Posted on

Dumaguete and SEA Photo Contest-Part Three

I was up early on Sunday, April 23rd. After breakfast I grabbed a trike out front and headed to the dive shop. This was the day we were going to Apo Island and I was looking forward to that!

Apo Island is considered one of the top diving and snorkeling destinations in the Philippines. It’s located about 19 miles (30 kilometers) south of Dumaguete. From Dauin it’s about a 30-45 minute boat ride. The marine habitat around the island is a marine reserve. There are over 650 documented species of fish and over 400 species of coral found here. Sport Diver Magazine listed Apo Island as one of the top 100 dive destinations in the world in 2008.

As we had the previous two mornings, after meeting at the dive shop we were transported by jeepney to the Dauin Marine Sanctuary where a boat was waiting to transport us to Apo Island. We made a stop at a convenience store on the way to purchase snacks. At Dauin our gear was loaded on the boat for us. Once all the gear was loaded and everyone was aboard, we departed for Apo Island.

Okay, maybe I’ve been in the Philippines too long (selfie’s are popular here 😉 )

The weather was beautiful and sunny as we headed across. A nice morning to be out on the water I thought! We had a large group of divers with us, probably 20 at least. There was music being played and everyone was enjoying themselves. Once we arrived there was a dive brief and then we all started gearing up.

Apo Island near Chapel Point.

The first dive was at Chapel Point which gets it’s name from a church overlooking the dive site. Although there were a fair number of boats there and quite a few divers, it didn’t feel crowded. My dive started at 9:44 AM. Where we dropped in was about 40 feet deep. It was a sandy area with patches of coral that sloped towards a drop-off and a very nice wall.

As I moved towards the drop-off I saw a nice anemone with a female tomato anemonefish. Even though I’ve photographed anemonefish many times I can never resist taking a few more 🙂 There were lots of anthia’s and damselfish. As I dropped down the wall I saw bigeyes, squirrelfish, and grouper. The corals were in really nice shape. There were gorgonian seafans. Lot’s of tube sponges. There were ledges and overhangs with plenty of fish underneath. Towards the end of my dive I found a nudibranch (Chromodoris magnifica) and took several photos. A very nice dive! My dive time ended up at 52 minutes with a maximum depth of 95 feet. Water temperature was 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

Tomato Anemonefish (Amphiprion frenatus) photographed on a dive at Chapel Point, Apo Island, Philippines.

After everyone was back on the boat we moved to the second dive site which was Katipanan. After our surface interval and another brief, we started entering the water. My dive started at 11:55 AM. Katipanan is a gentle slope. It has lot’s of corals. Soft corals, huge brain corals, lettuce corals, and numerous fish. Lot’s of damselfish, anthia’s, butterflyfish, triggerfish, and tobies. I took a photo of a titan triggerfish chomping away and couldn’t help but remember being chased by one last August in Puerto Galera! (read about it here in my blog). I ended up with a 67 minute dive with a maximum depth of 80 feet. Water temperature was again 79 degrees.

Titan Triggerfish (Balistoides viridescens) photographed on a dive at Katipanan, Apo Island, Philippines.

The boat moved again, this time to Largahan. After our surface interval and our last dive brief of the day we geared up and began stepping into the water. This dive site has lots of soft corals on the shallow side. As you move deeper there are more hard coral formations, with ledges and undercuts and a fair sized wall. What was interesting about this site is the streams of bubbles coming up from the sand that are caused by geo-thermal activity. My dive started at 2:40 PM. I was one of the first in the water and took advantage of that as it was the last dive of the day. I stayed relatively shallow with my maximum depth being only 38 feet. As at the other sites, there were plenty of fish! I saw a nice grouper near the beginning of the dive but was unable to get close enough to get a decent photo. There were plenty of damselfish, anthia’s, and wrasse. I photographed a damselfish and a cleaner wrasse. A toby, a lizardfish, then a curious staghorn damselfish that stayed around for several photos.

Staghorn Damsel (Amblyglyphidodon curacao) photographed during a dive at Largahan, Apo Island, Philippines.

After working the goby for several minutes, I found another lizardfish that I was able to spend some time on also. I took some photos of some of the corals, then another goby to finish up the dive. I ended up with a total dive time of 80 minutes. (No I wasn’t the last one out of the water 😉 ) Water temperature was again 80 degrees Fahrenheit.

Goby photographed at Largahan, Apo Island, Philippines.

After recovering everyone we started back to Dauin. I sat at the front of the boat and reflected a bit on the way back. The sun was descending to the west. It’s quite beautiful here! I love being out on the water. Perhaps it’s the sailor in me, but some of my best memories are out on the ocean or in it! I thought how fortunate I am to be here and doing the things that I love to do. Each day is a gift. It’s so easy to forget that sometimes! I’d had a great weekend of diving!

After arriving back at the dive shop, I rinsed my gear and let Snoopy know I was finished diving as I needed to review photos and make picks so I could make the deadline the next day. I didn’t think I’d have time to dive again and still get that done.

The next day, Monday, April 24th, I met my friend Mark for lunch. Mark suggested the Cafe Racer Diner. He told me it had the best cheeseburger he’d eaten in the Philippines! After lunch, I had to agree! We caught up a bit more on what we’d been doing and Mark talked about his plans for the dive resort that is being built at Dauin. After lunch Mark had a meeting with his architect and I went along. I believe it’s going to be a really great resort! It’s in a perfect location on the beach with the Dauin Marine Sanctuary being directly in front of it!

There will be deluxe rooms, a home for the owner, a meeting room/lounge, and a gym. There will also be standard rooms and backpackers as well. One of the things Mark is going to offer is the opportunity for experienced divers to do their own dives. From his place you can literally just walk into the water and you’re in the marine sanctuary! After a checkout dive (and a waiver of course) he’s going to let experienced divers buddy up and do their own dives at a reduced rate. This is a great idea in my opinion. I know that all of my diving in the US is done this way. All my diving in Japan was this way. All of my diving in Guam was like this as well. 99% of my diving in the Philippines has been done with a guide, because that’s the way they do it here. Of course it’s also very inexpensive to have a guide compared to the US or Australia too!

After the meeting with the architect, Mark drove me over to House Reef to pick up my gear. I introduced him to Snoopy. It turned out that although they had never met, Mark did know him by reputation. They started talking and really hit it off. By the time we left they were discussing doing some business together. I had copied my entries for the photo contest to a USB drive and took care of getting those entered while Snoopy and Mark talked.

Mark dropped me off at Gabby’s afterward. I went up to my room and started packing. After packing, I took a shower, and was on the computer for a bit, then went down and had dinner. I turned in early.

The next morning I checked out. I was in a trike at 7:30 AM on my way to the port. The trike ride was 50 pesos (around $1 dollar). All of the ferry lines were near the gate to the ferry terminal, except Ocean Jet. That turned out to be across the main street before entering the area of the gate. Once I got straightened out and had my ticket I went back to the gate where I was checked by a security guard and waived through (you have to have a ticket to get in). I paid 15 pesos for a terminal fee and 80 pesos portage fees for my dive bag. They took the big bag and I held on too my pelican case that my camera and electronics are in. I was on the ferry by 8 AM.

The ferry left at 8:30 AM and we arrived in Tagbilaran at 10:30 AM. After leaving the ferry I was directed to go around to the ticket window in the front and show my ticket. Then I had to pass through security again to get back into the terminal (no this didn’t make much sense to me either!)

While sitting in the terminal a guy walked by me who had a pelican case very similar to mine (except mine has stickers all over it). I noticed from his hat that he was a diver and we struck up a conversation. We introduced ourselves. He turned out to have just been diving in Dumaguete and was on his way to Malapascua where I’d been the week before. We chatted in the terminal while waiting for our ferry.

We were both in business class and we continued our conversation once we’d boarded. We expressed some concern to each other that our gear had made it on the ferry and I offered to step out and check. He pulled up a photo of his baggage (two big footlockers and a large bag actually). He commented that was just to make it easier to get help finding his bags, especially if there were a language barrier. Pretty smart I thought! I went outside to check and sure enough everything was there.

After that we started sharing photos that we had (mine on my smart phone and him on his small tablet). One of the first photos I saw I thought looked familiar. Turned out it had been a magazine cover! When he’d introduced himself, I thought the name sounded familiar. I had just met David Fleetham, one of the most published underwater photographers in the world! He didn’t say that by the way, I looked him up later. Here’s a guy who has had over 200 magazine covers, including the only underwater photo to ever make the cover of Life Magazine! He was a super nice guy and we spent an enjoyable couple of hours talking about photography and places we’d dived.

When we got to Cebu City we put our bags together and I watched his while he went to see if he could find the guy who was meeting him to take him to Malapascua. He came back with his driver and they picked up his cases. We walked out to the main gate, wished each other well and he got in the van to Malapascua and I got in a taxi to my hotel.

The next day I flew back to Clark. This concludes my trip to Dumaguete…. Finally! Aren’t y’all happy I’m finished? 😉

A short epilogue: Results came out a few days ago and I did not make the list of finalists in the photo contest. I wasn’t surprised. I thought my photos were fine, but nothing exceptional. It’s a very demanding contest and the competition was quite stiff. I saw some of the photos my fellow competitors were shooting and I was really impressed! What was important to me was that I had a good time doing the things that I really enjoy. I also feel that the conditions of the contest caused me to think about some things that will help me be a better photographer. Always striving to be better is a worthy goal in itself!

I chatted with my friend Mark in Australia yesterday and he and Snoopy have decided to work together on some things. Mark was quite happy about that as he would not have met Snoopy if not for me diving with him during the contest. They’re setting up an area now for Snoopy to work from right there on the beach at the Dauin Marine Sanctuary. For now Snoopy will be the instructor for anyone booking a course (Mark is an avid diver, but not an instructor). Anyone booking dives will be diving through Snoopy until they are fully operational. Snoopy will be able to book accommodations at the resort for his guests (as I mentioned earlier he has limited rooms). They will work together to fill boats for Apo Island, Oslob, and Siquijor Island trips. It’s a win/win for both of them. As of now, the fence has been completed and construction has started on 2 deluxe rooms and a home for the owner. It’s going to be hard to beat the convenience of being able to dive where you are staying! I’ve been invited to come back down and I fully expect that I will! I’m sure I’ll be writing more about his place in a future blog post!

Almost caught up! I was diving in Anilao just last week and I’ll be writing about that trip next. One of the things that people have lamented about for as long as I’ve been aware of Anilao is the way “pricing” is done there. It can be quite expensive for divers traveling alone. Well I’ve discovered a place that is quite reasonable and I’m going to write about it in my next blog post.

If you’re enjoying my blog please subscribe so you don’t miss a post. Just click on the subscribe button. It will only take a moment!

Until next time!

Posted on

Dumaguete and SEA Photo Contest-Part Two

After the days diving we stripped off our gear and put it in our crates for transport back to the dive shop. We then loaded into the jeepney for the ride back. There seemed to be a bit more traffic on the way back. Once at the dive shop, I gave my camera gear a good rinse, said my goodbyes, and walked the half block to the main road. From there I waved down a trike and headed back to Gabby’s.

The doorway to my room. Every room had a theme and I thought it was kind of cool that mine was “Lionfish” 🙂

After a shower, I went down and grabbed some food. Breakfast of course 🙂 Afterwards, I went back to my room, put all my batteries on charge, worked on photos a bit, checked Facebook, and went to sleep early.

Breakfast at Gabby’s. I know it might sound strange to some, but I LOVE spam and was really happy I could order it for breakfast 🙂

The next morning, Saturday, April 22nd, after a good nights sleep and breakfast, I set up my camera equipment with fully charged batteries. Then went out front and waived down a trike for the ride to dive shop. There we had a repeat more or less of the day before. A small amount of socializing. Verified all our gear was back in our crate, and then we loaded up for the trip to Dauin.

The dives on the second day were boat dives and we were to visit some sites outside of the sanctuary. The sites were all close by and we started gearing up once everyone was on the boat and we took off. The first dive site was called San Miguel (maybe after the beer?). It was mainly sandy bottom with some debris and coral here and there. My dive started at 9:17 AM. Although we dropped in with guides, we became spread out fairly quickly as we found subjects to focus our attention on. At the beginning of the dive I spotted a couple of sea snails creeping along the bottom. Then I saw a sunken piece of driftwood with a few gobies on the top. I saw that as an opportunity to work with the snoot I’d just purchased for my strobe.

What a snoot does is restrict the light from your strobe to a smaller area. They’re used to highlight the subject or certain areas of the subject. I’d used them in studio photography, but never underwater. When I was in Singapore for ADEX, one of the seminars I attended talked about the use of snoots and I was intrigued by the idea. When I visited Splash in Manila I talked to Jovic about it and bought one to add to my equipment. One of the things Jovic said to me was that some of the subjects I photographed would often blend into the background. Maybe not surprising when you consider that camouflage is a tool used by both predator and prey in the ocean. A snoot could help separate the subject from the background. The goby seemed a perfect subject to practice this on! I ended up spending a good period of time there… as long as I could get away with until my computer told me it was time. This was the maximum depth of my dive at 68 feet.

The use of a snoot highlights the subject by restricting light from the background and directing it directly where it is aimed. This results in a nice separation without a distracting background.

As I worked my way back up the slope, I saw a squat lobster on another piece of sunken driftwood. Took a few photos, then moved towards the area where the boat was moored. It was running close to an hour at this time and I could see other divers getting back on the boat. Although we’d been a bit spread out, we had always been in sight of other divers. Depth here was maybe 15-20 feet. By the time it was clear, my safety stop was finished. My total dive time ended up at 63 minutes. Water temperature was 80 degrees Fahrenheit and as I mentioned earlier, my maximum depth was 68 feet.

The boat moved to the second dive site called Ginaman. Most of the photographers spent the surface interval chatting and sharing what they had shot with their friends. When it was time we geared up and stepped in for our second dive. This dive started at 11:33 AM. Almost immediately I discovered that a large pillar of concrete almost completely encrusted in corals with plenty of life on it in less than 15 feet of water. I took my time moving around it. First was a juvenile lionfish. After taking several photos, I moved on and discovered a seahorse moving along the base. After photographing that, I found a banded boxer coral shrimp. Then another seahorse! Then a shortfin lionfish (also a juvenile), then a juvenile filefish. A little toby, then three more shortfin lionfish! Of course there were the usual cardinalfish, wrasse, and damselfish. It was a very small area, not more than a couple of yards on a side, but it was teeming with life!

Cardinalfish photographed in Dauin.

From there I moved out onto the sand and seagrass. I found a bottle with a crab dug in underneath. Commensal shrimp, there were a few fire urchins about. I found a small white sea hare. Then some coral outcroppings with Christmas Tree worms, and an anemone with saddleback anemonefish. To finish off the dive I photographed a small school of juvenile catfish. I was right underneath the boat and waiting for people to get on. They came along, feeding and swarming along the bottom as everyone who dives has seen numerous times! I thought, “why not?” and snapped a few shots! The second dive ended up being 69 minutes long with a maximum depth of only 17 feet. Water temperature was 81 degrees Fahrenheit. I ended up back on the boat with my tanks still over half full!

Sea Hare photographed at Dauin.

At this point we headed in to the beach at the marine sanctuary. I was invited to have lunch, but I opted to stay on the boat and take a nap! I think I was still recovering from my trip down from Malapascua!

After lunch, everyone started returning to the boat. For the third dive we dropped in a site called Punta. My dive started at 2:59 PM. Punta also turned out to be a sandy bottom with some coral here and there. I almost immediately discovered a waspfish! I haven’t seen them very often so I was happy to find one! The last one I’d seen was in Puerto Galera last year. I took several photos and moved on.

Waspfish photographed during a dive at Dauin.

I spied a goby and took a few photos. As I kicked away from the goby I saw a small frogfish! As I began to work around the frogfish it occurred to me that I’d never gotten a picture of one with it’s mouth open. I’d heard that all one had to be was patient and here was an opportunity as I was in a group of people who could quite easily spend a significant amount of time photographing just one subject to get it right! After shooting several angles and checking exposures. I settled down to wait. 30 minutes later the frogfish yawned! After getting the shot from the side I knew that I was going to have to do this again at some point to get the same shot from the front. Still I was pretty happy to get the shot!

Frogfish yawning photographed during a dive at Dauin.

After getting that shot I started towards the guide and the other photographer curious about what they were shooting and had a crab come scuttling along. As I maneuvered for a shot, he seemed quite willing to attack me if I got to close! After taking a couple of photos I let him go! I’d spent so much time on the frogfish, that ended up being my last shot of the dive! I checked my time and it was time to head for the boat so I caught up just in time. I never did see what the other photographer was shooting! I ended up with a dive time of 62 minutes with a maximum depth of only 13 feet! Yes I had well over half a tank left again! 🙂 Water temperature was 82 degrees Fahrenheit. Not surprising it was a bit warmer given the shallow depth.

A crab photographed during a dive at Dauin. He seemed quite ready to remove one of my fingers if I got to close!

We headed back to the marine sanctuary after the dive where we offloaded and were transported back to the dive shop in Dumaguete. Again taking about an hour with traffic. At the dive shop, it was a repeat of the day before. I rinsed my camera equipment, said my goodbye’s and walked down to the main road to catch a trike to the hotel.

I grabbed a quick shower and then went to meet my friend Mark Gormley. Mark and I met the first time I came to Dumaguete in December 2009. Mark is from Australia where he’s in manufacturing. His wife Marmae is from Cebu. When he and I dived together at Dauin he showed me his lot which is beachfront at the Dauin Marine Sanctuary and talked about his plans to someday build a dive resort there. Although it’s been 7 years since we’d seen each other, we’d kept in touch via Facebook and occasionally chatting. By sheer coincidence he and his wife were in town the same time I was there. He’d messaged me a couple of weeks earlier and I’d let him know that I was going to be there so of course we made plans to get together.

Mark called me on the phone from Australia last December and talked to me for 3 hours after I got out of the hospital in Singapore following my heart attack. Mark also had gone through a heart attack a few years ago and he wanted me to know that it didn’t mean that I wouldn’t be able to dive again.

I’d been told by the cardiologist that did my first angioplasty and stent in Singapore (and I have to say also saved my life), that I shouldn’t be in denial and that I’d likely never dive again. Mark assured me that lots of people, including him, did come back to diving after a heart attack so this was not necessarily true. I was really appreciative of that at the time as although I’d put on a positive face for “Facebook”, I was quite depressed about the possibility that I wouldn’t dive again. I never knew about Mark’s heart attack as he’d never mentioned it to me when we’d chatted.

I met Mark and his wife and niece at the Hayahay which is a great local restaurant. They will let you pick out your seafood and cook it to order. They have good pizza’s too! We had an enjoyable evening catching up. Mark has spent a lot of time in the Philippines and has been coming here even longer than I have. He’s a wealth of knowledge on the Philippines and also on the local dive scene. They gave me a ride back to Gabby’s and we made plans to try and see each other again before I left. I’ll talk a bit more about the resort he’s going to open in my next post.

My next post will start with our day trip to Apo Island. I’ll be working on that tomorrow so stay tuned!

Posted on

Dumaguete and SEA Photo Contest-Part One

I left Malapascua Island on Wednesday, the 19th. I decided to break up the trip and spend the night in Cebu. I used the Agoda app on my phone to book again with Travelbee Business Inn. After catching the ferry over, I caught a bus from Maya to Cebu City. Bus fare was 200 pesos. The bus departed at 12:05 PM and arrived in Cebu City, North Bus Terminal at 5:15 PM. From there I caught a cab to the hotel. To find the loading area for taxis, walk out to the main road and turn right. Walk until you see the sign for the loading area. It’s not far, maybe 50 yards down the road.

After arriving at the hotel, I spent some time working on enhancing my website and getting a new Facebook page setup. I continued working on it the next morning. I got involved with that and I ended up with a much later start than I had originally planned. I thought I still had plenty of time. It turned out I was wrong!

I had checked the ferry schedules and it looked like the last ferry was at 1 PM so plenty of time I thought when I left the hotel at 11:30 AM. That turned out not to be the case. The ferry I needed to be on was leaving about the time I was leaving the hotel!

The last time I went to Dumaguete, I’d ridden the same ferry all the way to Dumaguete from Cebu City, with a stop at Tagbiliran. That has changed. Now you have to get off at Tagbiliran and catch a different ferry, In order to meet the check-in time I needed to already be there before the scheduled departure at Tagbiliran for Dumaguete. In hindsight I should have checked, but I was tired from my long trip (and getting up early that day to dive Monad Shoal), and didn’t get near as much sleep as I should have the night before. Lesson learned!

I also discovered the ticket counters for the different ferry terminals (I use Ocean Jet) are no longer inside the terminal. They are on the main road entering the pier area. On the right, just before going through the gate. I’d had the taxi drop me next to the terminal building as that was where all the ticket counters were last year.

I got on my phone and did some quick checking and found that I could get a bus to Dumaguete. I caught a taxi to the South Bus Terminal and just made the bus. This is a much less comfortable trip, but I did save quite a bit of money at least! Bus fare was only 270 pesos. The bus departed at 12:25 PM to Dumaguete via Oslob, which meant the bus went down the east coast of the island of Cebu. The bus actually drove onto a ferry and we got off while the ferry made the crossing to Negros Oriental. The ferry was not included and we had to pay an additional 70 pesos which was a bit surprising. Count on it taking 5-6 hours. As always, it depends on the bus and how many stops it makes. Because most buses in the Philippines will stop wherever they are asked to by passengers, that can mean more or less stops depending on “who” is on the bus! It ended up taking just over 5 hours to the ferry, with one stop for passengers to get off the bus so they could use the CR and grab some food. The crossing was fairly quick, less than an hour, then less than an hour to Dumaguete after that. The bus passes through the city so if your accommodations are on the northeast side of the city you can let the conductor know and they will let you out.

I enjoy taking the ferry myself and always take business class. It’s one of the few areas where I opt to pay the money. After the long bus ride the day before, I’d been looking forward to a nice relaxing ferry ride… unfortunately it wasn’t to be!

I’d used the Agoda app again to book a room at Gabby’s Bed and Breakfast. As has happened to me before, it turned out to be cheaper to book online than to book in person! After getting off the bus, I had a trike transport me with my bags to the hotel. The hotel turned out to be very nice. They have all day breakfast (my favorite meal, I’ve been known to eat “breakfast” 3 times a day:)). The people were friendly and it was a very laid back atmosphere. The owner definitely had an artistic bend and the rooms had a nautical/scuba diving theme. The theme of my room was lionfish and I thought given that I’m a Leo and I have photographed so many lionfish, that it was somehow appropriate 🙂

My room at Gabby’s B&B in Dumaguete. Not large, but all that I needed and less than $20 bucks a night!

After checking in and being shown to my room, I went down to the restaurant to grab some food. I’d not eaten anything but a couple of snacks all day so I was ready to eat! I had breakfast of course 🙂 The food turned out to be really good… exceptional actually. I have to add it to one of my favorite restaurant’s in the Philippines… yes it was that good!

So, why did I change my original plan made in March of spending a couple of weeks diving in Malapascua in April? I’d planned on going back to Dumaguete eventually as it’s world-renowned for the muck diving. Before I went to Singapore I had visited the Splash UW Photo-Video store in Manila and my friend Jovic Santos who is the owner. I met Jovic last year as he is the local Ikelite dealer. He also owns a chain of stores called Stride and Stroke which focus on on outdoor sports, especially water sports and scuba diving.

I went by to visit because I’ve been thinking about upgrading my camera system and knew he would be a good person to discuss that with. It was the first time he’d seen me since I’d had my heart attack and he was really happy that I was diving again. He mentioned the yearly photo contest and that there would be 2 legs this year. The first leg was in Dumaguete and he encouraged me to participate. I thought, “why not?” and decided to plan on attending. Although I’d made tentative plans to go to Singapore, I’d really leaned towards going back to Malapascua the beginning of April. In the end I did decide to go to Singapore and had a great time so no regrets.

SEA (Small Exotic Animals) Philippines is a yearly photographic contest that is sponsored by Splash. It’s been around since 2011. It’s an amateur contest with rules that practically force you to become a better photographer! To start with, there are no enhancements… at all! No cropping, no adjustments for color or density, no removing backscatter. Everything is done with the camera so you have to get it right the first time. No coming back to fix it later!

We all take photos that when we look at them on our computer we say, “I like it the way it is” and we don’t do anything to it. Believe it or not, that doesn’t happen all the time! 🙂 The goal should be to make all our photos look that way. It’s a goal we’ll never reach (lot’s of variables in photography), but it’s still a goal worth striving for… to take a perfect photo every time. In this contest, the goal is to take a perfect photo… that makes technical proficiency a very big part of the contest. Even if you don’t win, you learn, and that is the real goal. To become a better photographer!

The first day of the contest I was up early. I charged all my batteries the night before. I took out my clothes and things I would need at the hotel. After a great breakfast, I grabbed my gear, went outside, and waived a trike over. It took a bit of work as my Visayan is pretty much non-existent (I’ve really only studied Tagalog), and the trike driver spoke very little English, but with the help of Google Maps on my smart phone I was able to explain where we needed to go. The dive shop was actually fairly close by. Maybe 5 minutes at most.

The name of the dive shop is “House Reef” and it’s owned and operated by Andre Montenegro, who goes by “Snoopy”. Someone with decades of experience who grew up right in Dumaguete. He has a BS in Civil Engineering from Silliman University in Dumaguete. Snoopy is a PADI Master Instructor. From the PADI website “PADI Master Instructors are recognized as elite scuba diving educators who, through dedication and hard work, have proven to be dive industry leaders. You earn the Master Instructor rating by exemplifying what it means to be a scuba diving professional through your teaching efforts and professional conduct.”

Snoopy is an accomplished underwater photographer. He is well known within the diving community both in the Philippines and abroad. They’ve been around for over 30 years now so obviously they’re doing something right! Snoopy also happens to be a laid-back and super nice guy 🙂

The dive shop is very modern. It has it’s own pool for training, along with office, classroom, and showroom space. There is a small bed and breakfast on the premises, but book ahead as those rooms can be booked well in advance. Convenient accommodations can be arranged nearby if they are full (they were when I visited, but I decided quite late to participate in the contest). I had a great weekend of diving with them and would have no problem recommending this dive operation to anyone looking to experience some of the better known dive destinations in the Philippines!

Jovic was at the dive shop when I arrived. He introduced me to a few of the other divers and to Snoopy. I took care of registration and then got my camera set up. My gear was put into a crate and I stored my dive bag in the shop, along with my Pelican case that I transport my camera equipment in. I’d already staged all my chargers at the hotel so I could re-charge batteries in the evening.

The shop has it’s own jeepney’s and trucks for transporting equipment and people. Once the dive gear was loaded we grabbed our camera equipment and jumped into the jeepney for the ride to Dauin. The first day of diving was in the Dauin Poblacion Marine Sanctuary. The shop is on the other side of Dumaguete so a good 45 minute ride with traffic. After arriving we were assigned a guide and we started gearing up for the first dive.

The sanctuary is mostly sandy bottom… in with a few areas of coral. There have also been areas where items have been sunk to provide mini-artificial reefs and these items have become encrusted with coral. Everything from an old car to automobile tires have been placed and they generally swarm with life. My dive started at 10:15 AM. During this first dive we followed the slope down to 90 feet where an old car was sunk. Here were two groupers chasing each other in and out of the car. This was quite entertaining to watch. This was the deepest part of the dive. After several minutes we began making our way up the slope. One of the first things we got a chance to photograph was an Ornate Ghost Pipefish. Then a juvenile white frogfish, followed shortly after by a black frogfish! A very nice dive to start my weekend. Dive time ended up at 69 minutes with a maximum depth of 91 feet. Water temperature was 79 degrees fahrenheit.

Tomato Grouper-Variation (Cephalopholis sonnerati) photographed in Dauin Marine Sanctuary.

The second dive started at 12:23 and was a different area within the sanctuary. I spied a tiny hawkfish perching on top of some bubble coral, cardinalfish, and commensal shrimp dancing it’s way across the top of an anemone. A pufferfish, more cardinalfish, then two pufferfish together but different species. A lionfish, then a neon damselfish. Another frogfish and right at the end a snake eel down in it’s hole that refused to come out to have his picture taken! Dive time was 54 minutes with a maximum depth of 79 feet. Water temperature was 80 degrees on the second dive.

A striped pufferfish and whitespotted pufferfish (variation) side by side.

Once we were back ashore we had a break for lunch. There are places there on the beach where you can purchase lunch. After food and a short break we geared up for the third dive of the day.

My third dive started at 3:07 PM. The area we were diving had open structures that had been constructed of blocks and old tires to form artificial reefs. Laying in the bottom inside one of these was a reef stonefish.

Reef Stonefish (Synanceia verrucosa) photgraphed at Dauin Marine Sanctuary.

There were schools of snapper moving around the structures also. We moved up the slope where we spotted plenty of gobies in the sand. A decorator crab, then a hermit crab. An anemone with a commensal shrimp. Near another area of debris and old rope we found another ornate ghost pipefish.

A school of snapper photographed on a dive at Dauin Marine Sanctuary.

More cardinalfish, filefish, and near the end of the dive a seahorse making it’s way along the sand. Dive time ended up at 61 minutes with a maximum depth of 86 feet. Water temperature was again 80 degrees.

Seahorse photographed in Dauin Marine Sanctuary.

I’m going to break this up into two parts as I’ve done with other posts. I still have two more dive days in Dumaguete that I will write about next. I’m still running a month behind, but at least it’s not getting longer than that! After that I’ll be writing about my long weekend in Anilao earlier this month so stay tuned!

Posted on

Another visit to Malapascua

On Friday, April 14th I caught a Cebu Pacific flight to Cebu City. I was on my way back to Malapascua Island. The flight was uneventful. Leaving the terminal, there was a long line to get a taxi. A few people went ahead and got a Yellow Airport Taxi, but not as many as you would think given the line.

As I noted in my blog about my last visit to Cebu, the yellow cabs are nearly twice as much! After waiting in line a few minutes, I noticed that there were a few white taxi’s showing up to pick up specific people. That’s when I remembered I had Grab on my smartphone. I contacted Grab via the app on my phone and less than 10 minutes later I had a cab pulling in to pick me up! Much quicker than waiting in line! I did pay an extra 70 pesos, but that was well worth it.

I had waited to long to make a reservation and was unable to get a room at Kiwi Lodge where I normally stay. Before I flew out of Clark, I booked a room at Travelbee Business Inn through the Agoda app on my phone. The location wasn’t as good, but it met my criteria of being under 1500 pesos a night. I dropped off my bags in my room and then walked down the street to grab a bite to eat at Jollibee. Then back to my room and bed.

The next morning I was up early. I showered and repacked my bag, then took the elevator down. I had a quick cup of coffee, then checked out. The security guard hailed a taxi for me. I had the cab drive me to an ATM so I could get cash, then to the North Bus Terminal. I just caught a bus as it was pulling out! 5 1/2 hours later I was back in Maya. A short wait for a ferry and I was on my way across to Malapascua Island! The ferry dropped it’s passengers on Bounty Beach and I walked along the beach until I reached Evolution.

I had emailed Matt Reed, one of the owners of Evolution Dive Resort, the day before to let him know I was on my way back. He had emailed me back to see if I’d booked a room yet since it was Easter weekend, accommodations were very full! I’ve often advised people online of the importance of having reservations during the holidays in the Philippines. As it turned out I had also emailed Sharks Tail about a room and received a prompt response from Andy. I knew Evolution was going to be full! Matt was correct about it being a holiday and there being a lot of people on the island… I got the last room available!

After leaving the ferry, I went to Evolution first because I wanted to dive that day. It’d been almost 3 weeks since I’d been in the water! I was too late for the afternoon dive, but I had plenty of time to dig out my gear and get my camera equipment set up in preparation for a night dive. After that I went to The Sharks Tail Resort to check in.

As I mentioned in my last blog post about Malapascua Island, The Shark’s Tail Resort is about a 5 minute walk away from Evolution. It’s not on the beach, but it does have a swimming pool which is nice. There is a nice little bar there and the restaurant has good food at decent prices. Once I was checked in to my room, I headed back to Evolution. Let the diving begin!

I’m going to do this post a bit differently since I posted so recently about diving with Evolution. I’ll skip a lot of the logistics. I made my first dive of this visit on the 15th at Lighthouse and the last dive was the morning thresher shark dive on the 19th at Monad Shoal. I did 12 dives total on this visit. I arrived on a Saturday and left on Wednesday to travel to Dumaguete for a photo contest.

I dived Chocolate Island and Gato Island. I also did a dive on Secret Wall and Bugtong Bato. I dived Bantigue twice (once in the afternoon and once at night). I dived Monad every morning I was there as I’m always looking for a better thresher shark photo than the ones I’ve taken before!

On the way to Lighthouse (so-called because it’s directly in front of Malapascua Island’s lighthouse) for the Mandarinfish mating we could tell it was going to rain. We got a few sprinkles on the way over. We got geared up on the ride there (only about 15 minutes). We were in the water quickly and the dive started at 5:24 PM.

Lighthouse is an area of mostly broken and damaged corals. The damage is from another time when scuba diving around the island was virtually non-existent and fisherman used whatever worked in order to feed their families. What worked, was dynamite and sadly there are many damaged areas. It’s not enough to pass judgement, or laws against these types of destructive practices. People will do what they have to in order to survive. It’s important to develop an alternative. Thanks to eco-tourism, now there are alternatives and a significant number of people now make their living through the tourist trade here. This has led to protections being put in place to protect the environment as now what you can see is a more valuable resource than what can be taken from the sea.

The main area that mandarinfish can be seen around dusk virtually every day, is areas of staghorn coral, which as I said earlier are damaged and broken. Lights will scare them so most guides will filter their bright dive lights through their fingers in helping people spot the mating dance. In my own case I have a Light and Motion Sola Photo 1200 that I attach to the top of my housing. It also has a 300 lumen red light that doesn’t seem to have much affect on fish which has come in handy in helping me spot and get close to them.

Right on schedule as it got dark, the mandarinfish came out to play! After seeing the mandarinfish, I moved out of the way so others could see them and amused myself by practicing with my new snoot setup that I’d just purchased that week. I had visited my friend Jovic Santos in Manila earlier in the week. Jovic owns a chain of shops in the Philippines known as Stride & Stroke, that cater to outdoor and water sports, including diving and snorkeling of course. Jovic’s passion though is underwater photography. He also owns and operates “Splash UW-Photo-Video-Pro Shop” in Manila. I stopped by to chat when I’d come back from Cebu the end of March. It was the first time we’d seen each other since my heart attack and he was really happy to see me and hear that I was diving again. Jovic is the primary sponsor of a yearly photo contest for amateur photographers. I’ll write more about that in my next blog post.

Mandarinfish mating at Lighthouse dive site near Malapascua Island.

I moved around the periphery, photographing whatever caught my eye. There were anemonefish, cardinalfish, soldierfish, and squirrelfish. As it got dark and the mandarinfish mating finished, we started to see more crabs and pipefish. I’ve seen octopus and frogfish on this site during past dives here. The dive ended up at 53 minutes with a maximum depth of 35 feet. Water temperature was 77 degrees Fahrenheit.

Anemone Crab photographed on a dive at Lighthouse dive site near Malapascua Island.

When we came up it was pouring down rain! I stripped off my wet suit on the way back and stored it with my other gear in my crate. When I left the boat I had my camera and my now soaking wet t-shirt. As I mentioned earlier, we’d gotten a few scattered showers on the way to the dive site and my shirt had gotten damp. I decided not to put it in my dry bag because of that. I used one of the outdoor showers at Evolution to rinse off, then dried off and purchased a new t-shirt in the office. By now the rain had stopped. I had dinner then headed to my room.

I wrote about Monad Shoal last month and the logistics at Evolution, so I will just write about the dives this time. I did 4 dives at Monad during this visit. As I mentioned in my last blog article on Malapascua Island, there can be several days a month when sharks are not seen. Lot’s of things affect sightings. Everything from what phase the moon is in, too to much current.

As luck would have it, I did run into some weather (the rain that showed up the first night was a strong indicator). Not terrible weather, although we did get some scattered showers the next couple of days. There was some wind and current was running. Current can affect shark sightings.

The first day I saw a pufferfish resting inside a bowl formed by coral. I also spotted anemonefish, triggerfish, clam’s, and of course nudibranchs, but no sharks. The second day I saw one thresher shark, very briefly at the beginning of the dive. Also saw what appeared to be the same pufferfish resting inside the same coral formation as the day before! Spotted a nudibranch (Chromodoris magnifica), a dragon sea moth creeping along, anemone’s, clam’s, and more nudibranchs. On the third day, I grabbed some photos of a jellyfish up in the water column. There were trevally swimming by and all the usual suspects… but no sharks.

Jellyfish at Monad Shoal… I thought given how “blue” it was that it would look better converted to black and white… What do y’all think?

The 4th and last day I had a good feeling about it. The wind had died down and there was very little current. As we were getting ready to descend, Jo, who knew I’d dived the previous three mornings with only one brief sighting, called out to me and asked how many sharks we would see today? I said the first number that popped into my head “Five”! As it turned out we did see five sharks! We were observing sharks almost the entire dive. Awesome!

Divers observing a thresher shark at Monad Shoal.

This is one of the reasons I encourage people who are planning on visiting Malapascua to plan at least 4-6 days if they can, depending on how many dives they are doing a day. I’ve stayed as little as 4 days twice now and still saw sharks. Normally in the past I stayed at least a week and once stayed for a month! Yes I really like the diving in Malapascua.

On Sunday, April 16th after diving Monad Shoal, I went to Chocolate Island in the morning. Chocolate Island is about 30-35 minutes by boat and is between Malapascua Island and Cebu. I really enjoy Chocolate Island. There are normally a good variety of nudibranchs there and the corals are in really good shape. It’s fairly shallow and the walls of the island taper down to a sandy bottom. I’ve photographed frogfish there in the past, although I didn’t see any on this particular morning. I was in the water at 10:08 AM. Chocolate Island is also known for nudibranchs and I would see 5 different species by the end of the dive. There were the usual lizardfish waiting for a meal to swim by. Neon damselfish were everywhere. Grouper (lapu-lapu in Tagalog), a toby with a cleaner shrimp hitching a ride, and threadfin hawkfish it seemed everywhere you looked! Saw a few different species of pufferfish and some beautiful anemone’s. Cardinalfish, lionfish, more toby’s, a seahorse, and a white-eyed moray. Anemonefish (of course), and a couple of small cuttlefish. The great variety and beautiful corals is one of the things I love about Chocolate Island. I would end up with a 56 minute dive with a maximum depth of 48 feet. Water temperature was 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

Neon Damselfish at Chocolate Island

The afternoon dive was at Secret Wall. Secret Wall is another site that isn’t that far from the dive op, so we start getting ready once the boat pulls away. The dive started at 1:49 PM. This dive has a short wall that bottoms out into a wide sandy area. On top of the wall, there is a large area of soft corals, and lot’s of life! The dive started with a nudibranch, and as we made our way along the wall, there were lot’s of things to see. The “usual suspects” I’ve called them before 🙂 Hawkfish of course. Lionfish, pygmy seahorse, beautiful corals, more lionfish, filefish, crinoids, wrasse, damselfish, grouper, goatfish in the sandy areas… a really nice dive! I ended up with a 43 minute dive with a maximum depth of 79 feet. Water temperature was 76 degrees Fahrenheit.

On Monday, April 17th the morning dive after Monad Shoal was Bugtong Bato. The dive site is about 15 minutes away of the northwest corner of Malapascua Island. It of course has another wall and also a sloping reef that bottoms out around 100 feet. I would hit a maximum depth of 85 feet on this dive. I saw 4 different species of nudibranchs (can you tell I’m a bit obsessed with nudibranchs?), and lot’s of beautiful corals. Butterflyfish were everwhere, as well as all the usual reef fish, from hawkfish, to damselfish, to wrasse, and anthia’s. A very nice dive that lasted 47 minutes. Water temperature was 78 degrees Fahrenheit.

Halgerda carlsoni photographed at Bugtong Bato near Malapascua Island.

The third dive of the day was at Bantigue. Bantigue is very close by. By the time you get your wetsuit on, it’s time to start gearing up! It’s a nice dive with mostly sandy bottom, so a muck dive. You can see a bit of coral towards the end. This dive is really about macro for the most part. I spotted a tiny cuttlefish near the beginning of the dive that was probably less than six inches! There was a hermit crab crawling along the sandy bottom. A mantis shrimp peering out of it’s hole. A glass anemone shrimp hiding between the branches of a soft coral. Flounder which is fairly common on the sandy bottom. Goby’s were in abundance. I spotted a very tiny nudibranch. It was hard to tell the species it was so tiny!

A tiny nudibranch photographed at Bantique near Malapascua Island.

A couple areas of debris had coral growing on it and a retinue of cardinalfish surrounding it, facing into the slight current. I’d been asked ahead of time if it were okay as it was me and two new divers. We ended up back at the boat after only 39 minutes. I still had over a 100 bar left in my tank! I’d half expected it though, so I wasn’t really surprised. I could have opted to do a different dive. Maximum depth was 46 feet. Water temperature was 78 F.

Cardinalfish at Bantigue.

The fourth dive of the day was again at Bantigue and was a night dive. The dive started at 5:54 PM. This would turn out to be a really great dive. I was diving with a diver from Hong Kong who was also experienced. Started with pipefish right at the beginning, followed by an anemone crab. We would see anemone crabs throughout the dive which is common on night dives in Malapascua. There was a lizardfish, damselfish, and a pufferfish. We saw banded boxer coral shrimp in several places.

Banded Boxer Coral Shrimp photographed on a night dive at Bantigue near Malapascua Island.

A large leopard flounder and then a small devil scorpionfish, half buried in the sand that reminded me of how important it is to check whenever you’re close to the bottom! A couple of old tires proved to be home to numerous banded boxer coral shrimp and little tiny transparent shrimp! I believe they were Urocaridella antonbruunii. They’re so tiny it’s always a challenge to get a photo.

Tiny shrimp photographed on a night dive at Bantigue.

I saw a couple of tobies that were still active. Saltwater catfish, a shortfin lionfish out hunting (I rarely see them during the day), then an octopus that I used my red light to get close to for a photo. A flatworm, another shortfin lionfish (this was the red variation), and a filefish. It turned out to be a very productive dive! The dive was 64 minutes with a maximum depth of 46 feet. Water temperature was 80 F.

Shortfin Lionfish photographed during a night dive at Bantique.

On Tuesday, April 18th, after the morning dive at Monad, I threw my camera battery on charge in preparation for the trip to Gato Island. My Canon G16 battery is normally good for 3 dives. Occasionally, depending how much I shoot, it could die towards the end of the 3rd dive though. I didn’t want this happening at Gato!

Gato Island is about 45-50 minutes by boat from Malapascua Island. It’s a day trip, as I’ve written before. Because of the distance, you go over and do two dives with lunch in between before coming back. The weather had really cleared up and it was a beautiful sunny day!

The first dive at Gato was the Cave which is actually a tunnel going under the island. The dive started at 10:17 AM. Right at the entrance to the tunnel I photographed a Phyllidia varicosa nudibranch. There were the usual hermit and anemone crabs inside the tunnel and a small school of catfish. As we approached the exit we could see a whitetip reef shark that was actively swimming about and I took a photo. As we got closer it turned and swam towards me and then right past me, almost close enough to touch! I snapped a photo as it went by, but unfortunately the photo is a little soft, probably from my moving out of the way!

As we exited the tunnel I photographed a lionfish that seemed like it wanted to pose for a few photos.

Lionfish at Gato Island.

A huge crab was scuttling along across the rocks and I photographed it as well. It continued to be a typical dive at Gato Island. Lot’s of life and lots of variety.

There is a huge crab in this photo. Can you see it?

Cardinalfish, damselfish, ornate ghost pipefish, lizardfish, threadfin hawkfish, more nudibranchs of course. A grouper that actually held still long enough for several shots (imagine that!).

Grouper at Gato Island.

A nice seahorse to finish up with. Very nice dive. Dive time was 59 minutes with a maximum depth of 65 feet. Water temperature was 79 F.

Seahorse at Gato Island.

After lunch we moved the boat and started our second dive at exactly 12:30 PM. One of the first things I saw on the second dive was the shed skin of a sea snake. Not surprising as Gato Island is sanctuary and a breeding area for them. There were a couple of species of nudibranchs, one was another Phyllidia varicosa. The other I’ve not identified yet (I actually have a fair number of those which I’ll get around to identifying at some point). The next thing I spotted was a beautiful Thorny Seahorse that was almost completely white. I couldn’t remember ever seeing one that color before so I took several photos. After that another nudibranch, this one a Nembrotha lineolata I photographed some of the beautiful corals at Gato Island on this dive.

Seahorse at Gato Island.

One thing we saw during this dive which was a bit shocking was a large (by comparison) wrasse going after an anemonefish. I didn’t see the beginning of it, but the anemonefish was literally ripped apart! Anemonefish can be quite aggressive… I’ve had them actually nip me while taking photographs. I think it picked on the wrong target!

Orange cup coral and tree corals are some of my favorites because of their color and they’re everywhere. I photographed another school of catfish, banded boxer coral shrimp, anemonefish, and pufferfish. More nudibranchs, including a Nembrotha cristata. Squat shrimp, anemone crab, and a grouper to round things out.

My last dive of this visit was on the morning of Wednesday, April 19th at Monad Shoal where, as I described earlier, we would see 5 thresher sharks. After returning from that dive, I washed my gear and sat it out to dry. I had breakfast, then went to my room to pick up my things and check out. I’d packed the night before. I returned to Evolution, settled my bill and packed my dive gear. The desk called someone to help me get my bags to the port area. Quite a feat to get my dive gear bag, my Pelican case for all my camera gear, and 2 people on a motorbike!

At the port I bought a ticket on the ferry that dropped us at the old port. I hired two motorbikes to take me and my gear to the new port where I could catch a bus back to Cebu City. 50 pesos each. The bus left at 12:05 PM and I was at the South Bus Terminal in Cebu City by 5:15 PM. From there I caught a taxi to the Travelbee Business Inn for a good nights rest before heading to Dumaguete.

I’m gaining… less than 3 weeks behind now 🙂 I’ll be headed to Anilao on Friday, May 12th so there will be more after I finish Dumaguete which I’ve already outlined. Stay tuned!

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

ADEX 2017-Singapore

I’ve been aware of ADEX (Asia Dive Expo) for years and have often thought about attending. It’s the oldest dive show in Asia, having been around for 22 years now. I’d seen an advertisement back in January and started thinking about it more. At the time though I was more focused on dealing with the aftermath of my heart attack and getting back to diving. Once I was cleared to dive in March, I went on a mini-tour of the Philippines which you can read about here in my blog.

When I returned from Cebu on March 27th I had planned only to edit photos and try to catch up on my blog. I did do some of that. I also spent some time hanging out with friends and just generally relaxing. Maybe a little too much or I wouldn’t still be a month behind on my blog!

On Thursday, March 30th I was chatting with a friend in Japan and mentioned ADEX. My friend encouraged me to go. I had thought about attending in previous years… why not now? I pulled up the Cebu Pacific website and bought a ticket on the spot. It was only a $198 dollars 🙂 I decided I would fly on Thursday, April 6th and attend all 3 days of the expo. I reserved a flight back to the Philippines on Monday the 10th.

I’ll talk a bit about flying in and out of Clark mainly because it’s so much easier than Manila! I’d had a conversation with a taxi driver when I’d returned from Cebu and he’d filled me in on the ways to get back and forth to the airport. A metered taxi was a bit over a 100 pesos to SM Clark or the Main Gate Jeepney Terminal. A private car shouldn’t cost more than a couple 100 pesos. 300 without haggling to much. To put that in perspective that’s about $6 bucks for 15 minute ride. It turns out there is a jeepney that goes back and forth as well for only 50 pesos… around a buck. At the Main Gate Terminal there is actually a lounge for passengers waiting to go to the airport, although it turns out that it doesn’t open till 9 AM. I was there early and took the jeepney! After all, every dollar I save is more money for diving and trips 🙂

My flight was departing at 12:25 PM on Cebu Pacific direct to Singapore so I had plenty of time. I really like flying in and out of Clark as opposed to Manila. Any chance to avoid the traffic in Manila, I take advantage of! I had time to have a cup of coffee before going to check in.

Check in was quick since I had only my carry-on bag. From the check-in counter I headed over to pay my terminal fee. All international passengers pay 600 pesos. From there I went through immigration where they stamped my passport, then through security, where my bag was x-rayed again and I went through another metal detector.

Right around noon they started ferrying passengers out to the plane by bus. Once the plane was loaded we took off a little behind schedule, but they would end up making that up on the flight to Singapore. Cebu Pacific is known as a low cost airline. Part of the savings are in the nature of meals and baggage. They have a base price and then you can add on. In my case, I had a sandwich before boarding the plane and I’d brought a few snacks with me. I had only my carry-on bag since I was just going for the weekend, so I didn’t pay for things I wasn’t using.

On my Cebu Pacific flight waiting for the plane to take off.

We landed just after 4 PM. The stewardess had passed out D/E (Disembarkation/Embarkation) cards on the flight and I had mine already filled out. Immigration was relatively painless. At the immigration counter I presented the completed D/E card together with my passport to the immigration officer. I was questioned about why I was coming to Singapore and I responded that I was attending the Asia Dive Expo. In Singapore they have a scanner for thumbprints. Once they were scanned she stamped my passport and both portions of the D/E card. The Embarkation portion of the card was inserted in my passport and I was waved on my way.

If you’re visiting Singapore for any length of time I highly recommend getting a local sim card and a Smartcard to ride the local buses and trains. They have really great public transportation in Singapore! My phone has dual sim card capability and I still had my sim card from my previous time in Singapore. I had went online and re-loaded it the night before.

I turned my phone on as soon as we were allowed too. I sent a text to my friend Jackie who was picking me up to let him know the plane had landed. After passing through immigration and customs (another x-ray machine there), I passed out and through the doors into the public area of the terminal. Jackie told me to look over the door that exited outside and tell him the number so he would know where I was and I did so. I went outside and stood by the curb and he picked me up. From there he gave me a ride to the same hotel I’d stayed in after I’d left the hospital in December.

I’d also brought my Smartcard that I’d previously had in Singapore. I still had load left on the card and I was able to use it to ride the local buses and trains. It’s very convenient and much easier than paying cash for each ticket. You can purchase them from any General Ticket Office or Passenger Service Center. I use data extensively when I’m in Singapore. I access Google Maps on my smartphone, put in the address, and it tells me which bus to catch, where I can get on, and where I should get off, along with a map and how far I should walk. Very simple!

The next morning I was up early so I could have breakfast. I went to one of my favorite restaurants in Singapore, Tolido’s Espresso Nook before heading to Suntec Singapore Convention and Exhibition Centre. It was a great breakfast as usual… probably the reasons I keep eating there 😉

Before coming I’d tried to buy a couple of shirts online at the ADEX 2017 website. The shirts included free entry to the expo. Unfortunately there had been glitch and I couldn’t complete my order because they didn’t have an option to pick the shirts up at the expo. I didn’t want the shirts sent to my US address since I won’t be returning to the US before July! I went to the desk and was escorted inside where I not only was able to purchase my shirts, but also received some free goodies as well. Afterwards I started walking around the expo checking out all the latest dive gear, meeting people from various manufactures, and talking to people from different dive operations, and chatting with people representing different environmental and ecological causes related to our oceans.

What I enjoy about these types of events is the opportunity to meet and socialize with so many people who love the same things you do. There were literally thousands of people there who all shared a love of diving and the ocean!

I ended up doing a lot of walking over the weekend and met lots of nice and interesting people. I had the chance to attend some interesting photography seminars and see some presentations on areas of the world that I’ve been thinking about diving.

On Friday I met Amelia Lassetter (Mermaid Amelia) who is a professional mermaid and photographer from Australia; and Jessica Bell (Mermaid Jessica Pearl) who along with being a mermaid is also an accomplished free diver, photographer, and artist. Together they are The Perth Mermaids. Their website is: http://www.perthmermaids.com/ Very nice ladies and I had a great conversation with them. They encouraged me to visit Perth and experience some of the great scuba diving there. I also briefly said hello to Alexis Vassal from France (Merman Arion).

I also finally met Mike Veitch, one of the co-founders of Underwater Tribe and a quite famous underwater photographer. He won the “World in Our Hands” Award at the BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2013. Find him on the web at www.mikeveitchblog.com/ It was quite entertaining that we both immediately recognized each other even though it was our first time meeting in person after knowing one another for 10 years online. I love Mike’s work and it was great to meet him finally! We met in the Philippine Paradise Divers forum on scubaboard.com years ago when I first started diving the Philippines in 2007. I also met Luca Vaime who works with Mike. Luca did a couple of great presentations at the expo. On Friday he did “The A-Z of Preparing a Filming Project” and on Sunday a presentation on “Photographing and Filming the Reef”. Their website is http://www.underwatertribe.com/

One of the interesting people I met was Bart Lucasik. Bart was at the “Africa is not for Sissies” booth and I had the opportunity to chat with him for a bit about Africa a place I’ve wanted to visit and dive for a while now. We had a great conversation and I was able to attend his presentation on Saturday morning where he did a talk titled “The Lagoon-Shallow Water Diving in Search of the Weird and Amazing Creatures”. It was quite interesting. Africa is a place that is still high on my list! Bart has spent the last 5 years diving and filming in Africa. Great presentation! Their Facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/AfricaIsNotForSissies/

One highlight for me was the opportunity the first evening to see Rob Stewart’s film “Revolution. I’d not had the opportunity to see it before and I can tell you that in the same way that Sharkwater opened peoples eyes to the tragedy of shark finning, Revolution is still opening peoples eyes to the dangers of overfishing, ocean acidification, and climate change. I don’t think anyone could walk away after watching the film and not feel touched! I encourage you to seek out more information, starting with visiting the website at http://therevolutionmovie.com/

On Saturday I met Marty Snyderman, who is an Emmy Award winner for his underwater cinematography work and is also the Marine Life Editor at Dive Training magazine. I’m a big fan of Marty’s work. He gave a really interesting talk on Histograms and I walked away feeling like I finally had a grasp on it (I came to digital photography quite late 😉 ). His website is: http://www.martysnyderman.com/

Iris Baula one of my friends from the Philippines and another alumni of the Philippine Paradise Divers group on scubaboard.com showed up on Saturday. We got to hang out for a while and walk around the show and catch up. It didn’t take 10 years to meet Iris 😉   In June 2008, at the end of my third Philippines trip I met many of the members of the Philippine Paradise Divers group from www.scubaboard.com for the first time. Iris is a Marine Biologist and is working in Singapore. Iris also visited me in the hospital when I had my heart attack in November in Singapore while heading back to the Philippines from the US. I can tell you it was nice to see a friendly face 🙂 Iris and Mike have known each other going back to when Mike was spending a lot of time in the Philippines. We hung out at the Underwater Tribe’s booth for a bit and chatted with Mike.

I spent the afternoon on Sunday hanging out with my friend Cindy Madduma, also from the Philippines. Cindy was Miss Scuba International in 2015. She is also a NAUI Divemaster and OceanQuest-Asia Coral Propagation Instructor. You can find her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/cindypaciamadduma/ Cindy introduced me to Devina Mahendriyana, Miss Scuba International Indonesia 2016. She is an architect and avid scuba diver. We walked around the Expo and everywhere we went people wanted to pose for a photo with them 🙂 Her Facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/cindypaciamadduma/

One place we stopped was at the Bali Sharks Rescue Center booth. We spoke with the founder, Paul Friese who spoke very passionately about the work they are doing in Indonesia which has the notoriety of being the number one shark killing country in the world. In 2011 Indonesia exported over 316 tons of shark fins that year alone! The Bali Sharks Rescue Center was founded to combat that. They are doing this through education and the creation of the worlds first rescue and release program. They also have eco-tours in which people can actually interact with sharks at their rescue center. Their website is http://www.balisharks.com They can be found on Facebook also.

Miss Scuba International 2015-Cindy Madduma, along with Miss SI Indonesia 2016-Devina Mahendriyani, chat with Paul Friese of Bali Sharks Rescue Center.

On Sunday I also met world-renowned photographer Amanda Cotton. Amanda and I have been Facebook friends for years but this was the first time we had really met. Amanda’s work has been published in National Geographic, BBC, Discovery, Smithsonian Magazine, Times Publishing, CNN, Scuba Diving Magazine, Sport Diver Magazine, Natural History Magazine, Earthweek, and Science Daily, as well as any other places. It was great to meet someone who’s work has been such a personal inspiration to me!

I was also introduced to Annuar Abdullah on Sunday by Cindy Madduma. He is the founder of Ocean Quest SEA. They have partnered with Sea Shepherd in offering Coral Propagation courses to help rebuild damaged reefs. Again this is very important work and I hope you will take the time to learn more about their program. You can start at their website at http://www.seashepherdglobal.org/dive/coral-courses.html

The folks from Sea Shepherd have teamed up with Ocean Quest to help rebuild damaged coral reefs.

All in all it was great show. I met and hung out with lots of great people who share my love of scuba diving and the ocean. I attended some great seminars and I got to look at all the latest and greatest gear. I even picked up a few photo accessories to bring back to the Philippines!

Sunday night I hung out with friends. On Monday afternoon my friend Jackie picked me up at the hotel and dropped me at the airport. My flight was at 4:45 PM. We were landing at Clark International Airport in Pampanga at 8:25 PM. A great weekend!

I’m actually less than a month behind now 🙂 On April 14th I flew back to Cebu and I will be writing about that trip next. I returned to Malapascua Island (one of my favorite dive destinations in the Philippines) and then headed down to Dumaguete to participate in a photo contest.

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

Malapascua-Part Two

Gato Island is one of my favorites when I visit Malapascua. It’s about 45 minutes by boat from Evolution. It’s a day trip. After the first dive, lunch is served. After lunch there is a second dive, then return to the dive shop. It’s a protected breeding area for the sea krait (sea snake) and I’ve seen them on a regular basis. It’s a great spot for nudibranchs, ornate ghost pipefish, and frogfish, as well as white tip reef sharks. One dive will normally include the “Tunnel” where you enter on the northeast side of the island and exit on the west side. I’ve often seen sharks in the tunnel on the west side. This is “technically” a cavern dive. You’re diving in an overhead environment, but you never completely lose light from one opening or the other. It’s relatively safe as the chance of a silt-out is nil and you can’t get lost. It is quite dark in the middle so a light is a necessity!

Our guide for this dive was Gino. When I returned to diving in 2014 after a break of almost 4 years (I was working in the middle east for a big chunk of that), I made a trip to Malapascua Island and stayed a week. Gino was my guide for almost every dive that week and took very good care of me. It was Gino who spotted a warty frogfish on a night dive that was maybe an inch and a half big. On another night dive he pointed out a tiny juvenile bobtail squid smaller than my fingernail! He is an amazing spotter!

As with Monad, everyone starts gearing up as we approach so that as soon as we arrive, we can jump in. It was just Gino, myself, and one other diver. My dive started at 10:50 AM. We started through the tunnel and right near the entrance I spotted an anemonecrab. Crabs are quite common in the tunnel. Not unexpectedly, as we exited the tunnel, there was a white tip reef shark, actively moving about.

A white tip reef shark swims around near the exit to the tunnel at Gato Island.

There are a number of swim-through’s we passed through as we made our way around. I photographed a cowrie with it’s mantle partially extruded, then a banded boxer coral shrimp under an overhang. Then we came upon three cuttlefish. We stopped and observed them for a few minutes. I took a few photos and then switched to video. Perhaps it was two males and a female? As I was videoing, one cuttlefish appeared to violently go after the other one. I reflexively tightened my grip on my housing and my thumb stopped the video! The one cuttlefish decided to depart the area and the attacking one came back. We looked at each other and shrugged, that was interesting.. then continued with our dive.

Cuttlefish at Gato Island.

It was a very nice dive. Gino spotted an ornate ghost pipefish near a crinoid, I found a couple of nudibranchs, and a pufferfish, lionfish, scorpionfish, more nudibranchs. I would end up photographing 8 different species of nudibranchs at Gato! This first dive at Gato ended up being 58 minutes with a maximum depth of 64 feet and a water temperature of 77F. Very nice dive!

Scorpionfish at Gato Island.

For lunch we had chicken with a nice curry sauce, vegetables and rice. There were bananas for dessert. Lunch out of the way we waited until we’d had an hour surface interval, then started gearing up for the second dive. We started our 2nd dive at 1:07 PM. The second dive was more of the first. More nudibranchs, pipefish, lionfish, an octopus, hermit crab, a seahorse, and a nice frogfish. Another white tip reef shark, this one sleeping. Dive time was 50 minutes with a maximum depth of 72 feet. Water temperature was again 77F.

As we were getting back to the boat, my buddy who we were diving with told me he was sorry he’d dropped the light I’d loaned him just before the dive. He was very apologetic and said he’d buy me a new light. I told him not to worry about it as these things happen. Gino said he’d go back and look for it. We were both saying there was no way he would find it. By the time Gino’s head popped up we were already back on the boat and had our gear off. I was standing at the bow as Gino swam back. As he approached the boat, I said, “didn’t find it did you?”. His response was to hold up the light! The ability of Filipino dive guides continues to amaze me even after all these years!

Once everyone was back on-board we got underway back to Malapascua Island. We were back before 3:30. I had brought all my chargers with me that morning and left them in the office at Evolution. As soon as we were back, I gave everything a quick rinse and then dried it off and started pulling batteries. I wanted to allow them to charge as long as possible before heading out for the night dive later. I had a bit less than 2 hours so I was hoping for the best!

I ended up at the bar in The Craic House having a mango shake and working on photos since I had also brought my laptop and left it in the office. I did a bit of writing and killed time waiting for the next dive to start. After an hour I started checking my batteries. At 5:15 we had the brief and by 5:30 we were on our way to Pipefish Bay. It’s very close so we started gearing up almost immediately once we were on the boat. There were 4 people diving plus the dive guide.

My dive started at 5:48 PM. Alex was the dive guide again. It wasn’t quite full dark yet, but it was close enough. I think I enjoy this time for the same reason I enjoy Monad Shoal in the morning. At twilight, you get that mixture of day and night. We see activities associated with both. My first photo was a nudibranch, Chromodoris magnifica. There were pipefish everywhere, making “Pipefish Bay” an apt name. Lionfish were still out and about. The usual assortment of crabs were in abundance including hermit crabs and anemone crabs. I spotted a twinspot lionfish, a fish I rarely see during the day. That was followed by a pair of ornate ghost pipefish. There were rabbitfish, and banded boxer coral shrimp of which I saw several throughout the dive. All in all a very nice dive. I ended up with a 60 minute dive with a maximum depth of 46 feet and water temperatures at 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

Crab photographed on a dive at Pipefish Bay.

By 7:15 we were all back at Evolution. I rinsed my camera gear, wiped it down and removed my camera. Then closed it back up. I ordered dinner and had a beer and reviewed photos while waiting for it. Once I’d finished dinner, I headed for my room at Sharks Tale. It had been a long day and I was getting up early again the next morning to go dive with the thresher sharks again. Once I reached my room, I put everything on charge, grabbed a shower and went to sleep.

My alarm woke me at 4:15 AM on Saturday the 25th. My last dive day of the trip as I was headed back to Cebu City the next day. I got up, washed my face and got dressed. I set up my camera which basically consisted of inserting a fully charged battery into my camera, and then inserting the camera into the housing, and then closing it up.

When I was ready, I walked out my door and down the stairs, carefully because it was still dark outside! There are no streetlights in Malapascua (no streets really as there are no 4 wheeled vehicles that I’m aware of). Lot’s of paths cross and cris-cross the island. A flashlight isn’t a bad idea! Evolution is about a 5 minute walk from Sharks Tail. I was at the dive op about 10 minutes early for the 4:45 AM dive brief.

The process in the morning runs pretty much the same everyday. After the brief the process from the day before repeated. After boarding the boat and checking our boxes, the boat got underway for Monad. This morning our guide was Jo, another long time guide at Evolution. I remember doing a dive with him at Gato Island last year and we were followed by a group from another dive shop. Jo would spot something and I’d start taking photos. I’d look over my shoulder and the guide from the other shop was there looking to see what Jo had spotted 😀 I’d look over my shoulder as I finned away and he’d be showing his group what I’d just photographed. This happened a few times and we had a good laugh about it back on the boat! At 5:46 AM (a whole minute earlier than the day before) I was starting my first dive of the day.

This morning as the day before, visibility was about 30-40 feet. Unlike the day before, we were looking at sharks almost the entire dive! When we reached the first viewing station, we saw sharks almost immediately, what appeared to be 2. They circled in and out of sight for several minutes, then they were gone. We moved on to a second viewing spot. On our way there a shark crossed in front of us. After reaching the second viewing spot, again within a few minutes, we had a pair of sharks circling in front of us which we were able to observe for several minutes. Likely we saw at least 5 sharks. I say likely because reality is that while they were circling in front of us, they were circling in and out of view due to visibility. It’s often difficult to know exactly how “many” sharks you’ve seen because of that. Unfortunately, this morning I didn’t have a shark come close enough for a really sharp photo, but it was still awesome just to see them! I ended up with a 44 minute dive. My maximum depth was again 77 feet and water temperature was 80 degrees Fahrenheit… a degree warmer than the day before.

Divers observing a thresher shark at Monad Shoal.

My second dive of the day was at Bugtong Bato. As one of the dive sites around Malapascua Island itself, it only takes about 15 minutes to reach there from the resort. Bugtong Bato is a small pinnacle. The top of the pinnacle is at about 50 feet and covered in corals. It descends to a sandy bottom at around a 100 feet. I really enjoy this dive site. There is a large school of batfish that hang out there and plenty of macro opportunities. For this dive we had Gino again. It didn’t take long for him to spot a nudibranch for me and by the time the dive was over we would find six different species, including a couple I’d not seen before! Also spotted plenty of fish, including rainbow runner, snapper, cardinalfish. Gino spotted a nice snowflake moray eel (Echidna nebulosa). Not uncommon, but not as common as the white eyed moray that I see on a regular basis in the Philippines. All in all a nice dive that ended up being only 36 minutes as we spent a bit too much time near the bottom of the pinnacle. Maximum depth was 86 feet and water temperature was 78 F.

Snowflake Moray
Eel (Echidna nebulosa) at Bugtong Bato.

Butong Bato would be a good dive for nitrox although I don’t normally dive nitrox much these days. Not because I don’t see the advantages of it, but because I’m normally diving so much that it would just add up to less diving for me. I’m “retired” now and I have to watch my budget sometimes so I can continue to travel and dive. Having said that I do still occasionally dive nitrox, but usually only if I’m diving in a group of people are using it.

After we the dive we headed back to Evolution and I had a leisurely lunch at The Craic House. It’s probably one of the best restaurants on the island, which probably explains why I eat there so much!

The last dive of the day was at Deep Slope. The briefing was at 1:15 PM and we were underway shortly after. Deep Slope lies off the northeast tip of Malapascua Island. The plan was to follow the mooring line down, then make our way around a short wall and then up a sandy slope back to the top. We had Gino as our dive guide once again.

Right at the beginning of the dive we saw a dragonnet. I still haven’t figured out the exact species so if anyone would like to help I’d appreciate it! Again lot’s of life here around Malapascua Island. Next was a nudibranch, then a pair of banded pipefish. Grouper, lionfish, a toby, another nudibranch, and then a white eyed moray. A twin-spotted lionfish, then another white-eyed moray. Yet another nudibranch, a cuttlefish, then a pair of filefish. A fifth species of nudibranch, wrasse, cowfish, and a school of catfish fry. The dive ended up being 54 minutes with a maximum depth of 71 feet. Water temperature was again 80 degrees Fahrenheit.

That night I packed after dinner and went to bed early. The next morning I settled my bill at Sharks Tale, then went and did the same at Evolution. I decided that although I was going to take a break, that I would come back to Malapascua Island after attending ADEX in Singapore. I left my dive gear and my underwater photography gear at Evolution, rather than carry it. The next morning after breakfast, I headed to the ferry terminal at the port. I purchased my ticket for a 100 pesos. As it was low tide a small boat took us out to the ferry that was moored in deeper water. 20 pesos for the trip out. We were dropped off at the old pier in Maya. I was lucky to catch a ride with a fellow American who was hiring a taxi for the trip back. 1500 pesos, but we were in Cebu City in just 2 1/2 hours, half the time of the bus! I checked in too Kiwi Lodge. After cleaning up and resting for a bit, I grabbed a taxi to Ayala Mall and had a bite to eat. Then called it an early night.

The next morning I was up early for the free breakfast. The desk sent someone to wave down a taxi for me. I was on my way to the airport by 7:30 AM As expected, taxi fare in a white taxi ended up being significantly less than it was in the yellow taxi. Only a 184 pesos!

In Cebu as at other airport in the Philippines, I passed through security, including metal detector and baggage x-ray before going to the check-in counter. Since I had no bags to check, I’d checked in online and took a screenshot of my boarding pass and saved it on my phone. I went directly to the gate passing through security again before going to the area of the gates. My flight was at 10:35 AM and I reached Clark International Airport in Pampanga a little after noon.

My trip had started on March 9th, the day after my cardiologist agreed that I had recovered enough to dive again after my heart attack in November while transiting Singapore (read about it elsewhere in my blog). I started in Puerto Galera, then Subic Bay, followed by Moalboal, and finishing in Malapascua. 21 dives in two weeks.

Time for a break!

Next I’ll be writing about my weekend at ADEX (Asia Dive Expo) in Singapore. Then my return to Malapascua Island and weekend in Dumaguete competing in the annual “SEA (Small Exotic Animals) Philippines” photo contest.

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up now. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

Malapascua-Part One

After a decent nights sleep, I woke up on Wednesday, March 22nd (yes my blog is over a month behind but I’m going to catch up I promise!), had breakfast, then had the desk call a taxi. The North Bus Station in Cebu City is about the same distance from Kiwi Lodge as the South Bus Station. A short ride to the bus station and then I was on a bus headed to Maya. 5 hours later we arrived at the pier in Maya.

At Maya the bus lets you out at the new pier. You’ll be asked to log in with the tourist association, then you will purchase a ticket. Price of a ticket on the ferry is a 100 pesos. When the boat was ready we were directed to the boat and someone took our tickets. Be prepared to wade through the water (usually not more than ankle deep) to a ramp to get up on the boat. About 35 minutes later we were walking off the boat at Bounty Beach.

I should add here that last year when I spent 4 weeks on Malapascua Island that I came and went 4 times. Only one of those times did the ferry go to Bounty Beach. When I was in Malapascua again a couple of weeks ago, we were also dropped off at Bounty Beach so perhaps this is something new. What was more normal last year was to go to the port and if it were low tide, a small boat would transport us for 20 pesos. Again, be prepared to get your feet wet.

I opted to stay at Purple Snapper which is under new management and ownership. I knew from having stayed there last year, that the rooms were much more inexpensive than anything I would find on the beach! When I arrived I discovered everything was in the process of being changed over, including the name which has been changed to Sharks Tail. Interestingly enough, I again ended up in the same room that I’d stayed at on my last visit when I stayed for 4 weeks last April. As I’ve said in other blog posts, I often will get the least expensive room. This usually turns out to be a fan room with no television in some places.

Unlike my last trip, the bar and kitchen were open this time, and there was water in the swimming pool! Last year the pool was empty! I met Greg, the new manager, and it sounds like they’re really going to do a lot with the place.

Although I was offered the opportunity to dive with Shark’s Tail, I opted to dive with Evolution. Nothing against Shark’s Tale, but I’ve been diving with Evolution since 2010 and don’t feel any need to go somewhere else. I’ve been very happy with their operation which I consider to be a very professional one.

I was in Malapascua again just over a week ago and have done over 80 dives with Evolution now. At present I’ve done over a 100 dives in Malapascua. I made my first dive there in October 2007. I’ve not gone every year, but I have made six trips now… there must be some reason I keep going back!

This trip I was only planning 3 dive days. I was exhausted after the long bus ride so I opted NOT to get up early for the shark dive. Instead there was trip going to Kalanggaman Island the next day and of course I signed up!

Kalanggaman Island technically is in Leyte so it’s a bit of boat ride to get there. It’s an all day trip. It leaves around 9 AM and takes an hour and a half to two hours to get there, depending on weather of course. There is an extra fee involved of course because of the long boat ride, 650 pesos, which also included lunch. There is also a Marine Fee charged by the Leyte government of 500 pesos, so yes you are paying an extra 575 pesos per dive (don’t forget lunch is included though). I always try to go to Kalanggaman every time I visit Malapascua though. The diving is just that amazing!

Kalanggaman Island is wall diving for the most part. You drop in over a sandy area, then swim over the wall and descend from there. Visibility is often well over 50 feet to as much as a 100 feet!

Wall diving at Kalanggaman Island.

After a good nights sleep and breakfast at The Craic House (Evolution Dive Resorts restaurant), we had our briefing at 8:45 AM. By 9 AM everyone was on the boat and we were underway.

I always try to sit in the middle of the boat. I’m one of those people who just cannot get a tan it seems. I can get very red though! It was a nice relaxing trip. The weather was absolutely beautiful! As we were approaching the island a pod of dolphins was spotted and the boat briefly followed them. Sometimes dolphins seem to want to play and will race along in front of the boat, with occasional leaps into the air, like they are just having fun with us! Today though they seemed to have other things on their agenda so we continued on to the island.

At 10:55 we were starting our first dive. Our guide was Mette Hallum who is a dive instructor from Denmark. I actually have a photo of her from a dive on Monad Shoal last year. Right at the beginning of the dive there was an eagle ray hanging out near the mooring line and I took several photos of Mette shooting video of an eagle ray with her GoPro.

I’m never disappointed when I dive Kalanggaman. Visibility was easily 50-60 feet. Right at the beginning of the dive Mette spotted a black frogfish. I never seem to get tired of photographing frogfish! There are loads of hard and soft corals at Kalanggaman Island and they are in good shape. You can see schools of jacks and rainbow runners. Lots of wrasse and damselfish. Scorpionfish, frogfish, nudibranchs, triggerfish, parrotfish, schools of anthia’s, hawkfish sitting on coral, just waiting to swoop somewhere, coleman shrimp, anemonefish, ghost shrimp, butterflyfish,… all the “usual suspects” as I’m prone to call them. Water temperature was 78 degrees Fahrenheit and my maximum depth ended up being 88 feet. The dive ended up being 44 minutes.

Frogfish at Kalanggaman Island.

During the surface interval we pulled in too shore and had lunch. After lunch we were able to get off the boat and walk around the island. There are a few basic facilities there, but no water or food. You have to bring your own. I walked around the island a bit and snapped a few photos then back to the boat. The boat pulled out again and we headed to do our second dive.

Evolution’s dive boat, The Haldane, beached at Kalanggaman Island.

I started the second dive at 1:28 PM. We again were diving the wall, but a different area than the first dive. Pretty early in the dive Mette found an ornate ghost pipefish next to a crinoid which I took several shots of. The rest of the dive was much like the first one. Lot’s of fish, anthia’s, damselfish, more hawkfish, a couple of different white-eyed moray’s… just another awesome dive! Maximum depth on this dive was 66 feet. Water temperatures were a bit warmer at 80 degrees Fahrenheit, since we didn’t go quite as deep as the first dive. This dive was 56 minutes.

Freckled Hawkfish were everywhere while diving Kalanggaman Island.

After everyone was back on board, we got underway and headed back to Malapascua Island. We arrived at Evolution Dive Resort before 5 PM. I checked out the board for dives that were scheduled for the next day. I had planned a full day of diving for the next day, but trips to Gato Island require a minimum of four divers. I’d let it be known that I really wanted to dive Gato Island and it had been put on the board before we left that morning. I was happy to see there were enough divers. I signed up to do the early morning Thresher Shark dive at Monad Shoal and also the night dive at Pipefish Bay. After dinner at Craic House, I headed back to Sharks Tale for some rest. It was going to be a long day the next day!

The big draw that Malapascua Island has for most people is thresher sharks. It’s the only place in the world where recreational divers can see them on a reliable basis. Is it a 100%? No of course not and no reputable dive operation should promise that. We’re still dealing with a wild animal and conditions, especially current can affect sightings. Having said that, I’d estimate that over 80% of the dives I’ve made on Monad Shoal, I saw thresher sharks. Another way of looking at it would be in a one month period there might be a half dozen or so days when no sharks or sighted which means you’re much more likely than not to see sharks!

Monad Shoal is an underwater island that is actually larger than Malapascua. Scientists currently believe that thresher sharks migrate to the area of Monad Shoal to utilize the services of particular species of cleaner fish that are found there. It’s about a 40 minute boat ride depending on conditions. You have to get up early to see thresher sharks. Early morning is the only time when sightings are consistent. The species that is seen here is the pelagic thresher shark (Alopias pelagicus).

Dive briefings at Evolution for the morning trip to Monad take place at 4:45 AM. The staff and boat crews are there much earlier making preparations and loading all the gear on the boat. Divers who have already been diving will grab their wetsuits. Wetsuits are always hung up separately from the gear to allow them to be at least somewhat dry from the previous days diving. It’s easier to let divers find their own wetsuit where it’s hung up. It would be difficult for the crew to know which is which since they’re hung up together, especially in the dark! Once the briefing is over everyone will be transported by small boat (it’s low tide in the morning) out to one of the large bangka boats for the trip to Monad.

I was up at 4:15 AM the next morning. I give myself enough time to wake up in the morning and get my camera gear set up. The walk to Evolution is only about 5 minutes, so not far at all. When I got there I grabbed my wetsuit and then sat and waited for the brief. The brief was given right on time at 4:45 AM. One of the rules is that if you don’t show up for the brief, then you will be charged for the dive. This is just to make sure that people don’t blow off the dive. The crew comes in early to load the boats so there is a lot of work to be done in preparation to go out. Having said that, as long as you show up, if you decide that you are not up to a dive that day, or want to call the dive for any reason, you can do so and there will be no charge.

As soon as the brief was finished, we headed to the beach where a small boat took us out to the Haldane, one of Evolutions dive bangka’s. It’s still dark outside at this point, but we can see a hint of light off to the east. Once on the boat, a boat brief is given for everyone who is on the boat for the first time. Everyone checks their boxes to double-check that there gear is all there. People are human, so things can get mis-placed, although in my experience, having dived with them for years, this is extremely rare. Always best to err on the side of caution. No one wants to get out to the dive site and not have all their equipment. The tanks are normally already set up and I double check mine. After all, I’m the one who is diving with it! After that I go and make myself a cup of coffee and sit in the back while the boat gets underway. By 5 AM we were on our way to Monad Shoal.

As we approach Monad Shoal everyone starts getting ready. People put on their wetsuits and booties, strap on dive computers, apply de-fog (or spit for all the old-school divers), and stage mask, fins, camera’s, etc… By now there is plenty of light as the sky brightens with the arrival of sunrise. Within minutes of arriving at Monad, the crew assists divers with their tanks, final checks are completed and divers start stepping into the water with a giant stride entry. I was in the first group. Our guide this morning was Alex, one of Evolution’s Filipino guides. I’ve been diving with Filipino guides for almost 10 years now and they have always impressed me with their skills. Evolution has some of the best guides I’ve had the pleasure of diving with over the years. I’ve often said that almost everything I learned about spotting, I learned from my Filipino guides!

I stepped in, was handed my camera by a crew member and then finned over to Alex while we waited for the rest of our group. Once we were all together, Alex got a final ok from everyone, then a thumbs down for descent. I dumped the air from my wing and my dive began at 5:47 AM.

The best word to describe Monad Shoal at this time of the morning is “twilight”. By now there is enough light in the sky that you can see quite well, but it is far from “bright”. The top of the shoal slopes and is at about 60 feet on the shallow side. The slope continues down to over 80 feet. Around the edge of the shoal it drops off into over 700 feet of water. Visibility runs 30-60 feet depending on time of year and conditions. Where we started our dive it was about 60 feet deep. When I started to drop, I could not initially see the bottom, but it came into view very quickly. There are permanent mooring lines attached at different places. If there is current then you can use the mooring line to descend. This morning current was almost non-existent.

For most of the dive there were no sharks… this happens sometimes. Nothing is exact when it comes to predicting when they will be there. Sometimes we see them briefly, sometimes we see them the whole dive, and occasionally the sea gods are against us and we don’t them. Still, for me there really isn’t any such thing as a “bad” dive. As I said before there is plenty of life there on the shoal. I spotted a free swimming moray early on in this particular dive. Something you rarely see in full daylight conditions. There are also the usual marine life that you would see, anemonefish, damselfish, batfish, jacks, cleaner wrasse, shrimps, crabs, etc… All the “usual suspects” that those of you who follow my blog have heard me refer to them as.

One of the “rules” agreed to by all the dive operations on Malapascua Island, is that divers will not take lights are strobes on the morning thresher shark dive. There is a concern that if that was allowed, that the sharks might be scared away, and of course no one wants that! So, although I do often see other marine life, I rarely photograph it during that dive. At that depth and under those lighting conditions everything tends to be very “blue”! Sometimes in post-processing I convert to black and white because of that, and sometimes I leave it blue. It kind of depends on how I’m feeling at the moment!

When there are no sharks, I sometimes entertain myself by photographing the other divers. I usually want a few shots of divers anyway. My background in photo-journalism drives home the point that divers are a part of the “story” here and they really are. Diving is so much better when we have someone to share the experience with! I sometimes also will take the time to look at the other life on the shoal. I spend most of though like everyone else… looking for sharks!

At Monad there are a number of observation stations that have been set up. There are concrete blocks that have been sunk there and line attached. This is to give the sharks room to approach on their own. Again, if there were no organization here, and with so many divers in the water, there could be a possibility that the sharks would go elsewhere. During the morning dive when there are so many divers there, groups are to confine themselves to areas behind the lines. If no sharks are appearing at one viewing station, then a leisurely move to another station is allowed. Just keep away from the edges and behind the area where the lines have been installed. This maximizes sighting opportunities for the majority of divers. The system must work… as I said earlier seeing sharks is easily 80%! It’s important to understand though, that sharks can approach from any direction, occasionally they even come from behind you!

This morning, as luck would have it, we just weren’t seeing sharks. It happens…. Towards the end of the dive we had returned back to the area of the mooring line and a little beyond it, when Alex spotted a thresher shark in the distance in front of us, coming towards us! The shark swam right by me and I was able to take a few still photos, then switch to video. The shark went by, circled back a couple of times, then was gone into the blue. Awesome!

Thresher shark at Monad Shoal.

Back on the boat everyone was all smiles! People were talking, the photographers were sharing their photos and video’s, and it’s just general happiness, especially from those who have traveled from half-way around the world and sometimes only have a brief few days. Does life get any better? I ended with a 43 minute dive with a maximum depth of 77 feet. Water temperature was 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

We headed back to Evolution. I gave my camera gear a quick rinse, then headed to the restaurant for breakfast. I ordered, then dried off my housing so I could remove the camera and download photos from the morning dive. By 7:35 my breakfast was in front of me. After breakfast, I relaxed until it was time for the briefing for Gato Island at 9:45 AM. By 10:00 AM we were back on the boat and headed to Gato.

To be continued…

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up now. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

Moalboal

I was up early on Sunday morning, March 19th. Breakfast was included with my room. Simple, just an egg on toast with bacon and coffee. Then I settled up with the front desk and they got me a taxi.

One of the things I like about Kiwi Lodge is that it’s only a short taxi ride away no matter which bus terminal I’m going too. In roughly 10 minutes the taxi arrived at the south bus terminal. Less than 80 pesos in cab fare. Buses heading south are leaving throughout the day. Within a few minutes of arriving I was on a bus to Moalboal.

You can hire a taxi to take you to Moalboal for around 2000 pesos (about $40 bucks). It’s certainly faster and more comfortable, but a bus ticket is only a 107 pesos (just over $2 dollars)! A bus takes about 3 hours depending on traffic and number of stops it makes. Riding local transport is all part of the experience of traveling and seeing the world I think! The bus left around 9 AM and was in Moalboal a little after noon.

After getting off the bus, I hired a trike for 150 pesos the rest of the way to Panagsama Beach where the vast majority of the dive shops are. After checking in with Eve’s Kiosk I dropped my dive gear next door at Nelson’s Dive Shop before heading to my room.

I rented a fan room for my stay at 700 pesos a night (around $14 dollars). I don’t spend much time in the room anyway so why pay for air conditioning? The temperature at night is normally in the 70’s in March so a fan is plenty. It turned out to be the same room that I stayed in during my last trip to Moalboal in October 2015, so almost like coming home!

I set up my camera in the room, changed into a swim suit, and then headed back to the dive shop. I filled out the usual paperwork. Then got my equipment together and started getting ready to go out for the afternoon dive. Dives at Nelson’s are 900 pesos per dive if you have your own equipment. 1200 pesos per dive with rental equipment. Like everywhere else in the Philippines, tanks, weights, boat, and dive guide are included. Nelson’s website is: http://www.ibara.ne.jp/~bitoon/

I always seem to run into Japanese divers when I visit Nelson’s for some reason. He also gets the usual European crowd and the occasional American. As I dive different destinations around the Philippines, I still often find myself the only American in the group. We are definitely the minority! I’m hoping to change that with my blog and the book series I’m working on by helping introduce the Philippines to more Americans. I want to show that it can be quite cost effective to plan a dive trip to the Philippines.

Once the tanks were set up and ready they were taken to the boat. I pulled on my wetsuit, put on my booties, grabbed my mask, fins, and camera gear headed to the boat. You walk across the street and down a narrow alleyway to a small beach. The entire beach in this area is lined with resorts, but there is a convenient access to the water here. My first dive in Moalboal in 2007 was a night dive and we geared up and walked this same path to do a shore entry.

More often though, the majority of dives here are by boat. During high tide the water can get fairly deep pretty quickly, and I almost had to swim to get to the boat! After everyone was on the boat, we headed north to Tuble Point. I was starting my first dive of this visit to Moalboal at 3:10 PM.

I do enjoy wall dives, and Moalboal is wall diving. Tuble Point is a nice wall with depths down to a 100 feet possible. There are plenty of things to see in the cuts and crevices of the wall. Some of the highlights included nudibranchs, scorpionfish, nice schools of anthia’s and damselfish, anemonefish, a huge pufferfish, grouper, and one of the things Moalboal is known for, sea turtles. A really enjoyable dive! Total dive time was 52 minutes with a maximum depth of 68 feet. The water temperature was 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

Divers checking out the wall along Moalboal’s Tuble Point.

It had been a long day and I opted to rest that evening. One of the nice things about Panagsama Beach is the many restaurants and eateries up and down the road along the beach. Plenty of places on the water with a nice view to have dinner. I made it an early night and went to bed early.

The next morning I was up early and ready for Pescador Island. Pescador Island is one of my favorite dives. It’s a drift dive and current can be quite strong. Normally you are dropped in on one end of the island and then the boat travels to the other and waits for you to drift down. We dropped in at 9:54 AM. It ended up being a 45 minute dive with a maximum depth of 88 feet. Water temperature was again 79 degrees Fahrenheit.

It’s a great wall dive. Big schools of trevally, frogfish, snapper, grouper, anthia’s, lionfish… just a great dive! After the dive we headed back to the beach.

We asked if we could go ahead and do a second dive and were told “no problem”. One of the things that Moalboal is known for is the huge sardine schools. It’s a can’t miss when diving Moalboal. The sardine schools are normally seen around the House Reef, which is in the area where we get on and off the boat. We started our dive at 11:55 AM and had a 57 minute dive. Maximum depth was 60 feet and water temperature was still 79 degrees Fahrenheit, so pretty consistent water temperatures.

The sardine schools did not disappoint! Just huge clouds of fish, with trevally making run’s in and out at times. Very cool to see! I’d mentioned to the guide before the dive I really like photographing frogfish and he found one for me! The “usual suspects” were there as well…. angelfish, pufferfish, damselfish, anthia’s, triggerfish, threadfin hawkfish, a white-eyed moray eel with a cleaner wrasse, nudibranchs, and right at the end of the dive a sea turtle. A really great dive!

Frogfish photgraphed on the House Reef across from Nelson’s Dive Shop in Moalboal.

My plane ticket took me back to Clark on the 26th. I decided to hit Malapascua before returning so the next day I headed to Cebu City (if you’re going by bus from Moalboal to Maya where you catch the ferry to Malapascua Island, you probably want to break that up). A trike took me back to the main highway for 150 pesos (about $3 dollars). There I caught a Ceres Liner (115 pesos) to Cebu City. I called Kiwi Lodge en-route and reserved a room. The bus ride was just over 3 hours to the South Bus Terminal. From there I took a taxi (78 pesos) to Kiwi Lodge.

Next I’ll write about my time at Malapascua in March. Then my weekend at ADEX (Asia Dive Expo) in Singapore, then I’ll be almost to the present. As I publish this I’ve been back to Malapascua and I’m in Dumaguete now… still trying to catch up, but stay tuned!

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up now. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

Diving Subic Bay-Part Two

I got up on Thursday morning, March 16th looking forward to the days diving. I’d requested the day before to go to Barges and San Quentin. They’re normally done together due to their proximity to one another.

I left my hotel and took a trike to Johan’s. It’s a fairly short ride. Less than 10 minutes. At Johan’s I had breakfast, then put my camera setup together. The staff at Johan’s set up my tank. I checked it over and they carried it to the boat. I put on my wetsuit. Grabbed my camera, mask, and fins and was on the boat a little after 10 AM.

The “Barges” aren’t actually barges, although they are similar in appearance. They’re actually sections of a floating dock, that were originally set up after Subic Bay was re-taken during WW II to conduct repair work. The floating dock eventually sank and is now a favorite dive site. The sections of the dock form a rough “T” and sit on a mainly sandy bottom. There is some separation of the sections. One side drops off from roughly 20 feet to around 60 feet. The other drops to over a 100 feet. My dive started at 11:08 AM and ended up being 55 minutes. Since I’ve dived this site several times I was allowed to buddy with another experienced diver and we did our own dive. It was his first time diving Barges so we ended up exploring the whole site. Maximum depth was 107 feet.

A dive on a sunken floating dock now known as the “Barges” near Grande Island, Subic Bay, Philippines.

One of the things I enjoy about diving Barges is that it seems like I often see something different. There are always schools of fish around, going in and out through seams that have opened up in the floating dock. Sweetlips, snapper, jacks, triggerfish, butterflyfish, bannerfish, nudibranchs, mantis shrimp, lionfish,… all the usual suspects! Visibility is normally better further out and this day was no exception with visibility being 40 feet plus.

Plenty of life around the Barges, a dive site in Subic Bay, Philippines.

After our surface interval we moved over to the mouth of the Subic Bay, not far from Grande Island for a dive on the San Quentin. The San Quentin is a Spanish-American War wreck that was scuttled and sank by the Spaniards in 1898 to block access by the invading American Navy. Considering that it’s almost a 120 years old now it’s actually in remarkable shape. Although the ship itself is largely deteriorated and scattered about, the boilers are virtually intact and heavily encrusted now. There are always plenty of fish around the wreck. It’s also a prime spot for nudibranchs I’ve found. It sit’s in just 50 feet of water.

Nudibranch (Phyllidiella pustulosa) photographed on the Spanish-American War wreck of the San Quentin.

My dive started at 1:35 PM and ended up being 65 minutes. Maximum depth was 50 feet. Water temperature was 81F. I came back to the boat with 50 bar/725 psi in my tank.

This dive was no exception. Plenty of fish. I photographed a batfish early on that was in the last stages of it’s juvenile phase. Still just a touch of orange along the edges. Damselfish were everywhere. I played hide and seek with a grouper that just didn’t want to pose for a photo! Nudibranchs of course. Anemonefish here and there. A couple of different hermit crabs posed for photos. A very nice dive. You see me write that a lot I suppose, but in reality I can truthfully say it almost always is. When I’m blowing bubbles I am definitely in my happy place!

A batfish in the last stages of the juvenile phase photographed on the Spanish-American War wreck of the San Quentin near the mouth of Subic Bay, Philippines.

We were back at Johan’s around 3:30. I rinsed my wetsuit, mask, and fins. Rinsed my camera setup and dried it off so I could remove the camera. Then showered and put on a dry pair of shorts and t-shirt for the ride back to the hotel. After a cold San Miguel Light. I grabbed a trike and headed back to T-Rose. Dinner at Sit-N-Bull again and an early night.

The next day was Friday. I decided to take a day off and just get ready to leave since I was flying the next day. I had breakfast at the WestPac Sailor Bar and Restaurant/VFW. It’s one of my favorite places for breakfast. I can get an American breakfast there, eggs to order, bacon, hash browns, toast, and coffee for around a 180 pesos (about $3.50). I went back to Johan’s, settled my bill, and picked up my equipment. I hung the wetsuit up at the hotel as it wasn’t completely dry. I spent some time working on photos and then ran some errands.

Saturday morning I slept in a bit. After my shower I finished packing then walked across the street to the VFW for a late breakfast. After I ate, I decided to take a trike to the bus terminal in Olongapo City rather than take a jeepney as I just didn’t want to wrestle with my bags. The going rate for a trike is 150 pesos and takes about 25 minutes or so.

I took Victory Liner from Olongapo City to Dau. The bus left at 2:20 PM and the ticket was a 140 pesos. We arrived at 3:35 PM, so only an hour and fifteen minutes away. From the bus terminal, I took a trike to SM-Clark Mall where I hung out for a while and had a late lunch/early dinner. From SM-Clark I had a van pick me up to take me to Clark International Airport on the old Clark US Air Force Base. The van was arranged through the same guy who I’d hired to take me home from the hospital after my second angioplasty and stent the end of January. It was my first time flying out of Clark and I would later figure out that 500 pesos was too much! The ride was about 15 minutes.

I showed my itinerary to the security guard and was allowed into the terminal. I checked in and got my boarding pass, then went through security inspection. I was flying Cebu Pacific and was about 2 1/2 hours early. I took a seat in the waiting area and made a call to Kiwi Lodge (my regular hotel) in Cebu City to see if they had a room (they did). My flight boarded on time and we took off at 9:18 PM. A little less than hour later we landed at Mactan-Cebu International Airport.

My previous flights in I’d been met at the airport, either with a private shuttle to wherever I was diving, or by my friend Charles who lived in Cebu City up until late last year. This was the first time I needed to take a taxi. I took a yellow airport taxi without giving it much thought, only making sure that they would use the meter. This later turned out to be a mistake as the yellow taxi’s are twice as much as the white ones (who will also use the meter). Taxi fare ended up being 423 pesos and the ride to the hotel, with no traffic, took about 30 minutes.

After checking it, I had a quick bite to eat, then called it a night…

Next Moalboal..

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up now. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂

Posted on

Diving Subic Bay-Part One

I’ll start with a few more details about the trip from Puerto Galera to Olongapo City and Subic Bay. I took the FSL ferry from Sabang. 230 pesos plus 20 peso tourist fee. We pulled away from the pier at 11:45 AM and were at the Batangas Ferry Terminal by 1:05 PM. Half as much time as my trip over by small bangka boat. The big ferry’s can make much better time than the smaller boats. As usual when leaving the ferry, I was approached by multiple people offering to take me to Manila by private car or taxi. They can be persistent! Usually a firm refusal works. I’ve been known to offer 200 pesos (approximate bus fare) and that will also make them go away. I just don’t see the need to hire a car usually. The trip is relatively short to Manila and since the bus is on the expressway most of the way, I wouldn’t save a significant amount of time. I boarded a bus and we departed right after 1:30 PM arriving in Cubao by 4 PM.

The bus let me out on the opposite side of EDSA from where Victory Terminal is located. Since it’s a divided and very busy road and was going to require a good 10-15 minute walk to get to, I grabbed a taxi. I just didn’t feel like maneuvering through pedestrians pulling a big bag full of dive gear and my small hard case filled with camera gear! The cab had to take a bit of a detour due to road construction, but even with tip I only spent a 100 pesos. That was $2 bucks well-spent in my book!

At Victory I boarded a bus for Olongapo City. We were on our way a little after 5 PM. A little over 3 hours later I was in Olongapo. A short jeepney ride and I was checking into my hotel in Barangay Barretto 🙂 I’d messaged Jocelyn, the owner of T-Rose, while en-route and she’d confirmed that there would be a room for me when I got there.

During recent trips I’ve stayed either in T-Rose or Coffee Shop when coming here for short periods. T-Rose has a bar associated with it, but it closes early. It has a gate and the rooms surround a small courtyard with trees and plants. It has a bit of privacy and being off the main road is quieter. Only a 1000 pesos a night (around $20 bucks). It’s in a decent location also in the center of Barretto. Walking distance to restaurants, nightlife, and the beach. Coffee Shop is a restaurant frequented by many locals. It has a 3 floors of rooms and is also well located. Rooms here can be had for 1095 pesos a night (about $22 dollars a night). Coffee Shop is a bit nicer, but not quite as well located. Both places are clean and have hot water and wifi. For this stay I opted for T-Rose.

For long term accommodations, I’ve stayed at Bella Monte on Del Pilar Street and at Suzuki’s which is right on the beach. I’ve also stayed at accommodations that are managed by Two Can Bar which is on the main highway in Barrio Barretto. I spent a month at Suzuki’s while I was recovering from my angioplasty and stent placement that was done at Medical City-Clark the end of January.

Tuesday I hung out and visited with friends. I also bought a plane ticket to Cebu to leave on Saturday. I normally dive with Johan’s when I’m diving Subic. Johan has one of the oldest dive operations around Subic Bay. My friend Rick Kirkham from Frontier Scuba in Puerto Galera runs some of his advanced technical courses there, taking advantage of the many wrecks in Subic Bay, and utilizing Johan’s operation as a base. Fun dives with Johan’s are running a 1000 pesos a dive if you have your own equipment. This is pretty much the lowest rate around Subic. You can pay more though. I like Johan’s. I’ve been diving there off and on for almost a year and a half now. Nice people and a laid back atmosphere. It’s very relaxed. They normally do 2 dives a day which fits in perfectly with the way I dive now. You can find his website at http://www.johansdiveresort.com/ They have rooms available also and they’re right on the beach in Baloy.

I unpacked my gear and setup my tank. Then had breakfast there at Johan’s. One of the things I like about Johan’s is they often don’t go out until about 10 AM, depending on where they’re diving that day and who is there. The dive sites are a bit further out than they are in Puerto Galera. We’re usually back between 3 and 4 PM depending on where we dive, which is also good. A nice relaxed day of diving!

We did 2 wrecks that day. The first dive was El Capitan. El Capitan was acquired by the US Navy in early 1942 and commissioned USS Majaba in April. It was used to move cargo around the Pacific during WW II. She was struck by 2 torpedoes from a Japanese submarine at Guadalcanal in November 1942. The entire engine room and boilers were destroyed. The ship did not sink though and was towed to the mouth of the Tenaru River and beached. In January 1943 the ship was towed to Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. The hull was repaired and the ship was used as a floating barracks and material stores vessel for the remainder of the war. After that it was towed to Subic Bay, Philippines in 1946 and officially struck from the Navy Ship List. It remained in Subic Bay awaiting return to it’s original owners, but ending up sinking during a storm. El Capitan is almost 300 feet long. She lies on her port side, on a sloping bottom. The stern is at just 13 feet with the bow at 73 feet.

A diver makes his way along the coral-encrusted hull of “El Capitan” which is laying on it’s side in Subic Bay, Philippines.

Visibility can be quiet variable. Subic Bay is protected on 3 sides and has a large island (Grande Island). This means that sediment that can be washed into the bay can take a while to filter out. Visibility during rainy season can be 10 feet! Although Subic Bay has recovered a lot, it’s not completely recovered the pristine status it enjoyed prior to the eruption of Mt Pinatubo in 1993. Ash and sediment is still being washed into the bay. Having said that I still enjoy the dives in Subic. The wrecks still attract plenty of fish life and are interesting to dive on due to their historical status. Visibility on this dive was around 30 feet.

El Capitan is lying on it’s port side at the bottom of Subic Bay in the Philippines.

Johan’s uses small fast boats to move about the bay, with a canopy for shade, and GPS to help quickly pinpoint the dive sites. My dive on the El Capitan started at 11:06 AM. My maximum depth on this dive was 66 feet and I was back on the boat with 70 bar/1030 psi after a 52 minute dive. Water temperature was 80F.

Early in the dive I spotted a nice grouper peering out from the wreck… almost eating size! A blue-spotted ray swam away from where it’d been resting in the muck near the wreck. There were bannerfish, butterflyfish, grouper, and sweetlips swimming around the wreck, along with parrotfish feeding on the algae growing on the encrusting coral. The issue often, but not always of diving in Subic Bay, is the amount of silt and volcanic ash that was deposited into the bay and still gets stirred up. Muck diving has become more popular here as a result.

A grouper makes it home on El Capitan one of the many wrecks found in Subic Bay, Philippines.

After our surface interval we moved to the next dive which was on the LST (Landing Ship Tanks). These ships were designed and used during WW II to support amphibious operations by landing tanks and vehicles on the beach. At 328 feet it’s bigger than El Capitan. It’s sitting with a small list, but upright in 90-120 feet of water on the eastern side of Subic Bay. I enjoy this dive. There are plenty of fish throughout this wreck. I’ve never done a real penetration here, but there are compartments that can be accessed easily that I’ve stuck my head into to take a few photos. There are large schools of cardinalfish who make the wreck home and usually a few lionfish are about.

A photo shot looking into a compartment of an LST (Landing Ship Tanks) sunk in Subic Bay, Philippines.

My dive started at 1:12 PM. We explored mainly along the superstructure and the top of the wreck. My maximum depth on this dive was 77 feet. My dive time was 50 minutes and I was back on the boat with 50 bar/750 psi. Water temperature was again 80F.

A lionfish hunts along the side of the LST wreck in Subic Bay, Philippines.

After we were all back on the boat, we headed back to the dive center. We were back well before 3 PM. One thing they do at Johan’s is meet you as get back and take your drink order. All divers get a free drink at the end of the days diving. Sometimes I have hot tea and sometimes I have a San Miguel Light, depending on my mood!

After getting back to T-Rose, I showered and got a nap in. I had dinner that night at Sit-n-Bull Restaurant on Del Pilar Street in Barretto. This is one of my favorite restaurants and I have dinner there quite often when I’m in town. They have a wide variety of American, Mexican, Italian, and Filipino dishes. I’ve never had anything from their menu I didn’t like! Be prepared for huge portions though! A good place to go with an appetite.

After that back to the room, work on photos for bit and sleep… yes I know very boring!

In the next installment I’ll write about two of my favorite dives at Subic Bay… Barges and San Quentin… stay tuned!

I hope you enjoy reading my blog. If you have, don’t miss my next post! Visit the “Subcribe” page and sign up now. It only takes a moment. Lot’s more coming! 🙂