Philippine Hotels, Travel, Vacation, Real Estate and Maps, News

If you have a good memory, you will remember the initial buzz concerning the opening of Splash Island Resort in 2005. After just a few weeks of publicity, it seemed like everybody wanted to go Southwoods Ecocentrum in Biñan, Laguna to experience the newly opened water park. You remember this commercial?

Yeah, I think we all remember that. But after a few years, it seemed that the novelty and excitement wore off. I was personally afraid that Splash Island would become a defunct landmark by the side of the South Luzon Tollway, a memory of a resort that was great when it started but couldn’t sustain its growth. It got so bad for the management that there were stretches of months that they closed down the park, only to open on certain days.

It is then a good thing that Global Gutz came into the picture and decided that to give Splash Island a second chance, as well as an influx of new funds and corporate connections. Global Gutz is a company heavily into theme and adventure parks. By investing into Splash Island, Global Gutz is entering into the resorts business — but with the Splash Island experience centered on rides and thrills, Global Gutz is in very familiar territory. (Of course, they added a paintball course as one of Splash Island‘s attractions — Global Gutz is the country’s largest paintball organization).

We visited Splash Island a few days ago, and from the looks of it, things should be looking up for the establishment as a whole. The entrance fee is 400Php, a bit pricey for our taste, but we hoped the experience was worth it. There was also the small matter of not being able to bring food into the resort — this is still the case, so be prepared to spend for food inside. Tickets in hand, we went in hoping for a good afternoon of rides and water fun.

As soon as we entered, we rented lockers. Locker rent is 50Php, but you need to give an extra 50 for deposit — if you lose the keys and such — that will be returned to you as soon as you check out. Lockers are a bit small, but one should be enough for 2 people. The lockers are handy, as you will always be roaming around from ride to ride. You can leave your extra clothes and valuables here.

We ate lunch at their food court — I wanted inasal but settled for barbecued liempo (prices inside are a tad higher than normal) — as loud  summer music (Jason Mraz, Big Mountain, etc.) blazed from the speakers.

After that, we grabbed 2 inflatables and floated down the Balsa River. It’s a man-made river — by my reckoning it’s about 2 kilometers long — it goes around the main ride areas and also serves as the “lazy” way of moving from ride to ride.

Note the 2 guys who just dozed off on the inflatables, floating around the river. This is the life!

Then we tried the famed Magellan’s Drop. It’s a normal slide ride, only that you lay on a mat face down and slide down headlong at breakneck speed. It’s a guaranteed rush, I assure you.

At this point we noticed that the rides had “break” schedules — the rides were open 3 main rides at a time. We realized that the lifeguards and technicians that operated the rides were the same people, and that they transferred from one ride to another during the course of the day. I don’t know if this is because last Saturday was an off-peak day, or if Global Gutz is still building up its manpower.

The next ride we tried was the Rio Montañosa. This one is a family ride — 3-4 people inside one big inflatable and sent down on a very steep and curvy slide. Fun fun!

After that, we lazed around in the kids area, called Water Wahoo. I actually loved this area, there were very few kids when we got there. The fountains and showers dripped of cool refreshing ambon, and the pool was shallow — you could sit down on the water and just relax.

We were actually waiting for the big wave pool, called Agos Grandes, to start making waves. It was “on break” from 12noon-2pm, but as soon as it started up, we frolicked with everybody else among the waves.

After that, we tried 2 more slide rides — the Tausug Trails and the Big Bam Boo. They were both 2-person rides — you ride on connected inflatables and slide your way down. Both very fun rides as well.

There were other rides, but due to time constraints and the fact that we were a 2-person party, we didn’t get pics of those.

It is highly recommended that you come in a group, in retrospect I think it would’ve been more fun that way. Splash Island is now offering a “buy 5 tickets, get 1 free promo“. Check out their website because I don’t know how long that promo will last. The new entrance rates are as follows:

• Weekends and Holidays – Adults, 500Php; Children 400Php
• Weekdays – Adults, 400Php; Children 350Php

The resort is now open all days of the week, with this schedule:

• Monday to Thursday – 9am to 5pm
• Friday to Sunday – 8am to 8pm

If you have the budget for it, we recommend that you try out Splash Island this summer of 2010 as a family swimming destination. We are pretty sure your family, especially the kids, are gonna enjoy it. We know we did.

*All photos were taken with a Canon Powershot A430 “point-and-shoot”, and burnt direct from a laptop PC with a DIGISTOR external DVD-Burner.