Santa Monica resort questions

[longtimejoe]

Hello, I will be visiting Dumaguete in Feb. I am thinking of Staying at Santa Monica. Anybody have any info or opinions on this place? I only know it from their website. Any other resort suggestions? Thanks.

[israelidancer]

We were married there (actually second time because the first was at the San Francisco City Hall). It is very luxurious and clean. Nice place. But detached from what the average Filipino can afford.

Keith & Cristy
Concord, CA

[pce704]

My wife and I spent 3 weeks in Dumaguete back in 2003 or 2004, can't recall for sure. We stayed at the S-M Resort for 2 or 3 days. I can say it was a very nice, clean, comfortable place. We felt safe there, the food was decent and the location was convenient to Dumaguete. The one draw back was, there really was no sandy beach in the front of the resort. Just a cement/rock retainer wall and a coral/rocky sea bottom below. Not so good for swimming. However, their swimming pool was quite good. Our kids could walk and play in just a few inches of water on the ledge that surrounds the entire pool.
As I recall, We had nice a clean modern style room near the pool with air-con, hot water and the maid service was good. I don't know what current rates are. I think we had paid about $28.00 (U.S.) per night for the 4 of us. If you want a sandy beach and good ocean swimming, Try the Eldorado or Atlantis in The Dauin area. They are further away from Dumaguete and could be more expensive but they do have a sandy beach front. Eldorado is so-so, Atlantis is nicer and the construction is native style.

[dogpound]

The people at Santa Monica are great. We stayed there for a month during December of 2006.

We are booked there again and arriving on Dec 6th for 5 weeks.

Food is pretty good, especially the breakfasts! This Canadian needs eggs in the morning to get going.

My only concern is the pool - I have two young girls that love the water but neither swim very well and the shallowest part of the pool is about 4 feet. We are taking some life jacket type swimsuits for them.

I looked at other resorts but Santa Monica is much closer to the areas that we visit, namely Valencia and quick to downtown Dumaguete.

Looking forward to getting there.

[Coyotes]

i've stayed there twice and it was fab, great service and people there, as for the pool, it's really nice and in my opinion if kids can't swim, they shouldn't be near the water with out you there!! the pool has about 10 feet wide steps into the pool and is shallow there, but does go deep quickly after them, but there's also a smaller type pool where kids can easily stand up in which sort of waterfalls over the edge of it into the main pool.

[PNO]

We was 3 days on Santa Monica in May 08.
The place was nice and clean and the pool area was good include the bar.
The big problem we found was how do you come to town from S.M.?
It is not every hour some Trike pass the place
It is possible to walk to the Highway but it will take some time

BR

PNO

[Coyotes]

Originally Posted by PNO

We was 3 days on Santa Monica in May 08.
The place was nice and clean and the pool area was good include the bar.
The big problem we found was how do you come to town from S.M.?
It is not every hour some Trike pass the place
It is possible to walk to the Highway but it will take some time

BR

PNO

i personally wouldn't fancy walking up and down that track, the hotel used to take us to town in a car, getting back was easy

[pce704]

The S.M. had a vehicle available for guest services. If the vehicle was not in service at the time, they would provide transportation for you to Duma. However, according to my wife, their rates were quite high.
My wife is a Cebuana, and a very thrifty Cebuana at that. So, we went by the Bethel House and my wife set up a transportation deal with with one of the drivers who hung out there, and around the Blvd. area. She found a driver who had a cell phone and the rest was simple. My wife had a cell and so she would just call him if we needed a ride from the S.M. to anywhwere. Usually, we would call him in advance and set a pick-up time for him. It worked real well.
As was already stated, Once in Duma, it's very easy to get back to the S.M.

[PNO]

It was not possible to get any car or trike in the reception. We asked every time and the answer was no.
They could call a taxi from Dumaguete to bring us downtown (Why Not). Price 600peso.

When we get back to S.M. we took two trikes. No problem at all.

After 3 days we went home to El Dorado Beach Resort

BR

PNO

[freddy]

I stayed in SM for 5 nights this Apr , during the stay the reception help to call the "Negro taxi" (white taxi) and there is a fixed price for 200p from SM to downtown (a price table shown by the driver)