In what might be a very Singaporean thing to do: we plan our next vacation as soon as the current one ends! Towards the tail end of our 18 days in Japan last month, I was discussing with the missus whether we want to do another Japan trip in December 2024. Before that though, we’d need to first think about our June vacation spot this year. We’d already spent a fair bit for the Dec 2023 trip – around $15K for a 100% DIY itinerary. So, we wanted to keep the expenditure of a June holiday significantly less than that.
Just a few places came into my initial exploration: Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam or Penang. For the former, we’d already done the important bits in northern Vietnam, excepting Sapa, and I was interested to visit southern Vietnam. We’d also always wanted to visit Penang, but given the number of days we had – around 10-11 – we would have difficulties filling up enough activities in Penang for a 10 day period.
Before long, Bali came into the picture. We’ve already visited Bali twice; in 2008 as a couple without kids, and in 2018 with kids. Bali though is a pretty big place and there was a lot that we’ve still yet to see. And there were a couple of activities that we were keen to also bring our kids back to: specifically, Waterbom Bali and also the Quad bike trip in the rural areas of Ubud. So, I did up a 11 day itinerary for Bali, and aside from the two activities above, covering the other parts of the island and also immediately offshore:
Basically, a key activity I was looking forward to doing in Bali was drone videography, and there would be plenty of opportunities in a Bali trip itinerary like this: of sunrise at Mt. Batur, the Jetiluwih Rice Terraces, and the many spots in Nusa Penida – widely regarded as the most beautiful island in Bali. Basically, the general structure of our 11 day itinerary would be 5 days in Ubud, 3 days in Nusa Penida, and the final 3 days in Nusa Dua.
There were challenges though: traveling around in Nusa Penida is not easy: the roads around the island are reportedly in very poor condition. We’d be necessarily moving around the island and getting from place to place in a car, and from videos we saw, being in a four wheeler does not really improve comfort levels! The missus was also especially worried whether the daughter post-spine surgery would be able to handle the stress of extremely bumpy car rides from point to point and for three days. Moreover, visiting the cliff-side and accompanying beach areas of Nusa Penida would require a good degree of physical fitness: we’re talking about very steep stairs and an hour down and another hour up, in at least a few places.
So I looked around for alternatives to Nusa Penida, including the Gili Islands – especially Gili Air – and also Nusa Lembongan, both areas of which are far less crowded than Nusa Penida. Both also had decent beaches but were finally less scenic.
This became one of those “So how”moments, and I went back to the drawing board, and explored alternative places other than Bali: and they included a return to Maldives – which I would have loved, excepting that 2023 trip would be pretty expensive on account that we’d need to fly by Singapore Air, as Scoot no longer flies to Male – a June Japan trip to perhaps the Fukuoka to Hiroshima stretch, but having done 15 to 18 days in Japan, 11 days would be pretty short!
That’s when Cebu came into our radar. I looked at Cebu as a possible place when we were exploring island type vacations in 2019 but decided on Maldives back then. A 11 days trip to Cebu would comfortably cover all the most important places – most people apparently tend to do just a week at most. And the highlights would include swimming and observing whale shark (though there are some questions about it being eco-friendly), lots of snorkelling activities, swimming with a sardine run, and canyoneering. The wife was especially interested too in Cebu, on account that we’ve not been to the Philippines before, while we’ve already been to Bali twice. For myself, I would have still preferred Bali on account of the drone videography opportunities I’d get, the challenges of filling a 3D2N middle segment notwithstanding.
Still, like all plans I draw up for all kinds of holidays, I dutifully went about making initial inquires with tour operators, and researching on what a 11 day itinerary might be to Cebu. And this is what I came up with:
In short, also doable: and the costs of an 11 day trip to Cebu would be just slightly more costly than an equivalent in Bali, but still in the broad ballpark of about $5K to $6K.
No guesses on what which way the decision swung, but hint – the wife’s preference prevailed. Haha.
Continued in the next post!