Dapitan Beach Resort Hotel (aka Pavilion Hotel) is owned and run by the local municipal government, who built it maybe 20 years ago from the proceeds of a gigantic US$ loan to promote tourism.

Since opening, the hotel has received next to no maintenance or further investment, but the air-con rooms are all huge and still luxurious - if you overlook the cracked bathroom fittings and the crumbling plasterwork everywhere.

The setting, on Dapitan's Sunset Boulevard, is spectacular, facing a huge 5 mile long white sand beach, with the South China Sea stretching in front of you; it feels like you've reached the end of the world (which you have, in a way...)

Grand luxury and elegance - at Php 1,650 per night (about £17) it's an unmissable bargain. Get there by overnight ferry from Cebu, Negros or Manila to the nearby Dapitan/Dipolog pier, or by plane to Diploog airport. Local motor tricycles will take you the last km or two for Php50 each. My wife and I spent our quite perfect honeymoon there 9 years ago, and we've been back a few times more since then!

Dapitan Beach Resort Hotel (Pavilion Hotel) Sunset Boulevard, Dapitan City, Zamboanga del Norte, Mindanao

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