After contacting a good friend Mike, who lives in Cebu, earlier this year some plans were made and then re-made to visit the Visayas, with a prime plan to dive Apo Island off Negros in the Philippines.
Initially we were going in April, but due to work commitments for my buddy Mike, the plans were re-made for early December, and altered when my daughter made a decision in September to join us.
One unknown factor that we did not plan for was Typhoon Kammuri, but in the end we were well south of it although we did get a few warnings and dive boats were cancelled on the Tuesday so plans were changed to shore dives instead of going out to Apo Island.
My daughter and I arrived in Cebu on the afternoon of Friday 29th November, and after an hour in crazy traffic arrived at my buddy’s place. We had not seen each other in just over 10 years so there was a lot of catching up to do, mainly related to San Miguel
At dinner, another old friend appeared and some reminiscing of ME4x4 days back in the UAE, sand and cars over wine, G&Ts and San Miguel.
On Saturday morning I assembled my camera rig, as well as my BP/W and sorted out our dive kit for an afternoon shore dive on Mactan Island.
There are a bunch of small dive ops here at a place called Kontiki and one of Mike’s friends, Simon, runs one of them – SiDive.
We had been assigned a guide, Alfred, and after getting the gear ready we walked down to the shore dive location and gently descended into nice 28C water.
A point to note here is that SiDive do not have DIN valves on their tanks and I had to use an adaptor. Mike had mentioned this prior to the trip and I was prepared.
Vis was reasonable 10-15m and we had a nice leisurely 90 min dive with a few nudis and some other critters.
On Sunday we were up early and down to Mactan again to take a boat out to Otango Island. As it was low tide all the gear was loaded on to what I would describe as a “punt” and transported to the large banka that was the dive boat.
The first dive was great, 20m vis, but my D7100 had decided to go into “Err” mode for some reason after my second shot. This was rectified during the SI by removing the battery and putting it back in. We had some good critters with various pipefish, a black frogfish and several nudibranchs.
The second dive was also good but with dwindling vis in the shallower area.
On the Monday with storm warnings coming over on the phone (I had a local SIM card), we packed Mike’s Hilux and headed south, although it took ages to get out of Cebu. Traffic was slow and busy but eventually the further south we travelled it became easier, and we arrived by 11:00am. Enough time to have lunch and buy our tickets, P980 for the car and 4 people one way, and a P20 tax for some reason to a bloke that was wandering around as we boarded.
The 30 min crossing took us over to north Negros Oriental and we headed towards Dumagette and Dauin, before arriving at Acqua Dive at 13:30. We decided not to dive that afternoon and just chilled instead. The weather looked like rain and the water was choppy. All boats had been cancelled by the Coast Guard but shore diving was possible. The forecast for Tuesday looked similar, so it was G&T time.
On Tuesday morning the weather had not improved much, bearing in mind that we were on the outskirts of a Typhoon, so shore diving was our only option since all the boats had been cancelled. We opted to dive off the resort itself and had some good muck diving with nudis, seahorses as well as Harlequin Shrimp and several frogfish. There was a group of Malaysian divers at Acqua Dive too, and they had been taken to other shore diving sites in a Jeepney.
My daughter and I had our own guide Eshmail, who is an excellent spotter.
On Wednesday morning the boat ban had been lifted and we headed out early to Apo Island in flat calm waters for three dives off Apo Island.
Vis was 20m+ on the first dive and the corals were really impressive, with my daughter exclaiming that this was the best she’d seen since she had been in Fiji two years previously.
My camera played up again about half way through the third dive just as Eshmail had found a long nosed hawkfish, so photographically not the best for me on this trip, but it won’t be my last trip to this area. Now that I have a feel for it I’ll certainly be back to enjoy Apo again but with a wide angle lens next time, as I’d only packed my 60mm lens and one camera.
The accommodation, meals and diving for two days at Acqua Dive cost P28,000, which included a few G&Ts, and the total fuel cost return from Cebu was only P2,000 (Diesel).
I’ve been told that a minibus from Cebu to the ferry is around P4,000 one way and the dive ops will pick you up when you arrive at Sibulan Ferry Terminal at the top of Negros Oriental. Allow a day each way for travel by road, although next time I plan to take in Oslob and perhaps also visit Moalboal, as well as some options further north.
Initially we were going in April, but due to work commitments for my buddy Mike, the plans were re-made for early December, and altered when my daughter made a decision in September to join us.
One unknown factor that we did not plan for was Typhoon Kammuri, but in the end we were well south of it although we did get a few warnings and dive boats were cancelled on the Tuesday so plans were changed to shore dives instead of going out to Apo Island.
My daughter and I arrived in Cebu on the afternoon of Friday 29th November, and after an hour in crazy traffic arrived at my buddy’s place. We had not seen each other in just over 10 years so there was a lot of catching up to do, mainly related to San Miguel
At dinner, another old friend appeared and some reminiscing of ME4x4 days back in the UAE, sand and cars over wine, G&Ts and San Miguel.
On Saturday morning I assembled my camera rig, as well as my BP/W and sorted out our dive kit for an afternoon shore dive on Mactan Island.
There are a bunch of small dive ops here at a place called Kontiki and one of Mike’s friends, Simon, runs one of them – SiDive.
We had been assigned a guide, Alfred, and after getting the gear ready we walked down to the shore dive location and gently descended into nice 28C water.
A point to note here is that SiDive do not have DIN valves on their tanks and I had to use an adaptor. Mike had mentioned this prior to the trip and I was prepared.
Vis was reasonable 10-15m and we had a nice leisurely 90 min dive with a few nudis and some other critters.
On Sunday we were up early and down to Mactan again to take a boat out to Otango Island. As it was low tide all the gear was loaded on to what I would describe as a “punt” and transported to the large banka that was the dive boat.
The first dive was great, 20m vis, but my D7100 had decided to go into “Err” mode for some reason after my second shot. This was rectified during the SI by removing the battery and putting it back in. We had some good critters with various pipefish, a black frogfish and several nudibranchs.
The second dive was also good but with dwindling vis in the shallower area.
On the Monday with storm warnings coming over on the phone (I had a local SIM card), we packed Mike’s Hilux and headed south, although it took ages to get out of Cebu. Traffic was slow and busy but eventually the further south we travelled it became easier, and we arrived by 11:00am. Enough time to have lunch and buy our tickets, P980 for the car and 4 people one way, and a P20 tax for some reason to a bloke that was wandering around as we boarded.
The 30 min crossing took us over to north Negros Oriental and we headed towards Dumagette and Dauin, before arriving at Acqua Dive at 13:30. We decided not to dive that afternoon and just chilled instead. The weather looked like rain and the water was choppy. All boats had been cancelled by the Coast Guard but shore diving was possible. The forecast for Tuesday looked similar, so it was G&T time.
On Tuesday morning the weather had not improved much, bearing in mind that we were on the outskirts of a Typhoon, so shore diving was our only option since all the boats had been cancelled. We opted to dive off the resort itself and had some good muck diving with nudis, seahorses as well as Harlequin Shrimp and several frogfish. There was a group of Malaysian divers at Acqua Dive too, and they had been taken to other shore diving sites in a Jeepney.
My daughter and I had our own guide Eshmail, who is an excellent spotter.
On Wednesday morning the boat ban had been lifted and we headed out early to Apo Island in flat calm waters for three dives off Apo Island.
Vis was 20m+ on the first dive and the corals were really impressive, with my daughter exclaiming that this was the best she’d seen since she had been in Fiji two years previously.
My camera played up again about half way through the third dive just as Eshmail had found a long nosed hawkfish, so photographically not the best for me on this trip, but it won’t be my last trip to this area. Now that I have a feel for it I’ll certainly be back to enjoy Apo again but with a wide angle lens next time, as I’d only packed my 60mm lens and one camera.
The accommodation, meals and diving for two days at Acqua Dive cost P28,000, which included a few G&Ts, and the total fuel cost return from Cebu was only P2,000 (Diesel).
I’ve been told that a minibus from Cebu to the ferry is around P4,000 one way and the dive ops will pick you up when you arrive at Sibulan Ferry Terminal at the top of Negros Oriental. Allow a day each way for travel by road, although next time I plan to take in Oslob and perhaps also visit Moalboal, as well as some options further north.
