Jason & Marisa's Island Wedding - Philippines

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** This blog has been censored: What goes on tour, stays on tour**


We left Hong Kong to make the long journey to Borocay Island in the Philippines for Jason and Marisa’s wedding.


Sun 29th Nov - Welcome Party

We got to Manila Airport for our flight to Kalibo only to be told that the weight limit for our bags was only 15kg. Both our bags were packed to perfection weighing in at almost 20kg each…..mmmm….5kg out of each bag - that’s going to be a struggle! So it was off to a corner of one of the most chaotic airports in the world, to start stuffing clothing into our day packs. After 20 minutes re-packing and testing the zipper bursting limits on our day packs, we finally got our packs down to 15kg. So it was on our way to Kalibo.

Once arriving in Kalibo, we were placed into what seemed like cattle pens to wait for our bus. The bus trip took us to Caticlan, through some amazing countryside, which revealed the way most Philippino’s actually live. The overall standard of living outside the cities is very low, with most living in temporary structures. After 1.5 hours we arrived at Caticlan, where it was onto a boat to take us to our final destination - the beautiful island of Borocay. Upon arrival at the wharf it was onto a mini bus for a further 30 minutes driving to ‘Sur Hotel’. We were finally at our destination, which was paradise….

After checking in and getting settled we walked down the beach to ‘Discovery Shores’ where Jason and Marisa were staying. We met Jason down by the pool bar and before we knew it we all had cocktails in our hands! We then met with all the other wedding guests down at ‘Hey Jude’ beach bar for the wedding welcome party. Jason and Marisa had put on a feast, and had literally bought the bar. Every spirit had been purchased…..so it all had to be drunk! It was a massive night! ** (refer to footnote)


Mon 30th Nov - Bucks and Hens

It was a very groggy start. We had breakfast at our hotel down by the beach, and then went for a recovery swim followed by time sleeping in the sun chairs. But we were too exhausted and ended up having a mid morning siesta to fully recover. We woke at lunchtime and wandered down the beach into the village for lunch at a place called ‘Chopstick’.

Mid-afternoon we met for the bucks and hens nights. The boys took a 38 foot cruiser around the island with a few girls who were hired to serve drinks for the afternoon. It was a relaxing afternoon, of drinking swimming and enjoying the paradise we were in. The boys also decided to take a dip at sunset and a sea snake ended up swimming straight in between Stacy and James! Stacy had just seen a Discovery Channel doco on how sea snakes were one of the most poisonous animals in the world - so it was no surprise that he was almost walking on water back to the boat!!! The boys ended up drinking copious amounts of alcohol and missed the seafood dinner that had been booked for 7pm. The father-of-the-bride, and brother of the groom were also at the restaurant waiting for the boys to arrive…..but they never did.

The girls were having a more sophisticated afternoon of massages, manicures and pedicures. Then after showering and dolling themselves up, they all headed up to ‘Two Seasons’ roof bar for dinner and drinks.

By 11pm the guys and girls met up and there were fireworks! The fact that the boys had missed the dinner and had stood-up the father of the bride set the scene for some of the girls to unleash their disgust for the boy’s behaviour. We on the other hand both stood back and watched it all go down! ** After an hour or so it was all resolved and everyone went to a lovely little bar on the beach, where you could sit on mini bean bags on the sand. By about 2am, we were spent, so we wandered back down the beach to our hotel to get some rest.


Tues 1st Dec - Wedding Eve

The groom and groomsmen and bride and bridesmaids were in preparation mode. They were all out for massages, foot scrubs, manicures, pedicures and last minute shopping to get ready for the wedding. We however had nothing planned, so we spent the morning with Damien and Nick just sitting and relaxing on the beach, going for the odd swim when we got too hot, and drinking fruit daiquiris….perfect.

In the afternoon we met with Nick and Damien again to go sailing on a traditional Philippino trimaran. The steering for the boats was very unusual, and the sailors had to use ropes to steer - it looked very difficult. The wind was a solid 15 knots so it was perfect sailing conditions. Nick managed to get ‘dunked’ on the leeward side on at least three occasions, whilst Damien was busy hanging off the edge dragging his body!

At sunset, there was a wedding rehearsal. It all went off without a hitch and the scene was set for a spectacular wedding. That night we met with Damien, Nick, James and Anita at ‘Sea Wind’ hotel for a seafood dinner on the beach.


Wed 2nd Dec - Wedding Day

Just as we were about to leave our room, our breakfast arrived in our room! Stacy obviously ticked the wrong box on the form the day before - so it was breakfast on our balcony. Again, we had another lazy day in the recliners on the beach out the front of our hotel. We also had to drink mango smoothies to keep our temperatures down…. Whilst we didn’t move for most of the day, we saw most people that were there for the wedding, as they strolled by on the beach. So the day was actually quite social, whilst being relaxing.

The wedding was due to start at 4pm, so at 2pm Erin took off to the room to start getting ready. We arrived prior to 4pm and amazing seafood canapés and Moet was being served on the beach to the guests. The scene was as good as it gets - the sun was dipping over the ocean, a light warm breeze was blowing, we had a glass of Moet in hand, the girls were looking incredible, and all the boys were dressed in white. It was absolutely picture perfect. At 4:30pm an island style variation of ‘Somewhere over the Rainbow’ began to play and set the scene for the bridesmaids to start walking down the beach/aisle. The wedding was short, but lovely. The sunset in the background was a beautiful sight as Jason and Marisa tied the knot.

It was then a 10 metre walk to the reception, which was on the beach at Discovery Shores (an incredible 5-star resort). The feature of the reception was a huge sand castle/sculpture that had “Jason and Marisa” sculpted across the front of it. The speeches were a laugh as half of them were in Spanish! Watching Javier (Marisa’s brother-in-law) trying to translate was a classic! The music was pumped up after the meal, and it wasn’t long before Jason decided to get his shirt off on the dance floor, and then get the other lads shirts off too!!! The drinks were flowing, people were dancing and we partied till we were told to turn the music off. The party was not going to be stopped! We all made our way down to a bar further down the beach. But it all went pear shaped around 2am when James went missing and Jason went skinny dipping.**

By 2:30am it was time to retire - we had a hotel pick-up at 7am for the massive haul to London. We said our goodbyes (not that anyone would remember at 2:30am), and made our way back to the hotel to make preparations for our early departure.

It was a sensational few days on Borocay Island for Jason and Marisa’s wedding. A big congratulations and thankyou to both of them!

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