Microtel Inn & Suites Mactan Hotel Cebu

Nice place -- but if it rains, you're screwedGuest Rating: 4.3

Overall, this is an excellent little hotel. It is brand new (as of November 2008), very clean -- almost antiseptically so -- has large showers, firm, new comfortable beds, very helpful and courteous staff, lovely swimming pool, bars on the beach -- indeed, this should be called the Microresort, rather than Microtel. Rooms are new, clean and of nice size, but more along the lines of a motel with nothing special to them. It has real value. Before you arrive, though, put the name and phone number of a good cab company in your wallet: once here, the hotel will cost you 400 pesos just to leave the front gate. If it rains, the clean little room and the quaint little restaurant can get dull pretty fast.

Brand new hotel (opened in September 2008), right on the water. Lovely view. Sandy beach, calm swimming area, affordably priced, just down the road from the Hilton & Mactan Island Resort, close to where Magellan met his maker, efficient and pleasant help, delicious (but limited) and reasonably priced dinner menu, nice included-with-the-room breakfast. Microtel is located about 15 driving minutes from the airport (but you never hear a plane!)

Located on the Mactan Island panhandle, once here, it seems like you're on a desert island. Nothing here is convenient: no stores, no shopping, so sidewalks or street lights outside the hotel. You must bring what you need BEFORE you get there, or you'll pay top dollar in the little lobby shopette -- including bottled water. (You think the hotel would put a bottle in your room gratis, since the tap water is non-potable.

• Travel tip : The hotel staff helped me to find a motorbike for rent at a place I'd never had found. (The place had motorcycles, too). Bikes were 450 pesos/day; motorcycles more. Also, bring a few bottles of water: Microtel has no potable water, and with no shopping nearby, you must pay $1.50 for a bottle that would cost you 35 cents from a store.

Overall, it was enjoyable.Guest Rating: 3.8

We had a reservation but it took about 20+ minutes before they got our room ready, despite the fact that it was already after 3pm. The lobby is quite small and can get crowded during breakfast. The lobby doubles as the breakfast area/coffee shop and it is open-air. The heat might be unbearable during summer period (March to May) but it was OK as it was December with cool breeze blowing through. The breakfast itself is so-so, with limited choices (sausage, egg, noodles, rice porridge) - nothing spectacular. The beach is clean, although obviously artificial with white coral sand dumped from somewhere. It was a good, relaxing experience nonetheless. The place is clean, staff are friendly and kids loved the pool.

Nice, clean, bright, new rooms. Cool, modern interior design and furniture. Friendly staff.

Breakfast is so-so.

• Hotel Feature Tip : Try the sambal seafood fried rice.