Eastern Luzon dive sites

[jonix]

hi guys,

have seen/read several books, mags, posters and sites on phil diving but noticed that there are almost no publicized dive sites to the east of luzon...isn't there any, even sites close to shore?

 

[Scuby Dooby]

Good question jonix - i've often wondered about this myself. Is it the fact that most of eastern luzon is pretty wild (cordilleras)?

 

[shugar]

well, in a way... most of eastern luzon is covered by the sierra madres like a spinal cord... pretty "off the beaten track" if you ask me especially such places as "tuguegerao", "cagayan", "isabela" and god-knows-whatother places i can barely place on a map

from my experience of quezon though (off the coast of mauban), there's no diving that i know off... definitely no operator... a guy i met who worked at the powerplant there would (literally) jump on a bus on his off days to get to PG as humanly quick as possible

i think it has something to do with it being the side that faces the pacific (read: oooooopen water)... so the currents and stuff along that side probably don't make reefs a very viable thing or resorts/ dive ops a good investment... i don't know...

Jag

 

[happybuddha]

I've been sitting here with this message open all afternoon trying to write it but work keeps getting in the way, then shugar guzumped me and gave my answer before I could

I've never been to the east coast myself but I've always heard since the Philippines faces open ocean to the east, the conditions can be a lot rougher than on the western South China Sea side. Also I think the water gets deep pretty fast.

There is a resort on Apuao Grand Island east of Bicol which I think used to have diving years ago, but I just checked their website and it doesn't list diving as an activity. I'm certain it had diving at one time as there are a couple of guys that live in PG that were involved in diving there 10 or more years ago. If you are really interested in checking with them you could contact them through the Swagman Hotel website, http://www.swaggy.com/start.htm, but I wouldn't get my hopes up.

There was a lot of naval activity along the east coast of Samar and Leyte during WWII, in fact the Battle of Leyte Gulf is a very famous naval battle with quite a few ships from US and Japan sunk. However, I've always been told due to depth and currents none are diveable. Somewhere off Samar are at least 6 US ships-2 escort aircraft carriers, 2 destroyers and a couple of destroyer escorts and in Surigao Straits there should be several Japanese ships.

Drew

 

[shugar]

guzump!

hahahahahaha well, you have to work hard to make the diving so much more rewarding (and affordable hehehehehe)

interesting about the ships off samar and leyte... but overall the eastern visayas is much more diveable than the luzon area...

Jag

PS
"guzump?"... never heard that term before...

 

[jonix]

hmmmm...for that matter, as shugar mentioned, there's pretty much no publicized resorts on this side

my place of residence puts me about 2 hours from the beaches of Infanta & Real...there are a few beach resorts and yes the water gets deep fast but is quite clear

anyways, thanks guys...probably the open ocean thingy is the real reason

 

[happybuddha]

PS
"guzump?"... never heard that term before...

I picked it up from an English friend that lives in Cebu, it must be a British usage since I checked an American English dictionary and its not shown but if I Google it I get lots of hits using it and its mostly Brits using it.

Glad to have increased your vocabulary by a word and have a great day

Drew

 

[paolov]

apuao is a nice island, golfing horse back riding however this was such when the swagman resorts were still operating.

the currents are wild on the east side due to pacific ocean surfs.

but the most critical aspect is the access to the area so very little development, to put it drastically in one go, NOT SAFE lack of logistics.

the waves settle down during south west monsoon as the east side is protected by the cordilleras. but mainly there is very little development due to the lack of infrastructure. this may be attributed to armed conflicts in the area.