Dolarog Beach Resort

Great location

This is a bit of a special place. The hotel is right at its own private beach. It‘s very isolated from everything else which can be nice if you don‘t want to leave the hotel at all. We wanted to go to the town some evenings and that is a bit of a challenge. You first have to take a golf car (which only runs until 10pm) and then change into a tricycle. The tricycles won‘t go directly to the hotel because the last bit of the road is too steep and winded. The other option is to walk along the beach for 20 minutes instead of using the golf car for the last bit, which we did a couple of times. It‘s not too dangerous but there are stray dogs. The food in the hotel restaurant was Italian and just ok, nothing amazing. The service was not great. Two women seem to know how to run a hotel but the rest of the staff were rather useless. They often seemed annoyed, even when we were just ordering food. We once asked about the zipline that is literally next door and they didn‘t know anything about it (price, time, how to get there). They organised a tour for us, which was great, but messed up the booking somehow so the tour guide thought we were only two people instead of four, which resulted in less food for lunch. And then they even charged us more for the tour. Our room was fine. Clean and no bugs. Yes, you can hear everything but we didn‘t mind that. The room was only made up on request though. The whole area is beautiful but there were a few things that annoyed us. So I wouldn‘t come back.

A little off the beaten track, well actually a long way off the beaten track but an amazing location. The hotel does advise access to the location is via a steep road and local taxis, trikes, etc will not go there. However the hotel does provide a free shuttle using golf carts. We had one of the beach front bungalows which was literally 10 steps from the water. Good size room with a full size tub and separate shower with rainfall shower. Large comfortable bed and good a/c. Large flat screen TV with satellite channels. Breakfast available daily with a choice of international or Filipino food. Good coffee. In the evening the restaurant served a variety of international dishes but they do prefer you to order in advance. A reasonable selection of beer , wine and spirits are available. The staff are very helpful and friendly and happy to accommodate any special requests. The hotel can arrange tours and scuba diving trips. It also has it's own power boat which can be rented , complete with driver.

Poor management of staff and facilities is why I rated the resort a fail. Shabby, dirty, worn out furniture, non functioning rusty game room for example. We stayed 10 nights with the swimming pool only usable for two of those days. The sea water flushing pump is totally inadequate. It takes two days to drain and another four days to refill with cloudy sea water and the cycle is repeated. Also there is real danger of falling coconuts with or without wind.