Day 1: Aloguinsan Summer Overnight Team Outing for P1,000

This is a belated post, but I still want to share this because it's almost summer and I know many work teams are looking for places to unwind. My husband and I work at home and we rarely get to meet our team mates, although we try our best to gather together twice a year (once during summer and another during Christmas) to keep ourselves updated of each other. Last year, in July, albeit belated, we pushed through with a two-day team outing. I suggested we check out the Bojo River in Aloguinsan, and we decided to stay over night at the Hidden Beach. Why it’s called Hidden was pretty obvious when we knew the place is about 5 minutes by car from the main road.
Our Day 1 itinerary looked like this:

08:00 AM - 09:00 AM -- Meet-up time at Parkmall
09:00 AM - 10:00 AM -- Grocery shopping for food at Savemore-Parkmall
10:00 AM - 11:30 AM -- Travel to Aloguinsan via Carcar
11:30 AM - 12:00 NN -- Stop-over in Carcar to buy puso, drinks, and ice
12:00 NN - 01:00 PM -- Travel from Carcar to Aloguinsan via Santander-Barili-Toledo road
01:00 PM - 03:00 PM -- Arrive in Hidden Beach, lunch, chika, rest, swim
04:00 PM - 06:00 PM -- Prepare dinner
06:00 PM - 09:00 PM -- Dinner, more chika

It was raining so hard that day we left for Aloguinsan.

On the way to Aloguinsan -- the Talisay City Hall.

On the way to Aloguinsan -- Cement Factory in Naga

On the way to Aloguinsan -- mini buko pies in San Fernando.

On the way to Aloguinsan -- a heritage house!

On the way to Aloguinsan -- the parish church in San Fernando

Stop over near Carcar to use the toilets

Our meeting place was Parkmall. It proved to be a good meeting place because there is a Savemore where we bought our provisions for the outing, and there was Jollibee where we bought our prepacked lunch. Along the way in San Fernando, we bought mini buko pies but sadly it was not the creamy buko pie I once bought while riding a Ceres bus from Liloan. We also stopped by a roadside restaurant to pee, and for our driver (my team mate) to have a cigarette break. In Carcar, we again stopped at the 7-11 store near Gaisano Carcar to buy softdrinks and ice. We also bought puso (hanging rice) at a nearby carenderia. There were about 12 of us and the 50 pieces of puso proved too much.

My team mate, the driver, used the Santander-Barili-Toledo road. This is the road that is past the Mantalongon market. I know three ways to go to Aloguinsan -- one was via the Naga-Uling Road and traversing through Toledo and Pinamungahan, another one was through the Liburon-Buenavista Road, and this one, through Mantalongon. There were portions of the road that were being repaired, but I loved the scenery because the road was on top of the mountain already. As a driver though, you have to be careful, because this road was almost deserted and help may not come fast when you need it.

Past lunch time, and already hungry, we drove past the Aloguinsan municipal hall, to look for Hidden Beach. If coming from Mantalongon, Barili, Hidden Beach is about 10 minutes from the Aloguinsan municipal hall. Do not miss the sign because it was quite “hidden” from plain sight. The road to the beach is a dirt road and gets muddy when it rains. You will know you have come to the right place when you see some flags hung in trees.

My team mates inspected the rooms first before we checked in. They agreed that the rooms were bare minimum and not nice, but we didn’t have a choice as there are few accommodation options in Aloguinsan (there is Al Maxi Apartelle and Lunhaw Farm Resort). The above photo is Hidden Beach resort’s current rates. We paid a total of Php2,030 for 11 people and we rented out: 1 fan room (which is good for 2 but 5 of our team mates slept there) for Php600, 1 bamboo cottage (2 people slept there) for Php600, charge for two tents (our own) Php200, and entrance fee for 9 people Php 630 (two people were free from the entrance fee because we rented one room.

Let me share my “good” and “bad” review of Hidden Beach resort:

Bad:

1. There are no reservations. It is a first-come-first-served basis. We went there on a Friday, and, luckily, we were the only people in the beach during our stay.
2. There are no group rooms. The rooms can only accommodate 2 people. Three is okay, but five in one room is stretching it too far.
3. There are no toilets near the beach. The common toilets and bath are near the owner’s house, which was about a hundred meters walk from the beach.
4. There are no trash cans in the beach. We placed our trash in plastic bags but we didn’t have an idea where to throw them when we checked out. The owners advised us to just leave the trash there. When we arrived, we saw two piles of trash — one at the sand and one on top of one table.
5. The toilets and shower rooms are less than decent. I got into one toilet and I had trouble coming in and going out because the door got stuck in the floor. The shower room I used had no ledge where I can place my toiletries and the hook for my clothes were too near the shower that they got wet when I splashed water to my face.
6. The pathway going down the beach is slippery when wet.
7. There were several dogs. About five, and they sniffed our food. And, well, I don’t like dogs.
8. The beach is not a private beach. The rooms are on a private lot, but the beach is public. Anyone can access the beach from other points. We were warned of thieves.

Good:

1. We had the place to ourselves. Because it was a Friday and July is already rainy season, there were no other bookings.
2. There is a covered structure for grilling and cooking. And the roof was helpful because it was drizzling the time we were there.
3. There was someone who guarded us during the night.
4. We were not able to see the sun set during our stay, but I’m sure, if it was a good summer day, the sunset would have been awesome.

Team Outing Budget: P1,000

   Breakdown:

      Bojo River tour - P650.00

      Hidden Beach - 150.00

      Food - 100.00

      Gas - 100.00

Alternative Accommodations:

Days Hotel in Toledo, an hour away