edpdiver
Contributor
My wife and I went for a 2 1/2 week trip to the Philippines. The main destination was Kasai Village Resort in Moalboal, where we stayed previously. On this trip, we stopped off at the Shangri-La resort in Mactan first. We had stayed there before, and knew that it was very nice, with great restaurants and a relaxing environment. We decided to stay there at the beginning of the trip to get over jet lag (having traveled from the U.S.). It was a good idea. We stayed for six days, and we dove for four days at the Shangri-La. While the diving was not as good as Moalboal, or a number of other Philippines diving destinations, it is well worth doing. Our favorite dive site was Talima, which had a nice little wreck, and beautiful corals and critters.
After spending 6 nights at the Shangri-La, we were picked up by a driver who took us to Moalboal. It was a little under three hours, and we arrived at the Kasai Village Resort. We were the only guests at the resort at the time, although other guests came and went during the week. We really like the diving around Moalboal, and we also like this resort a lot. The people are very nice, the dive operation is excellent, the food is good, and the rooms are simple and comfortable. There is not much else to do (you can arrange for tours, although we did not), but that was fine with us. Our dive guide for the whole trip was Tata, who was wonderful. He was very considerate, and was a phenomenal critter spotter. He could spot a little soft coral crab from 10 meters away. Simply amazing. While a main attraction for divers traveling to Moalboal are the sardines around Pescador Island, the other sites are equally attractive to us. Mostly, the sites are walls, and the healthy reefs and fish diversity and density make all of the sites well worth diving. The walls at Pescador Island are quite nice, and the wall at the Marine Sanctuary was particularly memorable. Also the critter density at Copton Point was incredible. It was not as pretty from the scenic reefscape point of view, but the number of nudibranchs, crabs, pipefish, and other macro critter attractions was wonderful. We requested to go there a second time because we liked it so much. The visibility during this trip was only fair (maybe 15m) compared to our previous trip (when it was probably ~35m). As a result I took more macro shots than I usually do. That was fine because either wide angle or macro would be a good choice for the vast majority of dive sites. We did 2 morning dives each day, and usually did an afternoon dive as well. You can also schedule night dives, but we did not.
Here are a few pictures that give a sense of what we saw.
First, here is a shot of the sardines from Pescador Island.
Here is a shrimp on the bubble coral. There were lots of these.
This reefscape shot is from a dive from the Shangri-La in Mactan.
Next is a soft coral crab. Again we spotted lots of these, which was very exciting for me. I had not seen one previously.
We also saw a lot of ornate ghost pipefish, such as this one.
This school of silver batfish was seen on a dive from the Shangri-La
There were tons anemone fish at all of the dive sites.
This gorgonian scenery was from the marine sanctuary dive site close to the Kasai Village Resort.
If you would like to see more, the whole set of photos from this trip are located at the following link:
2011 philippines - cebu and moalboal - a set on Flickr
Cheers,
Erwin
After spending 6 nights at the Shangri-La, we were picked up by a driver who took us to Moalboal. It was a little under three hours, and we arrived at the Kasai Village Resort. We were the only guests at the resort at the time, although other guests came and went during the week. We really like the diving around Moalboal, and we also like this resort a lot. The people are very nice, the dive operation is excellent, the food is good, and the rooms are simple and comfortable. There is not much else to do (you can arrange for tours, although we did not), but that was fine with us. Our dive guide for the whole trip was Tata, who was wonderful. He was very considerate, and was a phenomenal critter spotter. He could spot a little soft coral crab from 10 meters away. Simply amazing. While a main attraction for divers traveling to Moalboal are the sardines around Pescador Island, the other sites are equally attractive to us. Mostly, the sites are walls, and the healthy reefs and fish diversity and density make all of the sites well worth diving. The walls at Pescador Island are quite nice, and the wall at the Marine Sanctuary was particularly memorable. Also the critter density at Copton Point was incredible. It was not as pretty from the scenic reefscape point of view, but the number of nudibranchs, crabs, pipefish, and other macro critter attractions was wonderful. We requested to go there a second time because we liked it so much. The visibility during this trip was only fair (maybe 15m) compared to our previous trip (when it was probably ~35m). As a result I took more macro shots than I usually do. That was fine because either wide angle or macro would be a good choice for the vast majority of dive sites. We did 2 morning dives each day, and usually did an afternoon dive as well. You can also schedule night dives, but we did not.
Here are a few pictures that give a sense of what we saw.
First, here is a shot of the sardines from Pescador Island.
Here is a shrimp on the bubble coral. There were lots of these.
This reefscape shot is from a dive from the Shangri-La in Mactan.
Next is a soft coral crab. Again we spotted lots of these, which was very exciting for me. I had not seen one previously.
We also saw a lot of ornate ghost pipefish, such as this one.
This school of silver batfish was seen on a dive from the Shangri-La
There were tons anemone fish at all of the dive sites.
This gorgonian scenery was from the marine sanctuary dive site close to the Kasai Village Resort.
If you would like to see more, the whole set of photos from this trip are located at the following link:
2011 philippines - cebu and moalboal - a set on Flickr
Cheers,
Erwin
