Review: Mangrove Resort Hotel Subic

Located at the Baloy Beach of Subic Bay, Magrove Resort Hotel is one of the nice hotels along the area.  Checking the reviews at TripAdvisor, I recommended this hotel to my family for our family weekend getaway as the reviews were fairly acceptable (3.5 out of 5 stars).  And this hotel is also ranked #2 in the hotels in Olongapo category.

The room rates were quite expensive when you book at their website.  But if you booked through email or phone, they will give you a discounted price on their rooms.  You can also check TravelBook.ph to book your stay here as they are also offering best deals and rewards points to members as well as book now and pay upon check in (no credit card needed) scheme.

We are a family of 11 adults and 3 kids.  Their biggest room can only occupy a maximum of 4 persons (adult) so we decided to book 4 rooms and requested all rooms to be located in the same floor so that we could somehow be near to each other.  We booked 2 deluxe twin, 1 superior room and 1 deluxe room.  Fortunately, these available rooms at the time we booked (about 2 weeks before our travel date) were all located in the 4th floor.

The hotel is a 4-storey building with restaurant, beach, pool and parking area.  Water activities are also available to them.  The pool was located in the 3rd floor.  The restaurant is located in the 1st floor and there is also a poolside bar in the 3rd floor.  The hotel's beach shoreline is quite short but guests can still relax and stay at their beach side loungers.  As expected, beach in Subic is not as white and powdery as Boracay but it seems clean although we were not able to swim at the beach.

Pool and Pool Bar Area

The pool in the 3rd floor has kiddie and adult pools.  The depth of the adult pool is at 4 feet maximum so some kids can still enjoy the adult pool.  The pool is not that big but enough to accommodate guests.  It also has loungers and bar area where you can take a sip on your chosen drink or have a snack with friends and family.

The food were ok and quite reasonable (about Php 250 and up per person). By the way, breakfast is not included in the room rate. We encountered a little problem during our dinner time.  After taking all our orders, the waitress came back and informed us that certain meats are no longer available at their kitchen.  It's quite misunderstanding from their kitchen and the waitress because she has to come back to us several times and informing us of the meats that were no longer available.  Well, it turned out that almost all of our orders were not available. Of course if you're hungry, you will get pissed. The service was also quite slow in their restaurants, both at the 1st floor and at the pool side.

My husband and I stayed in one of the deluxe twin room together with my sister and her family.  I noticed that all their rooms are big or at least the rooms that we booked.  It is also complete with towels (bath, pool, hand and floor towels), toiletries, bath robe, safety vault, cable tv, mini ref, small dining area with electric pot and instant coffee (at least in deluxe twin, didn't see in other rooms we booked).  All our rooms have king size bed so its really comfortable for all of us.  I just noticed though that the single bed in the other deluxe twin room is quite smaller than in our room.  And their aircon is cooler than us.  The magnetic key which functions also as key to open electricity does not turn off the electricity when removed.

*Photos of room below courtesy of google :)

Deluxe Twin

Deluxe Room

Superior Room

The bathrooms were clean with hot and cold shower. Flow of water is ample however, the following day, the water becomes scarce to the point there's not a single drop of water coming out of the shower even on the sink.  You have to wait up to an hour before you see a drop of water in the sink and not on the shower.  This is during late morning where people are about to check out. When we complained it to the front desk, the reason they gave us is that there are a lot of guests during that they. I think that's not an excuse.  They are a resort.  They should've have expected guests to be coming in at peak season. They also have a quite number of rooms. If all were occupied, does it mean there will be no more water at any time of the day? Some of the members of my family used the bathroom at the 1st floor to take a shower while some waited. The only good thing is that they allowed us for late check out because of problems with water.

Toilet

Shower area

Shower area

Sink, toilet with bidet

Toiletries

We almost had a great time in this resort (most especially its my 5 month old niece's first time to dip in the pool). The loungers and snack at the pool side can be relaxing. But the downside we experience on the water, food and food service we're kinda turn off. I'm not sure if I will want to go back here.  Maybe not on a peak season.  And I think I can still recommend this to friends but with a warning.