Following our short stay in Subic Bay, we then headed down to Anilao for what we were really after ….. nudibranchs.
The journey was extremely tiresome and long, six and a half hours in total with only one pit stop, which was on the Anilao side of Manila. This was also the last place where we had a decent cup of coffee until we returned to Dubai.
Traffic in Manila
Jeepney in Batangas
Having left at 0600, we arrived at 1230 just in time for lunch
Even though it had been two and a half years since my last visit, several of the staff remembered me including Edgar and Glen the dive guides, however we were assigned a different guide Jhomel.
It was also good to have a decent place to work on my camera too, as Crystal Blue’s camera room is pretty top notch. As per their practice we also had our own assigned banka and crew of two besides the guide.
After lunch we decided to have a leisurely dive on the house reef, and discovered that some rules had changed regarding shore dives … they were not allowed and we had to use the banka in case of strong currents …. really! It was flat calm. But rules are rules, so we used the boat.
We splashed around 15:00 and had an eighty-two minute dive shooting over 100 images, including several nudis that neither of us had seen before, definitely a good start.
An unknown Melibe sp.
For the next four days our schedule was up at 0630, sort out our gases, fresh batteries in cameras and strobes then breakfast before we left for our first dives at 0800. We hit several sites over the four days and managed three dives daily including a couple of night dives, which also proved to be great. None of our dives was less than 80 minutes
Goniobranchus leopardus – been after this one for years
Favorinus tsuruganus
Of course it wasn’t all nudis, there were several other critters that made the week including a Flambuoyant Cuttlefish,
a Mimic Octopus – spot the shrimps
and a host of different shrimps, including two massive Emperor Shrimps on a sea cucumber
and several frogfish on most dives.
I would say in conclusion that Anilao matches Lembeh easily for critters, and for me a much more economic option as I only need one flight from Dubai, whereas to reach Lembeh I need two flights to Manado.
Now the only thing I ask Crystal Blue Resort to do is ....... install an espresso machine
The journey was extremely tiresome and long, six and a half hours in total with only one pit stop, which was on the Anilao side of Manila. This was also the last place where we had a decent cup of coffee until we returned to Dubai.
Traffic in Manila
Jeepney in Batangas
Having left at 0600, we arrived at 1230 just in time for lunch
Even though it had been two and a half years since my last visit, several of the staff remembered me including Edgar and Glen the dive guides, however we were assigned a different guide Jhomel.
It was also good to have a decent place to work on my camera too, as Crystal Blue’s camera room is pretty top notch. As per their practice we also had our own assigned banka and crew of two besides the guide.
After lunch we decided to have a leisurely dive on the house reef, and discovered that some rules had changed regarding shore dives … they were not allowed and we had to use the banka in case of strong currents …. really! It was flat calm. But rules are rules, so we used the boat.
We splashed around 15:00 and had an eighty-two minute dive shooting over 100 images, including several nudis that neither of us had seen before, definitely a good start.
An unknown Melibe sp.
For the next four days our schedule was up at 0630, sort out our gases, fresh batteries in cameras and strobes then breakfast before we left for our first dives at 0800. We hit several sites over the four days and managed three dives daily including a couple of night dives, which also proved to be great. None of our dives was less than 80 minutes
Goniobranchus leopardus – been after this one for years
Favorinus tsuruganus
Of course it wasn’t all nudis, there were several other critters that made the week including a Flambuoyant Cuttlefish,
a Mimic Octopus – spot the shrimps
and a host of different shrimps, including two massive Emperor Shrimps on a sea cucumber
and several frogfish on most dives.
I would say in conclusion that Anilao matches Lembeh easily for critters, and for me a much more economic option as I only need one flight from Dubai, whereas to reach Lembeh I need two flights to Manado.
Now the only thing I ask Crystal Blue Resort to do is ....... install an espresso machine
