Summer's not over at Alviera's Sandbox! :D

Sandbox Alviera is located at Porac, Pampanga, just a smooth 1.5 hours away from QC via NLEX - SCTEX - Porac exit. :D here's the location map!

What to expect:

• the place is scorching hot (well, esp if it's summer XD)
• the snack bar sells refreshments at lavish rates (bottled water - 35 pesos, bottle of C2 - 40 pesos). they also have burgers and hotdogs, which are all underwhelming, expensive, and magnet to flies. but who cares, you're probably gonna succumb to it amidst the heat and sweat. 
• the snack bar is home to a lot of flies. i almost thought they're selling shit. you will be annoyed. so be overly protective of your food.
• the packages allow you to have one pass at each of the rides. in short, you can only try the rides once... unless you pay for another try. :)

What to bring:

• lots of water and a cooler full of ice
• a change of clothes
• sun shields - fan, cap, arm sleeves, shades, sunblock
• your own helmet IF you have a large head (no offense meant). i read somewhere that a guy was denied access to some attractions because no helmet would fit him, and it's a required gear in Aerial Walk and Adventure Tower. you're allowed to bring your own of course, i saw one who brought their own helmet with a GoPro carrier!
• pocket money in case you wanna buy something inside
• patience haha

What to wear:

• closed shoes - rubber shoes preferably esp if you're doing the Aerial Walk and Wall Climbing
• shorts and denims are okay :D
• long sleeves if you want to protect your arms from the sun

Rates and Schedule:

The place opens at 9am SO BE THERE EARLY cos the registration line can get pretty long as each person is required to sign a waiver.

longs lines at 9am

Parking:

There is parking space inside and outside of the complex. Of course, you would want to park inside which is closer to the park entrance. The guard would probably lead you to the parking slots outside (which happened to us) but you can always go inside naman hehe.

We were there as early as 9am and there are already quite a dozen families and barkadas lining up. So yeah, be there early!

What we did:

AERIAL WALK CHALLENGE

We decided to line up for this first because the turnover for the safety gears is darn long. each person probably takes around 30 minutes to finish the course so yeahh, prepare yourself for more than an hour of waiting! so there's your tip, DO THIS FIRST.

grabe this course is a freaking fitness test. it challenged my every core! my arms were super stressed and my balance was challenged in every way. it was scary and i was fearful of a lot of courses especially those which include suspended and wobbly steps, and freaking HEIGHTS! waaaahh!! the second challege, for me was the hardest, it's this one with the steps. huhu

holding for dear life

btw, i thought the carabiners they used were super cool, if i remember correctly they're called Smart Belay (actually i looked that up haha), and it's super safe. didn't stop me from freaking out though. haha! my friend says it's an improvement cos they used a different one the last time she went there. MAYBE THEY HAVE BIGGER HELMETS NOW? (don't worry so much about the helmet tip though! i bet they fit most heads now)

ADVENTURE TOWER

Rappel Wall

If you have fear of heights this will definitely help you overcome it. We lined up first for the Rappel Wall which is all sorts of scary AT FIRST. to be honest, the scariest part with rappelling is positioning yourself to face the edge of the wall, and letting go of the rope the first time. but once you get the hang of it, it's pretty exciting! i didn't, but it was still exciting. i pretty much just cautiously lowered myself to the ground without all the coolness of kicking at the wall haha. 

Wall Climbing

After rapelling we headed directly for Wall Climbing (we didn't have to line up again) because it uses the same harness. i knew i would fail at this because i'm freaking weak i couldn't carry myself (even if my life depended on it) so i just took a step and asked a friend to take a photo of me as an obligatory shot. haha

Free Fall
At a height of 49 feet about the ground, we are to take a big step of faith, lean forward, and trust the ropes as we fall. this was definitely one of the scariest stints we had to do in the park. and again, the hardest part was letting go. when you do though, it will be all sorts of relieving. in a blink of an eye you're down to the safety of the mattress. you won't even be able to finish screaming. and after the fall, you're gonna stand up stronger, armed with the thought that after all, it wasn't so hard! you're ready for the next ride! parang life lang?

just don't ask the ride attendant to push you if fear got the best of you, BECAUSE HE REALLY WILL AND YOU'LL CURSE HIM FOR IT... then thank him afterwards haha.

Avatar One

The country's first roller coaster zipline! This was super fun and exciting! Every drop is scary and painful (cos the harness has a tendency to tug sharply at your thighs). i was all "ARAY! ano ba yan!" every time i dip! but then again, it was an exciting experience! XD

GIANT SWING

The scariest of all! The entire ride lasts for about a minute only but grabee the thrill!!! hahaha i was screaming all the way, super OA but i had to let it out!! if you know me, you should know i get easily scared of stuff and i'm super magugulatin, so yeah i like to scream. lol if you're super duper afraid of heights you may ask not be lifted too high. haha since we're daring, of course let's do the highest! so we were lifted some 49 feet then dropped! you wouldn't even notice when they're letting you loose! haha nakakastress sya i was fighting the urge to just close my eyes the entire time pero KJ daw so uhm, K!

MINI GOLF

I thought this was going to be boring but i had awesome company so we enjoyed it a lot!

All in all, Sandbox is a great place for bonding and team building! I do hope they add fans though! IT'S SO FRKN HOT!

After Sandbox, we drove to this eatery called Aling Lucing, featured in various TV shows and famed for its original sisig. to be honest, it was expensive and underwhelming, and almost disappointing. i've had better sisig! anyway, it wasn't that bad! we were all hungry anyway! haha

There you go! I hope Sandbox improves its facilities somehow and develop the park as a permanent attraction. Right now it seems like they can pull out anytime and the developers are just trying to make use of the land while it's under development. hehe did you know that their attractions do not require electricity (except for the giant swing which uses a generator to lift the seats up)? :D