Thinking back to a couple of months ago, I was laying in my hotel late one night, looking over google maps. I had to find another hotel to move to, as I was due to check out the following morning. Now, before I pick a hotel I have a figurative checklist I go through in my head to ensure the hotel suits my needs.

For example, the hotel has to be in a central location to different services I use each day. It also has to be in walking distance of good restaurants and public transport.

In the end, I settled on one hotel which really stood out to me, Cebu Parklane International Hotel.

This hotel is situated right in the heart of Cebus business district. The Hotel ticked all the boxes and was also extremely cheap considering what it had to offer.

The first thing that caught my attention was that Parklane hotel was right next to Ayala Mall, one of the biggest malls in Cebu. As we use Ayala regularly, being able to walk there from the hotel was a massive benefit. Previously it took a 10-minute taxi ride to get there; now from Parklane Hotel, it was a 2-minute walk from the lobby.

The rooms themselves are at the level of quality you would expect from a cheap hotel. The rooms are clean, well maintained and had all the features you would expect such as cable television, air-conditioning, daily housekeeping, complimentary tea and coffee etc. Although it’s not a high-end hotel, they provide more than enough to make you feel at home.

At the time I was really focused on using a sauna at least a few times a week. When we were shown our room the porter mentioned to us that the hotel had a sauna in the gym. This got me excited as I had been trying to find a sauna in Cebu. Then I find out that the hotel I had booked contained a sauna.

I went to the sauna the following morning, as I wanted to take advantage of having it available to us. Now in That one area housing the sauna there is a range of facilities available to the guests. On one side you have a Restaurant offering relaxing dining out in the open air. The restaurant overlooks the pool, also available to all guests; then on the opposite side is a seating area where guests can relax.

Then there is the gym, this is open to the general public but is free for Parklane Hotel guests. Having a gym in a hotel isn’t uncommon but this was the first time I had seen it in Cebu. In the back of the gym was the sauna which is where I hung out most of the time. I was walking about 20,000 steps a day in Cebu so I wasn’t too keen on working out on top of that.

For the first day, we missed the breakfast buffet as we woke up too late. This turned out to be a mistake, the following morning we managed to make it down to breakfast on time. I then realized it was probably the best buffet breakfast I had seen a hotel offer.

The range of food there was on another level. They had every style of breakfast you could think of available there. A range of cereals, bakery products, salads, pancakes, meat dishes, fruits. I over ate there almost every morning, it definitely takes a lot of self-control when there’s such a wide variety of food available.

Basically, the Parklane Hotel has a lot to offer at a very reasonable price. It is now one of the few hotels which I check on if I find myself needing to stay in that area again.

If you find yourself venturing over to Cebu City, I would not hesitate to book a stay at Parklane Hotel.