Boracay is a small bone-shaped tropical island located approximately 200Km south of Manila and 2Km off the northwest tip of the mainland island of Panay in the Eastern Visayas region of the Philippines.

Although measuring only approximately 4.5 Km long and 2km wide, the island is possibly one of the last best-kept secrets to international travellers and vacationers and has consistently been on numerous top ten best beaches for decades,but due to its remoteness - as the Philippines is far from the normal or usual vacation hubs that stick to the South East Asian mainland, and the majority of tourists to this region have already endured painfully long flights, usually balk at taking another flight that eats into their vacation time or who are already fighting off jetlag; and for this reason Boracay has remained mostly untouched from the "tourist trap" feel that plague many other places.

It has been said of Boracay to be that mythical deserted island that people day-dream of running off to while at work or sitting in traffic, there are seven beaches each with a distictive name and history, the best is considered the 4km stretch on the southern side consisting of beautiful white sand - called White Sand Beach - it is one of the few naturally produced white sand beaches in the world. The other six beaches going clock-wise from White Sand are Diniwid, Balinghai, Punta Bunga, Puka Shell, Ilig-iligan, and finally Lapuz Beach on the northern side.

Less than fifteen years ago vacationers had to bring in their own drinking water and camped on the beach with only fire for light, Boracay has grown into an international tourist hub with 20 dive sites, scores of bars or restaurants, native tattoo parlors, banks, a fire and a police station, and a small airport.

The main clientle are tourists from China and Japan on holiday, but there are a handful of American, British, and Germans at any time with the cuisine to match these palates. At the height of the tourist seaon (usually Feburary to March & June to August) the small island has a crowded feel.

As part of the province of the mainland island Aklan, which is home to the famous Ati-Atihan festival, the island is accessible by pump boat from the port of Caticlan, and two airlines offer flights directly to the island's small airport, but the normal route is from Manila or Cebu by plane to Kalibo or Iloilo City and then by bus or taxi to Caticlan, and from there the pump boat, but all this travelling is defintely worth it.

Increased marketing has begun to stress the infrastructure and for a period of time there were frequent power outages until a power plant seperate from the mainland was built on the northwestern side, and tourists are cautioned not to take the white sand in bottles or jars as souvenirs as numerous marine biology and aquatic studies have shown this is actually depleting the white sand, which has taken some 40,000 years for nature to produce.