Samal, Philippines

After visiting Davao for how many times, we tried to crossed once in Samal Island. Unfortunately, our first Samal visit was in vain. My husband drove for almost 4 hours but we're not lucky to experience the beautiful beaches of Samal offered, we drove in a wrong way. Although we found Pearl Beach Hotel backyard :), we're not able to check in because we don't have reservation yet. We don't have any choice that time but to go back to Davao City to to spend the night.

After a couple of months, we planned to go and explore Samal again on our 10th year anniversary. We arrived in Davao on Friday night, and stayed overnight in Green Windows Dormitel. This our second time in the said hotel.

For more details of this hotel visit my review here:

Saturday morning,after we had breakfast, we drove again to Samal Wharf and decided to explore once again this island. Prior on this, me and my husband researched the road that would take us in the beaches.

Luckily, we succeeded. Here are the beaches we had explored in 2 days and 1 night staying here in Samal. Hope it would help you to save time finding beautiful beaches in Samal.

Our first destination base on google and friends recommendations is Maxima Aqua Fun. Maxima Aqua Fun is located at Penaplata, IGACOS. Though we didn't experience those adventure because of lack of courage especially when it comes to doing extreme activities and witnessing some people freaking screaming while sliding from the 40 meters super slide all the way down to the 120 feet deep blue sea makes me shiver. (Kill joy right?) Moving on, Maxima Aqua Fun has banana boat, snorkeling, and scuba diving.

Upon entering the beach you have to pay Php5.00/head for Environmental fee.

40 meters super slide all the way down to the 120 feet deep blue sea

Here you can swim and experience snorkeling. They even have railway down to the beach and cottages.

Here's the watersports prices that Maxima Aqua Fun offered:

They have restaurant and rooms for those who want to stay overnight, start from 4,200/night and above. Too expensive right?. That's why we searched for another beach that day asked Mr. Google (Google search) and we've found Bluejaz Beach Resort and Waterpark. BlueJaz Beach Resort and Waterpark is located at Purok II, Brgy. Caliclic, Babak District in Samal. It is 25 min (13.6 km, kilometro) via Circumferencial Rd. We arrived at 3pm hoping that this resort is good based on the pictures that we saw in internet. So, we pay for the entrance 350/head for adult and 250/head for a child. We also ask for an overnight stay but the resort was fully booked. Luckily, we brought our tent, and they have area to pitch without extra fee.

Upon exploring Bluejaz Beach Resort and Waterpark, we're so disappointed at first because the beach was dirty a lot of trash are floating and the smell is not good. It has an abandoned floating attraction in the middle of the beach. After a couple of minutes, we decide to swim on their swimming pool hoping it would be nice. The swimming pool is not good except the slides in which my son enjoyed, so we let him slide and swim( after all the entrance was expensive).

BlueJaz Beach Resort and Waterpark has restaurant and souvenir shops inside. We tried their food and it's not bad.

It was 7pm when we pitched our tent and order for our dinner. In the camping site near the restaurant there has a band performers and fire dancers so it's not bad after all.

Deep in the night we decided to sleep, we noticed that some of the crowd was still enjoying while singing and dringking alcohol. However, we are so tired to disturbed by them.