The Cebu to Bohol Ferry is one way to get to Bohol from Cebu and takes about 2 hours. If you take the afternoon flight from Hong Kong you’ll have to stay the night at a hotel in Cebu (I stayed at the Waterfront Airport Hotel), which is not ideal. The last ferry is around 6p.m and you can take a look and book tickets here. From the Waterfront Airport Hotel Cebu (basically at Cebu Airport) it takes about 30 minutes with light traffic to get to Cebu Pier 1, where the Cebu to Bohol Ferry leaves from. Before you even get in, you have to pay 10 pesos for the taxi to drop you off right outside, well you don’t have to, easier to get him to just park outside and walk 10 meters to the entrance. Show your ticket to the guards, then pay the 25 pesos (per person) at the Terminal Fee counter before entering the bag check area. There are terminal fees everywhere in Cebu.
I bought tickets for the Cebu to Bohol Ferry online here, but you still have to go to the counter and exchange them for hard copies, which are printed on a dot matrix printer – haven’t seen one of those for a while (1980’s?!). You then go through the bag check and x-ray thing and then it’s a bit of a shit show. No waiting seats available because they’re all taken, well you can head to the back (keep walking through the crowd), and you’ll find some empty seats. There’s a few tacky souvenir and snack shops, but nothing great so bring some snacks if you think you’re going to get hungry. The Cebu to Bohol Ferry terminal is a bit dirty, loads of flies and some cockroaches running around the floor. We booked the 9:20a.m ferry, it arrived around 850a.m, and they started boarding at around 9a.m. With business class tickets there’s probably no need to get on their fast as seats are assigned but if you’re peasant class you might want to try and line up first as I can see there’d be a battle for seats which I don’t think are assigned in economy class.
You can bring your baggage on with you, business class for the Cebu to Bohol Ferry is up the stairs and there’s no line for business class when boarding. I’d wait until most people are on board. They put your baggage up with you, at the front of the cabin, and if you think you might want to get shit out of your suitcase, then don’t board first. When arriving at the terminal I did see a check in place for larger luggage, not sure where that goes, we had 2 small carry on suitcases. On board, the seats are ok, about the same legroom as premium economy in most airlines and about the same seats in terms of size and comfort. There’s no tray table but a footrest. Staff were pretty good and will give you a hand if you need help with getting suitcases up the stairs.
If you’ve read anything else about the Cebu to Bohol ferry in Business Class, believe all the comments about it being freezing. It’s not death cold but they definitely pump the air conditioning on full and don’t see anyway of changing it. You won’t freeze to death in shorts and a t-shirt but I highly recommend you take a light jacket or sweater or something with long sleeves. Seems no matter where you sit you can’t avoid the air con. It’s actually not that cold it’s just that it seems to blow right on you. The Cebu to Bohol Ferry is quite loud and has that vibrating noise for the duration. Definitely not a pleasant ride, but nothing unbearable. Basically if you want to go to Bohol, you don’t have much choice and I think I’d rather take the Cebu to Bohol Ferry then go through the hassle of getting a domestic flight from within Philippines.
It’s a bit of a mission getting to Bohol, and not sure I’d do it again, especially during peak season. On the way back going from Tagbilaran Ferry Terminal, allow plenty of time for lining up to either get a ticket or exchange your ticket, and pay for the terminal fee. I was bitching and complaining that the hotel kept suggesting to leave at 6a.m for the 7:05 Ferry but you really need to leave well before, especially during the middle of the day when traffic gets worse. It only took 25 minutes (they say it takes 45 minutes, and this might be true in the middle of the day and to allow for delays) but then another 20 minutes or so to line up for tickets and then line up for the terminal fee which is 20 pesos per person. The girl wasn’t too happy that I only had 500 pesos so try to bring some small change.
On the way back from Pier 1 in Cebu to the Airport, it took about 40 minutes and that was early morning, so make sure you leave plenty of time if you have a flight to catch. We had a 12:10 flight and were thinking about taking the 8:05 ferry from Tagbilaran, which would have got us to Cebu around 10a.m, but I can see it could have easily taken us an hour to get to Cebu airport if traffic was bad. If you need any more information about the Cebu to Bohol Ferry get in touch with us wither via email or directly on Twitter. Check out more info on Bohol here or Cebu here.
