The Bayview Park Hotel Experience

We recently decided to get my wife a US Visa.  And as you know traffic in Manila is horrible and interview schedules start as early as 6am in the morning.  So in order to avoid all the hassle of travelling to the US Embassy in the morning and having to wake up super early, we decided to just take a short vacation and spend the night at a hotel near the embassy.

A short Google search will give you several choices of hotels in the area, which include super expensive hotels and very affordable hostels.  We've already stayed at some of the other hotels in the area (when I applied for my visa) so we wanted another experience.

One of the hotels right across the embassy is the Bayview Park hotel right on Roxas Blvd.  But even then, the hotel is a bit of a walk to the Annex building where the entrance to the visa section is at.  For a slow walker it might take a good 15-20 minute walk to the overpass.  You can cross the street at other areas but I wouldn't suggest it.  This is Manila and vehicles don't take kindly to jaywalkers.  Safety first I say.

I did a quick TripAdvisor search on the hotel and found it to be at a decent #36 out of 105 hotels in Manila.  It appeared to be clean, secure, and near the embassy.  Exactly what we needed.

So I booked our stay at their website online and the transaction was quite smooth.  No hassles whatsoever.  I just put in the dates, the number of people staying, and paid with my credit card.  You can find their website here.

We paid P3200 for our one night stay, with a 10% downpayment.  The hotel lobby was decent enough, has a bit of a "classic" design or old if you prefer, but functional.  The front desk people were a bit on the slow side but were quite nice once it was our turn.  After a few minutes we got our room card/key.  I would suggest getting a room that is above the 4th floor and has a view of Manila Bay.

The room had a queen size bed, 2 bottles of free water, a fridge with soda and beer (not free), and a 32" LCD/LED TV with cable.  But the cable wasn't in HD so it was like watching a local channel on antennae.  

The bathroom was quite clean with a *bathtub* and that was quite a surprise.  Most of the hotels at that budget only have a shower.  The hot water was hot, while the cold water was cold.  Just as it should be.  The room also comes with 2 free toothbrushes and most of the toiletries you might expect ,such as a small tube of shampoo and lotion.

Yes!  A Bath tub!

Stuff that you take home. :)

Stuff you can do around the hotel

There are plenty of restaurants and fast food joints in the area, such as a Chowking, Starbucks, 7-11, Mercury Drugs, J-Co, and Yellow Cab Pizza.  But one of the places I would recommend to eat at is the Emerald Garden Chinese Restaurant.  It's a short 5 minute walk away from the hotel.  The place feels a bit shabby, with old utensils, plates, and table cloth with holes in them, but don't let that fool you.  The food was quite good.  Each entree cost about P280 and the serving is huge!  We had plenty of left over for dinner that night.  The restaurant specializes in sea food but since the wife is allergic to seafood (the ones with shell) we got the usual.

We ordered Shanghai Ribs and the classic Lemon Chicken.  At P280 each and at that serving size you can't go wrong.  The siomai was around P50.

This is the small serving size.

Small serving size.

Once you eat you can walk over to Luneta Park and hang out.  Or you can take a picture of the Pambansang Photobomber Torre De Manila...I mean with the Rizal Monument.

That's quite a sight...with a building in the background.

Another thing I would recommend is watching the sunset over Manila Bay.  Upside: Great view of Manila Bay and the Sunset.  Plenty of places to sit at.  Downside:  You have to ignore all the trash that is floating around. :(

Beautiful Sunset...ignore the trash.

After the events of the day you can go back to the hotel, take a nice hot bath or shower and cuddle in the queen size bed.  The air conditioning was quite good.  We slept like babies.

Additional Info:  Breakfast was quite good.  Available 6am-10am.  Swimming pool?  Try at your own risk.  The water was quite cloudy.  Not sure if dirty or too much chlorine.  Either way, not good for you.  Avoid if you can.  Gym?  Yes, ok gym equipment.  Not high tech but enough to get a sweat on.