Waterfront Airport Hotel

Airport hotels are built for travelers' convenience, and the Waterfront Airport Hotel in Mactan serves exactly that purpose.  You can fly into Mactan, cross the street and check-in, it's that simple!  In addition, this hotel has a spacious 5,000 m2 casino, and a lot of tourists just play the slots while waiting for their flight.

My suite was quite spacious, I'd say about 85 m2 in size, and I had an unobstructed view of the runway.  It was a nice sight to see, planes coming and going.  Room rates go for about P3,000 for the regular rooms and around P6,000 for the suites.  Staff are courteous and very willing to help.

Movenpick

During the nineties, Cebu was marketed as an island in the Pacific, without reference to it being a city in the Philippines.  That was an effective strategy--despite continuous depressing news bits from the rest of the country (e.g. kidnappings, coup attempts, terrorist bombings, and the like), the city was pretty much isolated from the negative publicity in the eyes of the international tourists.  Mactan Island was a favorite of the weekend tourists and the boom led to the construction of several resorts, among them the Hilton complex.  This project consisted of three buildings--a residential condominium, a time-share building, and a hotel, all sharing a common beachfront.

I recently learned that the Hilton contract had expired, and that the owners decided to enter into a management contract with Movenpick, the Swiss chain.  The hotel is due for a total shutdown in July 2012, and will reopen in January 2013, after undergoing a full renovation. If you look at the pictures below, you will notice that the room interiors are very 90s, and a much-needed face lift is in store for next year.  Present room rates for regular rooms hover around the level of P6,500 per night.

The Mactan seawater is absolutely so inviting!  The view from the room makes one want to dive right in.  The fresh water pool is located right next to the sea, and one has a choice where to swim.  Just the perfect place for a lazy day at the beach!

Quest Hotel

This trip to Cebu was pretty much a rush trip (overnight), but I managed to take a look at a few hotels.  I was pretty much delighted to find out that the Filinvest group has a 3-star property located right across from the Ayala Mall.  Quest Hotel has some 400+ rooms, and while the room sizes were not a spacious as the higher end hotels, the quality was pretty impressive.  The chain operates out of Indonesia, and I understand that this is their first foray into the Philippine market.

Lobby area with a welcoming flower arrangement

True to the no-frills concept, the hotel has only one restaurant, the Puso (I think this refers to Visayan word for the casing made of coconut leaves in which rice is cooked, rather than the Tagalog word meaning "heart").  However, it was a pleasant surprise to see a well appointed buffet, and a pretty extensive bar set-up.  Function rooms are also available for business meetings and social gatherings, and I was happy to note that the function rooms are connected directly to the car park, which is very convenient for guests.

I would say that the regular rooms are about 23-25 m2, while the bigger suites run to around 35-38 m2.  Room rates go for something like P2,500 per night for the regular rooms and around P4,000 per night for the suites.  Well appointed, very clean and comfortable.

The pool area is not lavish, but the concept works.  Travelling on business, I would say that this hotel is one of my top choices, the location is great, right next to the Ayala Mall, the rooms good, and prices are very affordable.  Two thumbs up!

De Original Jamaican Pattie Shop

Monique probably munches on Jamaican patties once a week.  She loves their cheesy beef & mushroom combination, and is quite lucky that their patties are available at their school canteen.  I understand that there are several Jamaican pattie shops in town, but De Original Jamaican Pattie Shop was the first one that gained a following in the early nineties.  The patties always come very hot, and most of the flavors have a spicy zing to it!  Quite inexpensive, these patties can fill the hunger in your tummy at a wallet burn rate P50 each on the average.  Variety?  Yes--beef, chicken, extra tomatoes, extra cheese, extra chili!  Stalls are easy to find in a lot of malls around the metro, and in some of the bigger gasoline stations.  Their specialty pattie is called the Pinatubo pattie, and I guess the spice level of this one is way off the charts!

Zarte Vollmilch

This is one chocolate brand that I haven't seen on the shelves of local stores.  Gwammy's tenant came back from Germany and he gave her this chocolate bar for pasalubong.  True to form, the whole family gathered together at the main house to taste and judge the chocolate bar.  Yes, we only had a few squares each, as we had to stretch the bar among all of us.  I thought Zarte Vollmilch by Rewe was creamy and had good texture--smooth, no "starchy extender" sensation.  The bar had just the right sweetness, and the "chocolatey-ness" rated high on my scale.  I'm pretty convinced with the quality of German chocolates, my impression is that they bring value for money (as opposed to French, Belgian and Italian brands that cater to the luxury segment).  Unfortunately, I don't think these brands are available locally, and it probably will take some time before I can get my hands on them again.

Fiorgelato

Fiorgelato is one of the better brands in the second tier competitive set of the local ice cream market.  Branches are not as spacious and flashy as those of say Caramia or Gelatissimo, and the variety of flavors are not that plentiful, but the evident pricing philosophy comes across as true value for money.  Double scoops are priced at the P80 range, and the flavors and texture are definitely of good quality.  I picked up the buko-lychee sherbet shown above at the Ayala Avenue branch (Ayala FGU Building), and I was very happy with the flavor of the sherbet, and the level of sweetness thereof.

Giligan's

The Tagaytay trip with the Dumaguete contingent took a whole day, and upon our arrival in Manila, we decided to have dinner at the Giligan's restaurant at Greenbelt 1 (curbside along Legaspi Street).  While the interiors seem to have seen better days (the air-conditioning wasn't working well), the food was still hot and delicious.  I like this restaurant for having set family meals at very reasonable levels (we took the P4,000 package for a group of 10 pax).

Interiors play on the pirate ship theme, their take on the TV series Giligan's Island

Fried fish strips with tartar sauce

Grilled Squid

Lumpia Shanghai

Chicken in garlic sauce

Sinigang--this time with pork cubes

Pork loin in mushroom gravy

Their specialy, seafood fricasse

Turnover at these restaurants is pretty fast, diners finish up in 45 minutes, and new customers queue up every few minutes.  We were there on a Monday night, and the place was 75% full, and a big group like us (22 pax) had to wait for around 10 minutes in order for the staff to work out the logistics for the table layout and properly set up the tables.  The buzz among patrons is probably because of the restaurant's pricing policy--very reasonable especially for big groups.  Also, we got to the restaurant at 7pm, which was just right after happy hour and several big groups were just  finishing up with their beers to give way for us.  I was told that on Friday and Saturday nights, the place turns into a bar by 9pm, and drinking goes on all the way till the wee hours of the morning.

Chef & Brewer

Had a fast lunch meeting last week at the Chef & Brewer along Emerald Street in the Ortigas area.  This place happens to be the watering hole of some friends, and we had a chance to try their P250 Executive Lunch, which wasn't bad at all.  This came with soup, a viand (in my case, I got the pan-fried garlic beef), a vegetable siding and a cup of rice. 

The restaurant is much like a pub, and I understand that they used to brew their own beers.  At night, the place is more like a bar than a restaurant, and we were told by the food attendant that President Noynoy was a frequent patron of the place when he was not yet the president.  Interesting!

Tagaytay Highlands

Our trip to Tagaytay with the clan members from Dumaguete was a well-deserved vacation for all of us.  My cousins and their kids arrived in Manila to celebrate Kong's 90th birthday, and the day after the party, we took them to Tagaytay Highlands for them to feel the cool air and enjoy the breathtaking scenery.

Foliage galore!  Walking around the complex makes me feel so relaxed.  Unfortunately it was a Monday; both the cable car and the funicular were under regular maintenance, so we weren't able to ride.

The club boasts of 2 championship level golf course, several swimming pools, several theme restaurants, a well appointed sports club, a horse-riding area, a go-kart track, an amphitheater, several inns and hotels, and many residential developments.  Truly a world-class lifestyle experience!

When I first looked at the project around 20 years ago, the land was just being bulldozed, and I could barely see the outline of the golf course.  The sales lady was offering me club shares for only P265,000 payable on installment basis.  Over the next few years, share prices ballooned to almost P3 million, and I was quite regretful that I didn't buy a share.  I wasn't a golfer, and I had no use for the country club.  But had I known that prices would shoot up, I'd simply buy shares to resell!  Well, hindsight is 20-20 vision!

Hosh Thermo Cooker

Thermo cooking was first introduced to me by my kumpare around 10 years ago, and I've been quite amazed at the tender meat texture of dishes that are thermo-cooked.  The process involves placing a boiling pot of semi-cooked food inside an insulated cooker that retains the heat up to 8-10 hours in order to complete the cooking process at lower heat levels, albeit using longer cooking times.  In this manner, one can save energy costs, as the flame time of cooking is considerably much less.  In addition, the slow cooking process makes meat literally fall off from the bone!  Of course, the down side of this is that cooking must be planned in advance, and instant dishes are not quite achievable.  As far as I know, the high-end brands that have thermo-cookers like Tiger, Aladdin-Thermos and Imarflex only carry small sizes (2-3 liters) which can cost anywhere from P5k to P12k, so when I saw the 5.5 liter model of Hosh in SM, I pounced on the product without any hesitation.  To my further surprise, the item was on sale!  So I went home with my thermo-cooker, shown above, with only a P1,900 cash out--pretty cool, huh?

Chooks To Go

Bounty Fresh chicken pretty much upstaged their prime competitor Magnolia with the launch of their Chooks To Go brand of roasted chicken in food stands all over the metropolis a couple of years back.  Their advertising pitch is based on the premise that their roasted chicken tastes great even without sauce, which is a pretty accurate assessment if you ask me.  Meat is soft and juicy, and the flavor blend is  slightly peppery, with only a tinge of sweetness.  Monique and I were in Unimart, and since Vicky decided not to cook much, we bought a couple of birds for dinner.  Not bad for P195 per chicken--it came hot and neatly packed in tinfoil.  The aroma of the roast filled the car, and as we drove home, Monique was even tempted to start off with a drumstick in the car!

Michelle Saram

I was just looking for old CDs to play, when I chanced upon the disks of Meteor Garden, which was the local craze sometime 10 years ago (Vicky had purchased the whole set of disks of both Season I and Season II).  My thoughts immediately turned to the Singaporean actress Michelle Saram, a lovely lass of Chinese and Indian descent, who played Ye Sha, the second love interest of the protagonist Dao Ming Su (played by Jerry Yan) who loses his memory in the second season.  She was an absolute beauty, and I was immediately captivated by her charms.  I guess everyone rooted for the character of Shan Cai (played by Barbie Hsu), being the first love interest of Dao Ming Su, but I was a true Michelle Saram fan!  Cheers for this wonderfully elegant young lady!

Jade Vine

A bit nostalgic today... Some places simply retain their look and character over time.  I passed by the Jade Vine Hotel along United Nations Avenue and I couldn't help myself--I opened the window of the car and took a snapshot of the place. This hotel and restaurant has been around since the late sixties, and even though the Ermita area is literally dotted with hotels and inns, Jade Vine continues to operate to this very day.  Why is this place so memorable?  We held a joint reception to celebrate the baptism of Monique and her cousin Kenny there.  We had around 150 guests, both family and friends, and the whole first floor was filled to the brim.  It was warm sunny Sunday, and Vicky and I, together with her sister and her husband, were very proud parents.  Time flies so fast, today these kids are already grown teenagers; they drive around town with their own schedules, enjoy mall outings with their barkada, will soon have exciting college lives.  Looking at Jade Vine reminds me of the time when I they were mere babies, and I had to change their nappies!  Funny how life perspective can change in a span of a few years... No regrets, a great ride, and I look forward to the next twenty years!