Summer is here and for those who love swimming, you can always go to several of our resorts in the Philippines and one of them is Plantation Bay in Cebu City.
Plantation Bay, dubbed as the “tropical lagoon resort”, has been given a five-star status by the Department of Tourism (DOT) what with its modern and complete amenities.
Conceived early 1996, Plantation Bay, a seven-hectare complex, is located in Marigondon, Mactan. From Cebu City, one reaches it by going straight down the Mandaue-Mactan bridge to the central road that bisects Mactan.
From its entrance, one has to go through a short driveway flanked on both sides of shallow, man-made lagoons to the reception area.
The lagoons of the resort are its special attraction, and the one behind the reception area is its focus. Its 30 or so low-rise buildings are clustered around the lagoon area. The overall effect is like being in a Caribbean.
The buildings and facilities are named alphabetically from A (Alcatraz) to Z (Zansibar). The buildings are similar in design but have different motifs, depending on their names.
Plantation Bay has 188 rooms, 368 of which are suites. The rooms are beautifully finished and furnished, and showcases the craftsmanship of Cebuanos. The bathrooms make liberal use of Cebu stonecraft.
All rooms and suites have telephones with bathroom extension, cable color TV with in-house movie channel, a fully stocked mini-bar, individual airconditioning, and tea and coffee making facilities.
When one looks at the lagoon from the main lobby, one would think that it is only one lagoon criss-crossed by several footpaths. But it is really several lagoons with a slightly raised swimming pool (the pool is all of 1,600 sq.m. with eight built-in whirlpools) off its center.
The hotel provides car service for those who wish to go from one point to the other because the resort facilities and buildings are scattered around the huge lagoon.
The Kilimanjaro Kafé “floats’’ in the swimming pool. It is open for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Two others are available, the Fiji Restaurant by the beach specializes on cuisines of the Pacific Rim, with emphasis on Japanese cuisine, which is why there is a Sushi bar. The other one is the Palerno, which is an Italian restaurant.
Of course, the resort also offers 24-hour room service of international cuisine.
Hotel amenities include a waterfalls with numerous bathing pools and two giant slides, a choice of several water sports as its beach front, pub, the tennis courts, and the 18-hole mini-golf. For children, radio-controlled boats.
Services available are airport transfers, laundry/valet, foreign exchange, safe deposit boxes and 24-hour medical service.
There is also a VIP lounge for early and late departures, a banqueting and meeting facilities and an auditorium with state-of-the-art audio-visual equipment.
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