you really get off the path and go exploring into the villages where people are so friendly. You don't have to worry about safety in Coron. Just be smart with your driving. Falling off your scooter is the only danger, so don't fall.
Hike
Hot Springs
That's pretty much it! That's everything from Puerto Princesa all the way up north to Coron. You could also do this entire itinerary in reverse order - flying from Manila to Coron, and then from there heading south all the way to Puerto Princessa, and flying to either Cebu or back to Manila.
Palawan is just so extraordinarily beautiful. You will never forget your time here through the highs, and the lows. It will be a fantastic trip. If this is the end of your itinerary, and it's time to fly home. Then get on that next flight flying from Busanga Airport back to the Manila Airport, but if you have some more time, let's head to Cebu!
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