Philippines Travel Portal

One of the most beautifull beaches I’ve been to in the Philippines, is the beach in Sabang on the western coast of Palawan. Palawan is an island province in the Philippines, the long island south west. It is 450 km long but only 50 km wide and fairly easy to find on the map. There are lots of beautifull beaches here, and you can spend weeks here and still not get to even half of them.

Sabang in Palawan, not to be mistaken for the Sabang in Mindoro, is a very quiet place without any huge resorts and nightlife. It’s a perfect place to go if you’d just like to hang at the beach for a couple of days and relax. You got a few small bars by the beach and some nice restaurants with mostly local cuisine.

The main attraction of Sabang however, is the underground river, or Puerto Princesa Subterranean River National Park. It is truly amazing and it’s now listed as a UNESCO world heritage site. To get here you just take about an half hour boat ride from the pier in Sabang. On the way there you get to see several other nice beaches, that seems only to be accessible by boat.

The boat will take you to a beach inside the national park, and from here it’s just a short walk to the entrance of the cave. The boats are like small canoes, and there is room for 3-4 people in each as well as a guide. When there we were told that the cave goes like 8 km into the mountain, but the guided tour is only a couple of kilometres in, still you get to see a lot on this trip.

Inside there are lots of facinating formations of stalactites and stalagmites, long corridors, huge chambers where you almost can’t see the ceiling as well as a bunch of bats flying around. I’ve never been to any cave like this one before, and it’s definitely a must see if you’re in the area. It costs like a couple of hundret peso each, with the park fee, boat fees and tips.

To get to Sabang from Puerto Princessa you could either rent a wan with a driver, rent your own motorbike or jump on one of the jeepneys going there. It’s only like 80 km to drive, but it will take you like 3 hours, not one and a half like the guys we rented the motorbike from claimed. You just can’t drive that fast on those bumpy roads. It’s an interesting drive though, and several small villages and other sights to see on the way.

Most people who travel here only take a day trip to see the cave, but I’d definitely recommend staying for a few days so that you can enjoy the beach as well.

If you have any comments, tips on other things to do in Sabang, good places to stay there and so forth, I’d appriciate if you left a comment here.