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Topic: Philippines (Read 9866 times)
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docstan
Barracuda
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Manila, Philippines
Posts: 517
Mabuhay!
 
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Re:Philippines
« Reply #32 on: December 22, 2005, 08:20:24 PM »
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There are some nice reports on the rodales scubadiving site about the diving in this area, you might want to check it out.
http://dive.scubadiving.com/members/tripreports.php?s=1261
Air plans
Any airline that can get you to manila, then take a connecting flight to dumaguete (Phil, airlines, Cebu Pacific air, Air Philippines have flights). If you end up in Cebu you either take a night boat to dumaguete or take a fast ferry during the day.
Accomodations
am unfamiliar with Bahura resort, sorry.
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Shoot as if PS didn't exist!
Fuji E900 in Ike; various inon and epoque glass bits, Inon D2000 + Oly C7070
| « Last Edit: December 22, 2005, 08:37:39 PM by docstan » |
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Reefwreck
Great White
Offline
Indonesia
Posts: 1115
I'm in Deep...
 
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Re:Philippines
« Reply #33 on: December 23, 2005, 07:24:21 AM »
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Hi Mike,
First, Congratulations on the prize! 
I am not familiar with that resort (I suspect it is new), but I was in Dumaguete (Atlantis Resort) in May of 2004. It is primarily known as a place for critter and "muck" diving. You should be able to give your 105 a good work out. Some of the stuff I saw included tiny frogfish, Giant Frogfish, various ghost pipefish, pipefish, seahorses, shrimps, nudis, Spanish Dancers, Ribbon eels, morays, Mandarinfish (Atlantis Housereef), Scorpionfish, and the rarely seen Twinspot Lionfish. These were all seen on shore dives or from short (less than 15-minutes) boat rides. These sites mostly feature gently sloping golden sand, with broken coral heads and "artificial" reefs, and range from depths of 30 metres to less than 5 metres. Currents at these sites were generally not an issue. Night dives are awesome. As these are "muck" dives, don't expect schools of tropicals or large pelagics. During early morning SI's on the shore, I was lucky enough to see breaching dolphins soaring vertically several metres into the air. Who needs aquarium shows. 
Atlantis (and presumably your resort) also offers 3-tank day trips to nearby Apo Island featuring several dive sites which are very different from what is offered closer to Dumaguete. Apo Island has lots of colourful corals, anemones and the famous "Clownfish City". While I am told it is not what it used to be, it still offers a stunning array of anemones and a large community of various anemonefish. Other sites around Apo Island include wall dives, with sometimes ripping currents which bring in the pelagics. I can't vouch for these drift dives, as during the time I was there, the currents and surface chop were too severe for diving at those sites.
Water temp. when I was there was roughly 28 degrees C. I was fine with a 3mm. You may want to bring a hood though if you have one, as others I dove with tended to use one. Viz. was not great, but good enough at approx. 10 metres (30 feet), even at Apo Island. But I suspect that generally speaking, viz. at Apo can be much better.
Dumaguete is not Lembeh, but is probably a decent substitute. It was not popular at the time I was there, but I believe it is becoming more well known. Except for the Apo trips, I usually had my own guide or shared him with another photographer (German pro). Other than my dive computer, there were no imposed limits on bottom time.
As far as flights from Honolulu are concerned, you likely need to go through Manila. If I am not mistaken, Philippine Airlines has non-stop flights to Manila, while Continental offers service to Manila via Guam. If you need to overnight in Manila, there are plenty of decent hotels in town. Be warned though, that some of the domestic flights from Manila to Dumaguete leave VERY early. As I recall, mine left at something like 0545 hours.  Give yourself plenty of time to check-in. The flight to Dumaguete as I recall was under 90 minutes and likely closer to an hour.
Atlantis Dumaguete's website has a decent section on the nearby dives sites which may be useful to you:
http://www.atlantishotel.com/dumaguete/diving/divesitelocal.htm
To give you an idea of what you might see as far as marine life is concerned, feel free to check out my modest array of Dumaguete images (May 2004) here:
http://allenhost.com/gallery/reefwreck
It has been awhile since I was there, but if I can be of possible further assistance, please don't hesitate to drop me a PM or e-mail.
Bottom lines is, if you want to experience some very good muck diving with some spectacular nearby island diving, I'd recommend it. 
Cheers.
Michael.
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Michael
Nikon D200, Micro-Nikkor 70-180mm, Nikon 6T Close-up lens, NEXUS Housing, INON Z-240, INON Z-220, Sea&Sea TTL Converter.
Powerbook G4
Reefwreck's Underwater Gallery
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kathymm
Damsel Fish
Offline
San Jose, California
Posts: 389
Sold my film, so I must be a Digital Diver!
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Re:Philippines
« Reply #37 on: January 20, 2006, 09:42:32 AM »
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Hi,
We are thinking of going to the Philippines on our vacation this year. The two locations we are considering are Atlantis Dumaguette, which seems to be getting pretty good reviews in this thread, and Eagle Point Mabini.
Has anyone been to Eagle Point and would give some information? It is near many of the same good dive sites as Club O' but with a little more "plush" accomodations.
Appreciate any comments.
Thank you,
Kathy Mendes
P.S. Mike, before you give up on the Bahura Resort check out Gutsy Tuason's new book on Bahura. Beautiful stuff there.
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Nikon D300, 60 mm and 16 mm Fisheye lenses, Sea&Sea housing, S&S YS110 strobes.
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cmichael
Guppy
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Posts: 1
I wanna be a Digital Diver!
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Philippines - Dumagete and Puerto Galera
« Reply #44 on: October 11, 2006, 05:18:19 PM »
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Trip Report November 2005.
My wife and I spent three weeks diving at Dumagete and Puerto Galera at the Atlantis Resorts for both.
http://www.atlantishotel.com/
Both resorts cater to divers, have solid food (the food at Dumagete borders gourmet as does the resort), and solid accommodations.
Dumagete is a little beach of paradise in a strange location. The diving near the resort is mostly muck diving, even the planned reef of old tires offers some solid critter stuff for macro. A trip here also warrants at least one if not two trips to Apo Island depending on how long you visit. The black lava sands make the trip worth it and the abundance of fish, nudi branchs just add to the fun. We had one issue with a bad dive master here that could not read the currents nor find the boat but other than that no issue. If you are experienced it should not be an issue as the other dive masters were outstanding and often we saw everything in the briefing and more. A guaranteed sighting of ghost pipefish lead us to see around four. They have a night dive for Mandolin Fish - very boring but if you see the fish it is worth it and on the way back to shore we saw a blue ringed octopus and stargazer.
Puerto Galera is a strange location. A cross between Margaretville, Patpong Bangkok and Dumagete, there is fun both above and below the water. The diving here was also macro and exceptional. We dove with Ulrika from Sweden and if still around probably the best dive guide in the area. She gets enjoyment both out of finding creatures and watching her group discover them as well. The diving here is reef but tons and tons of critters and fish. The variety of nudi, stonefish, frog, pipe, goby, eel etc goes on and on. Needless to say we were impressed and could not believe the variety, quantity and with ease that we found things. At times we find stuff that we could not identify.
Enjoy the recommendations travel to each is a bit of a pain but with all good dive locations well worth the trek. To give the place its true kudos we have dove Sipidan, Fiji, Tonga, Hawaii, Roatan, California, Cozumel, and Belize and would rate these close to number one.
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