Puerto Galera, Anilao, Subic Bay Trip Report (May 2011) Part I

[willwx]

I have been looking forward to diving in Puerto Galera and Anilao for a long time. During the planning, I found Subic Bay is also in reach without taking a flight, so I just added it in. I benefited a lot from this forum when I planned this trip, that I decided to put up a proper trip report after it. If it can help one fellow diver for the trip planning, it will well worth the effort…

Part I: Puerto Galera

Transportation:

We took Singapore Air from SG to Manila and arrived a little before Sunset. After staying overnight at nearby hotel, we took SI-KAT bus-ferry combination, which cost 700php/person and was very convenient. We purchased tickets at the night before departure and the bus was full when we boarded in the next morning. We are not sure whether there will be seat available if you just show up at the departure time. The bus left Manila at 8:30 am and we arrived at the resort about 12 noon. (prepare some small changes for the porters as you will probably need their help to carry the gears on/off the ferry)

Dive Center/Resort

Asia Divers lies on the west part of the beach, which will take 5 to 10 min walk from Sabang pier. If you have heavy luggage, it’s better to call El Galeon when you get on the ferry. They will arrange staff to wait you at the pier and carry your luggage all the way to your room.

The room we took was the sea view with quite a few steps up to climb, which is very nice and clean. They have a stylish in house restaurant and few ladies can provide massage service after your dive. Wifi is available, but the reception in our room is very weak. The rooms close to the reception area should have a stronger signal.

Asia Divers has a very good diving set-up, as they have their own pier and a huge dive deck attached to it. They encourage divers to use nitrox and if you stay a few days here, only need to pay 60$ for the unlimited nitrox (32%)

Asia Divers have few boats, two fast and several slower banka. It does not make a big difference with whichever the boat we took, because most of the sites are just few minutes away.

Their dive schedule is 8:00, 10:30, 13:30, 16:00 and 18:00 for the night dive. Let them know whether you are going to join the following dive after every dive. They will put your name on the board and they are very puncture.

We dove with several of their dive guides and all of them are very experienced. We loved the briefing because it was in great detail, so we can expect what to do there (camera/video camera). The divers can choose the dive site and the DM will let you know the current condition of each site. Because we were there in a relative low season, two of us had the luxurious to do some repetitive boat yard muck dives. Otherwise, the guide will prefer to lead the bigger group to Canyon or some coral sites (less pressure).

In terms of the negative side, (if you consider it as negative), the current was a bit strong after full moon, which limited our choice of dive sites and also turned one of our big clam muck dive into a drift porridge dive; the diving is also restricted within 55 min and most of them lasted 45 min, a bit short to us; the better rooms are on the hill and it was hard to enjoy the climb after the 4th dive of the day.

Overall, we are very happy with our choice, both resort and dive center. If we will dive in PG again in the future, we won’t bother to try another one.

PS: bring enough mosquito repellent, because there are plenty of them.

Dive sites (highlight):

Boat Yard (twice) (muck, 5 ghost pipe fish, 5 sea horse, ocellated sawblade shrimp, baby scorpion fish, baby lionfish, baby file fish, a school of fusilier)
Dalarvan (muck, leaf scorpion fish, mimic octopus, baby file fish)
Sabang Wrecks (twice) (flying gurnard, stone fish, sea moth, huge turtle)
Canyon (twice) (“canyon”, current, big sweet lips)
Sinandican (twice) (nudi, many of them)
Escarceo (nudi, beautiful coral)
Coral Cove (electric shell, cow fish)
Big Clam (the person guarding the calm)
Alma Jane (wreck, school of bat fish)
Kilima Steps (frog fish, turtle)
Sabang Bay (ghost pipe fish, cow fish)
Wreck Point (nice coral, nudi)
Verde Island, Pinnacle (twice) (beautiful coral, lot of fish)

PG has a nice mixture of dive sites which provides both muck and coral dives, except pelagic. It is a good place for nudibranchs lovers because they are all over the place. I am not into “Canyon” type of diving very much, although it is apparently the favourite site of many divers, including DM working there for years. My personal favourite site during this trip is definitely Boat Yard for the muck, followed by Verde Pinnacle and Escarceo for the coral.

I have uploaded some pictures to the photo gallery, but haven't figured out how to link it to the post yet.

Part II: Anilao (to be continued…)

 

[Ardy]

Excellent report and exactly what I wanted to hear about the diving.

 

[willwx]

Puerto Galera, Anilao, Subic Bay Trip Report (May 2011) Part II

Part II: Anilao (Batangas)

Transportation:

Sabang to Anilao (Batangas): this journey can be tricky if you insist on public transport. It can be done via ferry-bus-jeepney-tricycle combination, but we were afraid that we will lose a day of diving after that. The resort arranged a private boat for us (big enough for 10 divers), which cost 100$, 1 hour trip, door to door service. It is not cheap for 2 people, but with limited choices around, we are happy with the convenience. Alan (the boss) also mentioned that you can even do diving during the trip and use the journey as surface interval! We didn’t bother to check in the next resort in wet suite, but please let me know if anyone has tried!

Dive Center/Resort

We chose Planet Dive because of the Twin Rock house reef. The dive center is sitting beside the beach (no sand, all pebbles) and with all the rooms spread along the hill. The dive center set up is basic and so do the rooms, which is not comparable with the resorts in PG. But their staffs are super friendly that compensated all the negatives! The room we took has aircon, water heater and very clean. The meals are provided in house, because there is no where else to eat nearby. Food is Filipino, plenty and good enough. Because there is no sandy beach, Planet Dive built a wooden sundeck in front of the resort, where is perfect to enjoy the sunset.

The diving schedule is very flexible and we usually do 1 early morning house reef dive, followed by 1 morning boat dive. After another afternoon boat dive, we complete the day with the house reef night dive before dinner. More boat dives are also available upon request, but what’s point of it with Twin Rock in front of your door!

The area is very quite during the week days, but super crowded in the weekend because of the weekend divers from Manila. The advantage is you can share the boat with them to reduce the cost, but Twin Rock will be packed with divers and snorkelers. We were lucky to dive with the co-owner of Planet Dive, Joey as our guide, who is very experienced with the area and shared a lot of interesting stories about the dive sites. During one of the Secret Bay muck dive, Joey took 3 of his DM students to help 2 of us finding stuff. That was the busiest dive I have ever had!

Overall, Planet Dive gave us a kind of family warm feeling and we will be more than happy to dive with them again if we go back Anilao.

Dive sites (highlight):

Twin Rock house reef (6 times) (day: Jack School, barracudas, big eye mackerels, turtle, nudi; night: many decoration crabs, eels hunting, abalone)
Secret Bay (twice) (muck, nudi, emperor shrimp, baby fire goby, worm, jaw fish, frog fish, ghost pipefish, baby scorpion fish, flying gurnard, sea horse, and the stuffs I don’t know the name)
Beatrice (beautiful coral)
Cathedral (the cross)
Rekudo (cockatoo leaf fish)
Kirby Rock (frog fish, nudi)
Aphol’s Rock (big frog fish, false stonefish)
Dari Laut (wreck, nothing special, can be skipped)

Our favourite dive site is definitely Secret Bay for its concentrated wired stuff. Joey mentioned the site used to be 10 times better before the nearby resort built a wall, which reflected the wave impact back to sea and pushed the critters to deeper water. Beatrice is also a must-dive for its large area of beautiful corals.

In terms of the Twin Rock house reef, the best time for day dive is early morning, when the Jack, barracuda, big eye mackerels are feeding. You can do two night dives if you like, and most animals are attracted to the shallow water because of the light from resort. Be very careful with the sea urchins and scorpion fish. There was almost always a scorpion fish when I tried to ground for a picture.


ScubaBoard Gallery - Anilao (May 2011)

Part III: Subic Bay (to be continued…)

 

[willwx]

Part III: Subic Bay

Transportation:

Anilao (Batangas) to Subic bay: we took the van arranged by resort (100$), which sent us to the victory liner bus station at Pasay, Manila. The trip took about 2.5 hours with light traffic. Then took the bus to Olongapo (250php, 3.5 hours), followed by “taxi” (350php, 30 min) to arrive at Subic Dive (Johan’s Resort).

Dive Center/Resort

Johan’s Resort is sitting on the beach, overlooking Subic bay. The room we took is small, basic and looks more like a cruise cabin. Although it has an aircon, but we still felt a bit damp in the room, probably because there is not direct sun light through the window. Anyway, it wasn’t a big deal, as we came here to “get wet”. They have a 24 h bar/restaurant in the resort and the food was good that we didn’t bother to eat anywhere else during our stay.

The dive center is an area between the rooms and restaurant. It was a bit crowded when everybody trying to gear up in the morning. The staffs are friendly and helpful, very conscious on safety and gave great details during briefing. Because the divers supposed to share the boat with us didn’t show up, we got the luxury of taking the private boat, private DM and choosing wherever we want to dive.

Dive sites (highlight):

LST (wreck, barracudas, devil ray)
USS New York (wreck, huge propellers and guns)
LCU (wreck, ghost pipefish)

The information on the history of the wrecks can be easily found on internet, so I’m not going to copy-paste here. Subic bay is used to be a US military base till 1990s and the diving is all about wrecks. There are two must-dive wrecks for us, LST and USS New York. LST is a big guy and more importantly, bull sharks have been seen over there, because it is close to the opening of the bay. We were not lucky enough to see the shark, but at least we met a group of barracudas and a devil ray on top of the wreck. USS New York is the star of all wrecks in Subic bay. Upon seeing its huge propellers and main guns, we started to feel what a true wreck dive should be.

Overall, we are very happy to dive with Johan’s dive center but will probably choose a slightly better place to sleep next time. We only did 3 dives there and will not recommend anything more than 2 diving days, unless you are a technical diver or wreck maniac. The visibility is really poor and you should always keep an eye on your dive computer if you don’t want to go de-co.

Transportation back to Manila:

Because there was no “taxi” by the time we checked out, we took the readily available tricycle to Olongapo bus station. There were two of us (Asian size), two big gear bags and two smaller backpacks, in ONE tricycle! At first we thought the driver was kidding to fit everything in his tricycle, but he did it! Unfortunately, the poor vehicle “died” 200m to our destination… if everything all right, this trip should take 30 min, 250php. The victory liner bus from Olongapo to Manila is frequent and plenty of seats available, so we didn’t purchase ticket in advance. The journey took 4 hours, 250php/person.

ScubaBoard Gallery - Subic Bay (May 2011)

This is the end of our story. Happy diving!

 

[Wantonmien]

willwx,

Thanks for posting, great detailed report and sounded like a good trip - also some great pictures in your gallery.

cheers

 

[Centrals]

A very detail reports on three popular diving areas in the country.

To those who could not or will not spend US$100.00 on private transfer there are suitable alternative though.