Located in a fishing village in Palawan the Puerto Princesa Subterranean River National Park is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, one of the longest underground rivers in the world, and one of the New Seven Wonders of Nature.

There were two options for us to visit this incredible attraction; take an organised tour from Puerto Princesa, or make our own way there and spend a few days in the village of Sabang (where the river is located).

A tour would have cost 1,800 peso per person including a return minivan, entrance fees, boat fees, miscellaneous other fees, and lunch. We decided to wing it without the tour and see if we could save ourselves some money.

Before you go

Before leaving Puerto Princesa we needed to acquire a permit for the Underground River. If we’d taken a tour this would have been taken care of as part of the tour package — but it’s easy enough to do by yourself.

We took a tricycle to the City Coliseum and were directed to the correct office by some friendly security guards. We’d previously read that there are only 100 walk in permits available per day and most of them are given to the tour agencies, but as it was low season we thought we might as well try our luck.

We took a waiting room ticket and noted that we were number 2 — maybe it was a slow day! We provided our ID and after a few minutes were handed a blue sheet of paper and a receipt detailing the costs we’d pay in Sabang; boat fee, environmental fee, audio guide hire etc — all mandatory.

Getting to Sabang

Getting to Sabang was very easy. We took a tricycle to San Jose bus station which cost 100-150 peso from South of the airport. As is common in Asia the bus station was a bit of a shambles, so we asked the tricycle driver to drop us at Lexus — the company that we already knew goes directly to Sabang.

Lexus have a website with the departure times and prices, though the schedule seems to be ‘flexible’, with vans waiting until they’re full before leaving. We paid the tourist price of 200 peso each for our space in a very cramped van, though the journey only takes an hour so it was bearable.

The road is lovely and scenic, though very windy and we were thrown around a fair bit. If you suffer from travel sickness, like me, don’t forget to take some tablets or your remedy of choice!

Sabang Village

Sabang is an absolutely beautiful little fishing village. There are a handful of small guesthouses offering basic bungalows right on the beach. Somewhat surprisingly there’s no government supplied electricity so they store solar energy during the day and only turn the power on between 6 and 11pm.

Though if it’s been a cloudy day then the power can only lasts a couple of hours!

We stayed at Hill Myna for 600 peso per night which provided us with a large fan, mosquito net, and cold water shower. We were very happy listening to the sea whilst falling asleep, and seeing beautiful blue clear water when waking up!