PALAU TRAVELER'S NOTES

(Koror, Palau) - Since it's birth in 1982, Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau) has been using electricity in providing hot water to it's hotel guests. It is not until the late months of 2008 that Palau Hotel has provided an extra fund in putting up a solar water heater in its roof top. Palau as a whole is generally warm, although occassionaly there are rain showers, the beautiful island country of Palau still enjoys the warm climate all year round. Situated eastern of the Philippines and southern of Japan, Palau is outside the typhoon zone.

The solar water heater became popular in 1920s especially in countries were solar energy is quite abundant and in Israel, they even passed a law requiring the installation of solar water heater to new houses. The solar heater technology have constantly been improved thereby developing more innovative, durable and high performance solar heaters.

This is a picture taken outside of the Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau) with a view of the solar water heaters at the roof top. The solar water heater provides hot water to Palau Hotel's 32 hotel rooms. Now hotel guests never have to worry about not enjoying a hot shower in their rooms.

At the second floor of Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau) a palau traveler will find a hot and cold water dispenser available to all hotel guests. This is where hotel guests get their hot water for their ramen, tea or coffee.

This is a closer picture of the solar water heater system installed at the roof top of Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau).

With sunlight abundant in Palau, and the ramphant growth of techonology competition and cheaper innovations, it wont be long before many if not all establishments in Palau will install solar water heaters. This way people can save much from using electricity and is putting the natural solar energy resource of mother earth into good use.

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Koror (Palau) is one of the 16 states of the Republic of Palau. Palau is a small island country found in the Pacific, east of the Philippines and south of Japan. The island of Koror (also Koror State) has the highest population amongst the 16 states of Palau. Although Koror is not the biggest island, it is the center of major business establishments. Shopping centers, restaurants, beauty and massage salons, souvenir shops, stores, banks, government offices, dive shops are some of the establishments you will find within the area.

To know the other states of Palau, click here.

Palau Hotel (Koror Palau) is a budget hotel in Koror, Palau (do not confuse with Palau Hotel in Italy). It is where divers choose to stay for convenience and budget hotel rooms with complete amenities. At the rooftop of Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau) is a solar water heater (not many have one here in Palau). It provides hot water to its hotel rooms. Now, the rest of the budget hotels in Palau may not have the same water heater system as of this day, but Palau Hotel, aside from cutting costs from electric bills wants to provide hot water to guests even at the event of power interruption and above all make use of the solar energy of which Palau is abundant.

As you might already know, Palau has an annual mean temperature of 82ºF (27 ºC) (got the figures from Alii Palau) and basically Palau is located outside the typhoon zone. That simply means there is so much sunshine and solar energy in Palau although there are months with frequent rainfalls.

Anyway, I got the chance to take the stairs up to the rooftop of Palau Hotel (in Koror, Palau) and took some pictures of building a Palau traveler may expect when they come for a visit in Palau. Don’t go expecting tall buildings like 101 of Taiwan, Palau is an island country and Koror is a small island state in Palau!
The building in this picture is just a few meters aways from Palau Hotel (Koror, Palau)where a Palau traveler can find Surangels Grocery Store (Koror, Palau) at the ground floor and a refreshemt stall and snack bar can also be found at the main entrance. In Palau it is more commonly called as simply Surang. Going up the stairs will take you to the Surangels Department Store and Raw that sells a variety of dry goods, swimming/snorkeling and fishing gears. Here, the "Customer is King", that's what it says on Surangel's Customer Card that allows a customer to avail of discounts and accumulate points that the customer may claim by buying their products on a specified date. The Palau Public Utilities Corp. (electric company) is also located on the same building.

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Palau is well known for its dive sites as tourist spots which are nonetheless the best ones in the world. Most of Palau travelers who flock to this small island country have diving prioritized on their minds. But, there are also a couple of travelers who settle for a more subtle experience like visiting Palau land based tourist spots, but all the same a memorable experience as diving.

If you came to Palau without an idea of where to go, you can always ask for a copy of an Alii Palau (Alii in Palau means "hello") from the airport upon your arrival or at the front desk of the hotel you checked in. Alii Palau is a booklet with information about tourist spots, dive shops, hotels, restaurants in Palau and more.

In this case if you decided to stay in a budget hotel, Palau Hotel F&B Palau Hotel in Koror, Palau(send Palau Hotel an email today for your hotel reservations at fnbpalauhotel@yahoo.com so you can have more to spend on exploring Palau) keeps a few copies of the Alii Palau at the front desk. The Palau Hotel Manager and staffs would be very glad to help you in looking for places to go to.

Not far from Palau Hotel (F&B Palau Hotel) located at the center of Koror, Palau, a Palau traveler may opt to visit the Palau Aquarium (a Palau tourist spot) at the M-Dock. A Palau traveler may request a pick and drop service from the front desk of Palau Hotel (F&B Palau Hotel) or call for a local taxi.

It is not that far actually, from Palau Hotel (facing WCTC shopping center) take the straight road to your left until you see the Palau Supreme Court building. After that, turn left straight to Palau Coral Reef Center. There, i've told you the way to go there. You can also rent a car or a bicycle if you feel up to it. But whether by car, biking or walking (whatever is your kind of thing) you will see a lot of shops from Palau Hotel down to the Supreme Court. I'll tell you about the different shops in my future blog.

First, Palau Aquarium (Koror, Palau) is now one of the best land based tourist spot in Palau, so you'd want to visit this place and see the magnificent marine life of Palau, in an aquarium, without getting yourself wet.

The Palau Aquarium is a division of a non-profit organization, the Palau International Coral Reef Center. It has sub-themed aquariums representing the different habitats and ecosystem of Palau. Each aquarium features the variety of marine life in a specific habitat. Now imagine witnessing the beauty of Palau marine life in land without getting yourself wet and the burning heat of the sun. The last time we visited Palau Aquarium I couldn’t take my hands off my camera, trying to get a good shot at the fishes. I also saw a few giant clams there and branching mangroves that provides for the growth of more marine life.
Palau Aquarium is open from 9:00am-5:00pm Monday-Sunday (you can check their schedules for changes) and the entrance fees are affordable, that is $7.00 for the adults and $2.50 for kids from aged 3 to 11 (again you can check their rates in case there are chages). They do have some open house schedules where a Palau traveler may visit Palau Aquarium for FREE, like what I enjoyed when we visited there, but then, I was just lucky. You may give them a call for more information at 680-488-6950.

The pictures are all taken from the visit we made to Palau Aquarium. I was overwhelmed to see the different aquariums and just to take a picture of each.


At first glance you'll probably ask what's with the picture? Well if you look closer that is actually a fish comouflaged as a rock. I waited a couple of minutes waiting for this one to move, but alas to my dismay, it did not. But i'm sure it was alive... before and after our visit.

Labels: budget hotel, koror palau, Palau, Palau Aquarium, Palau Coral Reef Center, palau hotel, palau traveler, tourist spot

This is how Palau Hotel looks at nighttime. See the busy street? It's safe to say its the main road of Koror since all vehicles use this same road every hour, no traffic though. At the ground floor of the hotel a traveler finds a convenience store and internet shop that is open until 11:00pm daily. Across Palau Hotel (F&B Palau Hotel) is WCTC Shopping Center where Palau travelers buy their daily supplies, souveniers or simply window shop.

As of today, the hotel’s single, double and triple rooms are priced as $60.00, $70.00 and $75.00 respectively. The good news is that Palau Hotel (F&B Palau Hotel) gives a 20% discount to bookings made through their email address at fnbpalauhotel@yahoo.com or call at (680) 488-1703/1704.

With 32 hotel rooms, each room is fully air conditioned with hot and cold shower, complimentary toiletries, cable television, phone line and a refrigerator with free bottled mineral water. At Palau Hotel’s (F&B Palau Hotel) front desk, a safety deposit box is available for travelers to leave their valuables.

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Single Room

Double Room

Palau is a country to dive for. Palau hotel (Koror, Palau) comes recommended for people who wants to save on room accomodations (without sacrifising convenience) and get more chances of diving and exploring the beauty of Palau islands.

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