Our Family Staycation this Pandemic at Lucia’s Tagaytay

Before the pandemic, if there was a budget and occasion, we usually spend it with a staycation in a hotel or resort to create memory. But unfortunately because of the pandemic, we have not done it for almost a year. We need to follow the IATF guidelines and of course the threat of getting the virus while outside should also be considered.

Noel and I are already fully vaccinated, the number of cases are going down and I believe that Ren has antibodies because he recovered from Covid a month ago, so we decided to have a staycation for our mental health. Maiba naman… sakto din kasi sembreak ni Ren.

Since I consider myself as a new driver, I decided to look for a place that is familiar to me. I stumbled upon Lucia’s Tagaytay and I got interested with this place because I have read good reviews of a few bloggers and costumers on their Facebook page.

I was choosing between the camping and forest cabin options. We don’t have camping items yet so if I will choose this I need to go to Decathlon to buy the stuff we needed. Online shopping is not an option since I won’t be able to see the tent if it’s sturdy or not. Base on my computation, I will be shelling out around 7K for a complete set including chairs, tables, food and cooking utensils. The lights and fans are not included yet. The entrance fee for camping at Lucia is way way cheaper for P800/head. Plus we can use the stuff for other sites naman din.

For the forest cabin, Lucia’s published rate is P6200 for a weekday getaway for 3 persons for 1 night. The breakfast is included already.

I also considered the sanitation of the place. Of course if we were to choose camping, we will feel safer from the virus because we’re gonna use our own stuff. But the problem was the bathroom is a common area and you get to share it with other campers, wala din.

As for the forest cabin, they indicated in their FAQ that they sanitize it after every use. I also considered some posts that mentioned that the cabin is far from other people in the area.

So, I decided to just book the cabin for an overnight stay.

FOREST CABIN (OCTOBER 28-29) check in time: 3PM / check out time: 12nn

It was raining when we traveled from Bacoor to Silang. I’m so proud of myself when we reached Acienda. I decided to drop by here first to withdraw and buy food because we have not eaten our lunch yet.

Lucia’s location is just in front of Acienda. I just followed the Google map to get to the exact location. Their gate is automatic so you need to call them to open it. It’s a good thing that when we arrived the guard was already at the gate. He just checked our reservation and the number of people who are going to stay.

Then we went directly to the reception because we need to give a P2000 deposit first and listen to the orientation. I was shocked when the customer service informed me that there is an additional P50 per plate if we want our breakfast to be delivered to our cabin. Also, there is additional 10% service charge for food in their menu.

Guess what? there menu rate is not that cheap already. We ordered a chicken sandwich for P200. My husband expected it to have a real chicken fillet inside, but it was just shredded chicken and chicken spread with lettuce. There’s no picture in the menu so you won’t know what it looks like.

OUR ROOM

This is the entrance to our cabin.

This is our small room with a queen bed and additional single bed on the floor. In fairness, their bed and pillows are comfy.

The bathroom has a shampoo and body wash. There are no toothbrushes or toothpaste. It’s a good thing a brought our own toothbrush, I just bought a toothpaste at the reception area for P15 per sachet. They provided 3 towels but since I brought our own, we were not able to use it too. I like the PVC roof, maliwanag kapag umaga, tipid pa sa kuryente.

There is an open kitchen outside our cabin too. You can bring your own food and cook. There is a min ref inside the room so you can use it to store your fresh meats. There are plates and cooking utensils but we did not use it. Since the kitchen is open, you can’t avoid stray cats roaming around the area. But instead of stray cats, we heard rats on the roof haha.

Since the room has no TV and even WiFi, we came prepared by downloading movies in our laptop and we also brought some books to read.

There are a lot of ants inside our room. I guess this is one of the reasons why I was not able to sleep well. I was thinking that they will enter my ears. I saw some on the bed kasi.

I don’t know if they will die of the disinfectant solution, but since there are a lot of them I was thinking if they really disinfect the place every after use. Na-trigger ang trust issue ko.

The floor looks old too, may mga vinyl tiles na nakaangat na.

AMENITIES

Lucia’s Tagaytay has 2 swimming pools. One indoor and one outdoor plus 1 small jacuzzi.

We decided not to take a dip in the pool because there are a lot of small kids with their companions during our visit. My son decided to just let them enjoy it. I don’t like to use the indoor pool too, ewan ko may kakaibang feeling haha.

Here’s a photo of the pool at night.

They also have greenery areas where you can have a picnic and where kids can run freely.

And of course, an exclusive area for campers.

If you did not bring foods to cook, they have a restaurant and bar, but there is a time limit for accepting orders so take note of that.

Here’s a menu of the dishes they offer including the price. As I have mentioned, there is an additional 10% service charge on top of the price in the menu.

We ordered our dinner here

Here are our breakfast that is already included in the published rate. Ren and Noel ordered an American breakfast (sausage, toast and butter, salad and scrambled egg). While I ordered a Filipino breakfast which is tinapang bangus, garlic rice, salad and a cup of brewed coffee.

VERDICT

I agree that the staff here are approachable and friendly, but other than that I feel that their rate is not “sulit”. For the experience we had, I think the rate should be just around P3,500-P4,000 per night for me to consider it fair enough. I base this from the other resorts we’ve been to before.

Let me know if you have visited this place also and if you have other areas that allow kids and is not far from the metro that offers value for money.

and of course, our signature family photo in every staycation we had.