Cebu Recommendations for Tentative Beginner?

[Russtafaerian]

Hi,

My GF recently certified open water but is still very new to diving with only 5 dives and the last couple of dives lasted only 20 mins as she got nauseous and actually vomited under water and on the surface.

Personally I’m keen to do the threshers at Malapascua but my priority is helping her enjoy our 3 dive days and I think super easy dives, ideally not much deeper than 10 meters, limited current and ideally beach or short boat ride dives.

Hoping to hear from experts on Cebu if the ideal place would be Moalboal, or if we could make Malapascua work even if I did 1-2 advanced dives without her and the rest of dives with her but of the super easy variety.

Anyone who could share some view on this would be very helpful as unfortunately the dive resorts in both locations and not helping that much and obviously have some bias toward selling me their resort deals.

Thanks in advance!

Russ

 

[Searcaigh]

Getting to and from Cebu city to Moalboal and / or Malapascua is time consuming.

If you only have three days, stay in Cebu then dive Mactan Island, which is close by and a shore dive. We also went out to Olango on a shared bangka booked through Si Dive, who were okay. This was 2019.

 

[eagleray180]

As @Searcaigh pointed out there is some travel time involved getting to Moalboal or Malapascua from Cebu City. You would need to basically plan using up a minimum of 1/2 a day each way for travel. So if you do have 5 days in total (2 for travel/3 for diving) IMHO I would pick Malapascua. It is easy diving, clear water with short boat rides. It is a sleepy, pretty little island with beautiful beaches and is more interesting and exotic then Moalboal. For a couple it is also a much more romantic destination.

There are some recent threads on diving Moalboal. They pretty much are on point about the diving there.

​

 

[chillyinCanada]

Why not go to Bali? Or even Tioman? It's so close to you.

Is your girlfriend vomiting because she's frightened or because she's seasick or is it the salt water?

Has she been motion/seasick before?

 

[Russtafaerian]

Thanks for the replies @Searcaigh @eagleray180 and @chillyinCanada.

Actually flying in on Sat 27 and then we can stay in Cebu one night or go direct to the resort depending on where we decide to go. Malapascua would likely have to leave early Sunday. We’d have Mon Tue and maybe Wed to dive and fly out Thurs about 1:30pm.

If all places have some basic shore dives that are super easy then it sounds like any of the 3 (Inc. Mactan) are decent options but with Malapascua at least I can also get some thresher action in while she sleeps in! Would others agree with this direction?

No idea why she’s vomiting, the first 20 mins she’s been fine, enjoying the dive, practicing her buoyancy and then bam, suddenly feels ill. We don’t know if it’s nerves or motion sickness or what. I emailed DAN and they guessed likely motion sickness and suggested a few things to try out. My guess is could be just beginner nerves so that’s why I’m keen to just let her practice and get accustomed to the water in a safer and super easy environment.

Thanks so much for the advice!!

 

[diveUAE]

With such short time I would not go for Malapascua. If you leave early Sunday, you would be there in the afternoon, then dive Monday and Tuesday, making your way back on Wednesday and flying out Thursday. Diving is great, but IIRC the deeper sites - I don't recall us doing anything above 10 m (that could be because we're experienced divers).

Moalboal is just a (taxi?) ride away, it's not the best diving in the Philippines, but there are nice corals and at least when we visited there was not much current and good viz. If you don't land too late Saturday you could take a taxi direct to Moalboal and start diving Sunday, then have Mon-Wed for diving/exploring and leave Moalboal early Thursday to catch your flight.

Mactan is another option.

 

[Centrals]

^
Can't agree more.
Moalboal is about 3hrs away from the airport and traffic is usually very light in the evening. Diving there is very very easy especially along the coastal wall.
Malapascua is NOT recommended for beginner diver especially for the thresher shark.
Mactan is another option but I believe Moalboal is more suitable for the timid.

 

[Tadpole Frogfish]

Moalboal is good for beginner and sardines. Dives are shallow and a few sites. There is a mix on a boat with those just certified to divers free diving sardines and want to see a bit of macro in coral with camouflaged frogfish, a tiny pipe fish or seahorse and a hidden scorpion.

You can get around Moalboal on foot or with moped tuktuks. Mopeds can take you around to streets off the main one (cabbies lined up) for non-diving activities. Traffic near Cebu airport/into city can be densely polluted.

Malapascua is only for threshers and divers comfortable in depth/air.

 

[JonnieB]

Moalboal is good for beginner and sardines. Dives are shallow and a few sites. There is a mix on a boat with those just certified to divers free diving sardines and want to see a bit of macro in coral with camouflaged frogfish, a tiny pipe fish or seahorse and a hidden scorpion.

You can get around Moalboal on foot or with moped tuktuks. Mopeds can take you around to streets off the main one (cabbies lined up) for non-diving activities. Traffic near Cebu airport/into city can be densely polluted.

Malapascua is only for threshers and divers comfortable in depth/air.

There is varied marine life, and a lot of macro, in Malapascue not just Threshers. But I agree, do to time constraints and diver experience it would be better to go elsewhere.

 

[Centrals]

There is varied marine life, and a lot of macro, in Malapascue not just Threshers. But I agree, do to time constraints and diver experience it would be better to go elsewhere.

Have you done any tec dive in Malapascua?
There are couple of deep wrecks around.