The Horizon Opens: BE Grand Resort’s Elevated Take on Island Living
Travel, at its best, sharpens the senses. How could it not? Certain destinations introduce themselves loudly. But it’s this sharpening that helps a fractured person feel composed—dramatic, perhaps, yet familiar to anyone who has booked a flight in search of recalibration. What lingers, though, isn’t the volume of arrival, but the clarity that follows. BE Grand Resort prefers a measured approach. In Panglao, the resort opens with a horizon and lets the experience build from there. The welcome is immediate: the shimmer of water beyond reception, the warmth of stone underfoot, the sound of activity that signals a property fully alive ten years on.
RELATED: Singular Takes You on a Modern Journey through Spain
The first thing that greets you at reception isn’t a desk. It’s a horizon. The sea stretches forward like a dare. Sunlight hits stone floors. Water hums in the distance. A whole coconut is placed in your hands. The furniture curves and coils, signature whimsy from Kenneth Cobonpue.
The lobby is open to the elements. Wind moves through it without permission. Children’s laughter ricochets from the pool below—joy on loop. It doesn’t intrude; it completes the picture. This is a place that understands families: there’s a daycare, a game room, and karaoke for the brave or the tipsy. Energy circulates; no one hoards it.
Walk toward the ledge, and the property reveals itself in layers. From one vantage point, the ocean is a playground—parasailing arcs against the sky, snorkelers slip into glassy water, banana boats skim past shrieks and salt spray. Smaller yachts dock neatly along the edge, composed against the waterline. Near the main pool sits a practice-dive station, over ten feet deep, reserved for those preparing to meet Panglao’s reefs properly.
The gym and spa are present without flexing. Nothing intimidating, nothing performative. Perhaps it’s the warmth of the locals—the Boholanos—whose kindness disarms even the most tightly wound guest. You begin to suspect that hospitality here is natural. Rooms and suites hold their own, but the villas—private casitas—shift the tone. Each one is encircled by a “moat pool” that glides past the veranda and connects subtly to its neighbors while preserving a sense of seclusion. You can have breakfast floating on a tray, sunlight blinking off the water. It’s indulgent, but also faintly childlike, a delight you forget you’re allowed.
Dining unfolds across several spots: The Food Hall, Bridge Café, and the Swim-Up Bar. Then there’s Monkey Bar by Chef Jenzel Fontilla, stationed by the beach. An Ilocano chef with a sharp sense of narrative, he treats Filipino cuisine as evolving text. Local ingredients anchor each dish to Boholano soil, but the execution refuses to be provincial. “You walk for five minutes anywhere in Bohol, and you will always end up at the beach,” he said. His team includes former tricycle drivers and housemaids—people who chose to learn, to pivot, to plate possibility. The food nourishes, but the story feeds something deeper.
At night, the resort tilts upward. Lune Rooftop Bar—Panglao’s only rooftop bar—waits above the shoreline. Games are scattered for easy laughter, yet conversation flows even without liquid encouragement. However, in a bar, cocktails are much-appreciated necessities, much like their Zodiac-themed drinks. You sip one and, for a second, believe in alignment.
Ten years in, BE Grand still moves with ambition. It does not behave like a property content with its résumé. It wants to be discovered. It wants to be remembered.
Travel often begins as escape. Sometimes it’s clarity we’re after. A horizon has a way of widening perspective. The sea does not rush you. It waits. The breeze keeps passing whether you’re ready or not. Children keep laughing. Staff keep smiling. The world continues its small, persistent offerings: coconut water, warm stone, a pool that invites you to float instead of sink.
A shadow isn’t always the absence of light. Sometimes it’s shelter from it—just enough cool to gather yourself before stepping back out. You don’t return whole in a single sweep, after all, but in pieces that fit better than before. BE Grand Resort did what good places do. It offers a horizon when you’ve been staring at walls. Between salt air and open sky, you’re reminded that the tide keeps moving, and so do you.
Photos courtesy of BE GRAND RESORT
The post The Horizon Opens: BE Grand Resort’s Elevated Take on Island Living first appeared on MEGA.
The Horizon Opens: BE Grand Resort’s Elevated Take on Island Living
Trending Updates Central
No comments: