Iris Young

“If we have to travel with the disease-carrying masses, count me out,” said Christine Calomarde.

It’s a statement loaded with privilege, but the fact remains that being able to travel as COVID-19 rages on is already a privilege in itself. Further, Calomarde’s pronouncement was particularly apropos of Cebu, which, for a time, had the highest number of COVID-19 cases in the Philippines. By mid-2020, the island province gained infamy by having the lengthiest lockdown in the world—not to mention the most punishing, with threats, straight out of the Presidential palace, to have quarantine violators shot.

As restrictions finally eased in early 2021, so began a frenzy of travel planning. For many Cebuanos, house-bound, isolated, and working from home for the better part of the previous year and whose collective identity is very much tied to the sea, the island of Malapascua was the obvious choice.

As far as island paradises go, it is a modest one—no more than 2.5 kilometres across at its widest. But what Malapascua lacks in size, it makes up for in charm and gentility, evident in its people and Utopian topography.

Beyond the pick of several halcyon beaches around the island, all powdery white meeting the Visayan Sea’s perfect blue, Malapascua’s draw at the time of COVID-19 was a more practical one. Despite being disconnected from the rest of Cebu by a narrow strait, the island is still part of Cebu Province. This made the crossing from the mainland port of Maya a relatively painless one—that is, sans the red tape and pandemic-related paperwork required to travel between provinces.

Maya is approximately a 4-hour drive from Metro Cebu. At around $5 per person each way, the public bus was unquestionably the most cost-effective way to get there. However, with social distancing concerns, it was not necessarily the best one. Private travel was then the more feasible solution, but not without great cost.

As travel started to pick up again, rental vans charged $200 for the same 116-kilometre trip. Capped at eight persons per vehicle by pandemic regulations, that’s $25 per head, one way. Factor in another $10 to cross the strait, and travellers were looking at around $70 just to get to and from the island—not at all a pittance in a country where a monthly salary of $1,000 is considered princely.

Paradise comes with a price, but COVID-19 jacked it up.

High summer on the Cebu coast is a sweaty and sticky affair, but travelling in a spacious, open outrigger vessel can be surprisingly pleasant when there’s a generous breeze, a cool and salty spray, and a seat in the shade. The diesel engine is loud and cantankerous—impossible to ignore, yes, but all that the island promises will see you through if you can just sit tight for the next 20 minutes.

It will be a while yet before the party starts again—if it ever does.

On Malapascua’s brand-new pier, barely used before the lockdown, just a handful of touts and motorcycle drivers were gathered—a far cry from the throng that used to compete for incoming tourists’ business. Along this side of the island, there were more shuttered establishments than open ones—a sight replicated on Bounty Beach, the main beachfront adjacent.

Blanco Beach Resort was one of the few accommodations on the island that was able to reopen so soon after restrictions were lifted. Andrea Valeriani, Blanco’s Italian owner and manager, had been locked down on the island since the start of the pandemic, fighting to keep his family’s business afloat and provide for the local staff and their families.

As a way for the resort to hit the ground running post-lockdown, Valeriani opened his doors with a special rate of just $90 a night for Cebu locals. At a little over half of the original published rate, it was a stellar deal, indeed, considering that Blanco is arguably within the realm of the luxurious.

Instead of rooms, Blanco has villas: stark white, tiered structures with private balconies offering sweeping views of the sea. The sprawling resort itself is unique in that it sits on three of Malapascua’s beaches — two of which, Cemetery and Sunset, are virtually private. Lastly, it has an in-house Italian restaurant and bar where the tequila sunrise is generous and the burrata is miraculously fresh, no matter the time of day.

“For the first time in months, I wasn’t worried about COVID,” recalled Charly Villano, who spent much of their three-day sojourn nestled on a seaside day bed on Cemetery Beach—so-called for the small graveyard next door to Blanco.

“COVID couldn’t exist in a place like Blanco,” agreed Calomarde.

Just outside Blanco’s bubble is Bounty Beach, once known as Malapascua’s party central. Before COVID-19, Bounty’s many bars would have been packed to the rafters by mid-afternoon happy hour as divers and tour groups, done with the day’s activities, geared up for a night of dancing and debauchery with buy-one-get-one-free drinks. But in these early days after lockdown, a boom box somewhere half-heartedly played an EDM tune, and nobody was dancing. It will be a while yet before the party starts again—if it ever does.

And for the time being, it may all be for the best. Lockdowns may have been lifted, but the threat of COVID-19 remains. In fact, it will rear its ugly head again and again in Cebu in the near future, serving as a constant reminder to disconnect from the superfluous and reconnect with what truly matters. A trip to Malapascua (or anywhere, for that matter) at this time is a costly privilege, yes, but one that affords the traveller the untold value of connection: to the earth, the people one holds dear, and life itself.

Much like most of the world, Malapascua was a ghost of its former self after the lockdown. However, there’s comfort in knowing that, despite massive changes from such an extraordinary time, some things remain the same, such as being able to sit on the beach with friends, cocktail in hand, to catch a spectacular sunset.

Life, as promised, really does go on.