Scuba Diving In Philippines – General Travel Information
Philippines is much like the Caribbean of the East. When I went there, I saw similar tropical vegetation, similar township structures and even trucks. Indeed, I saw divers from other parts of Asia like South Korea, Japan and China as they venture south to their version of the Caribbean. One of the main scuba diving areas in the Philippines is Puerto Galera.
To get to Puerto Galera, one must fly into Manila. From there we have two main options. Take an expensive seaplane or an inexpensive shuttle bus or van two hours south to Batangas Pier where you catch a ferry to the next island south which is Mindoro. Puerto Galera is one of the ports on the north side of Mindoro.
Most of the dive action will be at Sabang Beach which is in a curved shape lagoon. This is where all the dive resorts, hotels and dive shops are, all beachfront. You can literally walk from your room to the dive shop downstairs and to the beach where the dive boats will come in. Since this is in the Philippines, the costs for everything are actually quite low considering what you get. This destination is much like the equivalent of Dominican Republic, Roatan or Utila where costs are at the lower end for the Caribbean.
Here’s the video on Philippines diving.
Puerto Galera Scuba Diving
The water temperatures around Puerto Galera are around 79-84 degrees F or 26-29 degrees C much of the year but in the winter months like December, deep dives will have thermoclines where temperatures can dip down to 72 degrees F or 22 degrees C. There are marine critters in the waters there that you would not see in the Caribbean.
But overall at least in the Puerto Galera area, the dive sites are on par with the average dive site in the Caribbean. I don’t think they are better nor worse. With the chances of seeing some creatures unique to the Philippines and with the added cultural component, traveling there might be worthwhile.
However, for most scuba divers from North America or Europe, they must justify the long travel for scuba diving that is basically on par with Caribbean diving. For me, I justified my trip to the Philippines by traveling to two other countries, China and South Korea on the same trip. So a triple country trip for me made it worthwhile.
Most of my travels involve lugging along my scuba gear or skis anyway even though if trips are not spent with all my time diving or skiing. With this trip, I got to see the main sights in Beijing, then Seoul as a quick layover followed by scuba diving in the Philippines. If you were to do a big trip to that part of the world from here in North America, I would recommend a similar trip like the one I did. Go there not just for scuba diving but for other attractions as well since it will be a very culturally interesting trip. You likely won’t be traveling all the way to the other side of the world too often so make the most of it and the scuba diving can be just part of a great big trip.
Granted all the dives I did were boat dives off Sabang Beach, I imagine that there are more remote dive sites in the Philippines that are more spectacular and reachable by the liveaboard boats. Depending on the season, liveaboards do base from Puerto Galera.
