Richard & Jo's Blog

Diving day #9

After last night’s wind, it has calmed down again…

Dive #27

Daryl Laut

The barge wreck

Lovely dive. We spent time on the sand below the wreck looking for nudis then on to the wreck.

Different nudis, Christmas tree worms and general prettiness.

We spent our surface interval at Minilog eating lollies, but when it came to diving there was a bit of current. So we moved to Olympic.

Dive #28

Olympic

Most of our time was spent on the rubble between 16m and 27m.

We saw yellow featherstar shrimp, zebra crabs on a fire coral and I saw a shark. Small, similar to at home. Not sure if it was a baby or fully grown.

Back at base, it was time for lunch.  BLT for me and carbonara for Richard.

Diving again at 2pm, so a little culling of photos.

Dive #29

Apol’s Point

What an amazing site this is. So beautiful covered with featherstars and swarming with thousands of red tooth triggerfish, which surrounded us. Fabulous!

We saw lots of critters, on the top of my list was the pink pygmy seahorse, even got a picture. Slugs, shrimps including peacock mantis shrimp.

We moved to Coconut point for the surface interval, but the current was strong so we moved to Mainit West for our last dive of the day.

Dive #30

Mainit West

Coral garden, on a slope, no current

A lovely relaxing dive

We saw lots of critters and took plenty of photos.  Another reef octopus.

Very short trip back to the resort.

At the bar by six, lots of chatting!

Dinner at seven. Baby back ribs, coleslaw and fries for us to share.

There is a local party to celebrate the end of May. We could have gone but five of us six opted to retire instead. Only Darryl chose to go. I am sure we will hear all about it tomorrow.

Photo sorting, I have been at it for the last hour and a half, while Richard has been snoring in a not too quiet manner, which of course he would deny.

Tomorrow our lovely guide, Nanny, is off for five days, doing family stuff. We have Eric, a new guide. We will report back on how that goes…

Dive Day #8

We head down for an early breakfast and we greet our friends Darrall and Dianne from Adelaide. With Brendan and Vicki from Melbourne, we are now six.

That being said, due to various coughs etc, it’s just Jo and I on the boat this morning though we are joined by Marrianne from Germany for the morning.

For breakfast, a couple of fried eggs along with a sandwich of ham and cheese (you know, the triangles!).

Dive #23 Kirbys Rock

A lovely current free dive on the rock where a lot of time was spent with the pygmy seahorse and various other critters at depth so before long we needed to shallow up and avoid deco.

On the boat it’s time for coffee and orios as we head over to ‘olympic’ for our second dive.

We anchor up and wait for the surface interval to complete.

Dive #24 Olympic

We set nannies the objective of finding Tiger shrimp on this dive and just before the end, he delivered. Well done indeed. Now if only the little bugger would keep still I might just get a picture of it.

No, it’s sole intention was to scramble back down the slope at speed making portrait photography a little challenging, I clicked away regardless.

Now back to base for a lunch of Kinilaw La Tinigui, raw tuna with ginger and chilli. Awesome!

After a bob in the pool I’m sitting on the balcony writing this and waiting for afternoon dive which we bought forward an hour from 3.00pm to 2.00pm.

Dive #25 Bubbles

Never has the vis been quite so good on this dive as it was today. What is usually dark and intimidating was today bright and highly visible. That being said, only a few of the regular nudi’s showed up today. Then at the end of the dive by the boat, the current fish swam by.

After the surface interval (fuelled by oreos and coffee) we get back in at The next site.

Dive #26 Twin Rocks

We didn’t go far but we saw plenty including well positioned nudi’s and an entire family of large octopus – three of them!

Another lovely dive on our second day here in Anilao.

Apparently it had a shot of just about everything!

Tonight’s dinner consisted of sweet&sour chicken, vegitable chop suey and rice, a good combination.

It looks like the move from 3 to 4 dives a day is taking its toll as I might just have dozed off a little at dinner!

Dive Day #7

It would appear that Richard forgot to mention that my last dive was dive #1800. When we started, never in my wildest dreams did I think that I would do that amount of dives.

Thunderstorm last night. Oh boy, the loudest and flashiest we have ever experienced!! Oh, and it poured and poured!!

When we awoke this morning (4.00 for Richard and 5.45 for me) it was blue sky, sunshine and wind free for our crossing to Anilao.

We were packed, and at breakfast before 7.00.

We packed very carefully, one bag to go to the dive centre, one bag for the camera room and everything else to go to our room.

It looks like our crossing to Anilao will be fast. Water taxi coming at 8.00.

Hoping to be diving all for dives today…

Our water taxi arrives early. We are wavef off by Marie-Chris and leave the jetty at 7.36 and arrive at Anilao exactly 30 minutes later at 8.06. We are in, sorted, out again on a boat and in the water at 8.25.

Step off the boat, hugs all round. Nanny is here, our wonderful guide.

Our friends Brendan and Vicky (from Oz and China, although now living in Oz) are here already and waiting to go diving.

Dive #19

Mainit Corner

One of my favorite dives. So much to see.

First we saw a dragon shrimp, Christmas tree worms, all sorts of nudis, range from small to large, shrimp in a featherstar

Surface interval with coffee and Oreos!!!! Turtle at the surface.

Dive #20

Arthur’s Wall

Excellent dive. Beautiful reef and wall.

We saw various nudis shrimps on wire corals.

Lunch was BLT and fries for me and baby back ribs and fries for Richard.

It is only at this point, at about 1.30 that we actually get to our room to unpack.

Out diving again at 2.30. At 2.20, it would appear that we are late, Brendan and Vicky are already on board…

Dive #21

Koala

Reef down to about 16 meters, then a bit of a wall.  At about 28 meters,  on the wall, I had a chance to take pictures of a pink pregnant pygmy seahorse. Nice.

We saw a beautiful reef and lots of critters and a pink pregnant pygmy seahorse,

Surface interval, more coffee and more Oreos. Nice!

Dive #22

Mainit West – dodging the current fish

I know it is starting to sound boring but another excellent dive and another chance to take a picture of pink pygmy seahorse.

We saw nudis, shrimps, pygmy seahorse plus other critters barracuda and a turtle.

After a quick shower, we have cocktails at the bar, Richard a Negroni and me a mango daiquiri. We are chatting to Dave the resort owner, and Steve and his daughter, Mia, for the US.

We are joined by Brendan and Vicky and then have dinner. Tuna sisig, chop suey vegetables and fried rice.

Back in the room, lots of pictures to sort out. Waiting for Darryl and Dianne to arrive from Oz. It’s now 10pm and they haven’t arrived yet, so we are going to sleep.

Zzzzzz

Sadness prevails as its our last day diving here. Tomorrow we transfer to Anilao.

Regardless, today, after a breakfast of fresh croissant, banana pancake and bacon we head out for the first dive.iju

Dive #16, just this side of sinandang wall.

A lovely clean reef with plenty to see including Nudis, Candy Crab in soft coral and pristine colourful reef festoon with featherstars.

We head back to the usual spot (opposite Secret Bay) for tea, coffee and surface interval after which we dive at:

Dive #17 Secret Bay

Starting a little deeper than usual we find much to keep us occupied including butterfly nudis and a tiny red Frog Fish.

After this we are hunting for some large Coleman Shrimp that we spotted previously. Along the way we find all sorts including a pair of pipe fish.

Right at the end of the dive, when Joseph (our guide) has his SMB ready to launch, I spot them, Hurrah!

Jo go’s in for the pictures and then the dive ends!

We head back for lunch and managed to hit a fairly large block of wood on the way round. Everything stopped but the Stainless props were – phew!

Back on dry land it’s lunch time – grilled calamaris – two of them – so so very tasty!

It transpires that today is the day to replace one of the restaurant roofs so we take our lunch at ‘the other’ restaurant instead, equally lovely, just no sea view. We are joined by new guests (two of them) though they are non-divers so we are still the only divers in the resort.

All out again for the afternoon dive

Dive #18 White Beach

Back here again for our last dive of this section of the trip. Mostly sand at the start, some micro Bob Tail Squid (2mm long!) and other micro critters eventually give way to coral outcrops and then an entire reef which has several well positioned nudies and sea fans (a favourite of Jo’s). We end up with another tiny frog fish an a ‘Jo’ (no not my buddy but an actual creature) we’ll tell more once we have studied the photos.

Back on the boat – all sad faces, kit comes apart and is washed when we get back to shore.

A swift (well, actually not so swift) bob in the pool with a Mango Daquiri and a Negrone (my new favourite drink) before we hang stuff up to dry as best we can and stuff everything into bags.

Because of the extremely short transfer time (<30 minutes) we shall be holding our cameras and wearing our dive kit. We have arranged to jump off the private taxi and right on to a dive boat the moment we arrive. Lets see how the plan is actually executed in the morning!

Right now we are surrounded by drying dive gear and mostly packed bags – time to head off to dinner me thinks!

I slept well, Richard not so much…

Another beautiful day. Less clouds than yesterday and looks like less wind too.

Time for breakfast…

Every time we are here I have Lipton’s green tea and kalamansi to drink. Delicious. Bought the stuff to make it at home… Not delicious! What’s the difference?

We are thinking that today, we will be the only divers. Maggie left for UK yesterday and Beni and Matt leave for Australia today.

So we wait to see.

Every morning, at home and abroad we do (or try to do) the NY Times Connections.

Dive #13

Sinandang Wall

Right round the far side. A fair amount of chop on the surface. Not my favourite.

Once underwater there was total calmness. No surge, no current.

Coral outcrops and a wall later in the dive.

We saw two large reef octopus. The second one I thought that I would entice it out by scratching the rock around the area. The octopus came straight out, it gave me a bit of a start! It then tried to hide again.

We also saw, a couple of Cinderella nudis and a beautiful risbecia among lots of other stuff.

Our surface interval was spent here…

It looked like this, panoramic view.

Dive #14

A different part of this site. The first hour was spent on stones and rubble, the next half hour was a bit deeper on sand.

We saw lots. Lots of different nudis teeny tiny cuttlefish and a blue shrimp on a blue starfish. Finished off with a Shaun the sheep slug.

We had a dip in the pool before lunch of sausages, Chinese fried rice and lettuce. Very tasty. Richard had pudding of fruit cocktail and ice cream.

Dive #15

White beach

Looking for the blue ringed octopus again.

A bit of current combined with sausage acid reflux at the beginning of the dive, I wasn’t feeling too happy. Then I spotted a nicely positioned flabelina,  and order was restored!!

The flabelina was shortly followed by a frogfish and the blue ringed octopus. Lots of pictures were taken. After all of that, there was a mimic octopus with its eyes just popping up about the sand. I very slowly and gently put my hand towards it and it reached out and touched my finger with its tentacle – a very special moment!

After the dive we went for a dip in the pool, where we drank cocktails. Richard had another negroni and I had a mango daiquiri.

Then a review of the photos, of which there were lots.

It is quiet in the restaurant this evening…

Red horse and sprite, both with copious amounts of ice…

So… Pasta course…

Followed by…

And for the first time, Richard had no dessert!

Alexia and Sandra came and chatted with us after dinner. It was lovely to catch up with them and tell them what a lovely time we were having.

On the way back to our room, I almost stepped on this frog (toad?). That would have made a mess!!

That’s about it for today. Tomorrow is our last diving day in Puerto Galera, which is sad but we will be diving in Anilao the day after that. Happy days.

Dive Day #4

Back on track today, set an alarm, no more waking in a panic and realising that we should be at breakfast.

“Set an alarm” she said.

“As early as you like” she said.

Alarm set, 05.45, worked well. Now I’ve got plenty of time to sort out batteries, beverages and general Relaxation before the onslaught of breakfast.

I had some gear failure Yesterday explained the issues I was having with one of my strobes. The end dropped off one of my fibre optic sync cables. Or, to be more precise, being that the end was firmly plugged into the strobe, the cable actually fell off the end.

It can be pushed back on and works just fine but it does need attention.

Disappointingly, I do not carry a spare (blunder #1) and equally dissappointingly, I did not pack superglue (blunder #2).

Good news however, Dave Santos (resort manager at Buceo, our home for the last two weeks of our trip) has picked me up a spare from Manilla and all will be good. For now I’ll just manage my pushing the thing back in if I see it dangling under water!

After an awesome breakfast which included fresh fruit, doughnuts, pancake and bacon we went diving.

Dive #10 Boulders.

Does what it says on the tin, lots of massive boulders in the first 15m giving way to fewer and fewer in the 15m to 30m area and culminating in a visit to a sea fan where the usually elusive pygmy sea horse hangs out.

This time it was captured!

Upon entry, Jo managed to find herself sufficiently distant from the boat (Windage on the boat) that one of the guides went and fetched her camera (which is normally handed down after entry)

After the dive we head back to the cove for the surface interval before a muck dive.

Dive #11????

A most excellent dive over the sea bed where many critters were lurking including many nudi’s, shrimps and an ornate ghost pipe fish.

We head back to base for a quick dip in the pool and a lunch of Grilled fish steak, rice and salad, yum!

Wet have arranged to dive this afternoon at 2.30pm, it’s just gone 1.33pm and I’ve not ordered dessert yet!!!

Dive #12 White Beach

We head back to the room for a quick rest before turning up nice and early due the 2.30pm.dive turns out to be a 3.00pm dive as Matt and Bennie are joining us.

We head off for a dive at White Beach such turns out to be another corker.

Towards the end of the dive, I’m busy taking pictures of an oculate blue ring octopus whilst Jo had discovered a whole family of flamboyant cuttlefish, what a result!

A long bob in the pool follows, chased down with a mango daquiri and a negrone, yum.

A short trip to the room to offload pictures and hang up the wet stuff and it’s back out to dinner which tonight consisted of:

Breads with olive oil and balsamic, spaghetti carbonara/bolognase and super tender steak with salad and mash, very nice indeed.

There is a slight risk that this will be followed by mango and ice cream!

… Which turned out to be fruit salad, lovely.

We head back to the room, full of good intentuons of editing photos etc.

ZZzz……

Slept well. Another nine and a half hours!

Breakfast was fruits followed by scrambled eggs, bacon and toast for me and fruits followed by eggs and bacon for Richard.

Diving at 9am but of course we are early. On the smaller boat today. We have been spoilt as it has only been us on the boat each day. Lovely.

We are diving with Joseph who is very knowledgeable and off course very good at finding critters.

Dive #7

White Beach

Coral dive. Where we got in it was a little bland but improved as the dive went along, ending at a lovely pinnacle.

We saw various slugs, lots of featherworms, which I love.

A very enjoyable dive.

The surface interval was taken in the bay, watching jet skis tow huge doughnuts that seat about eight people.

I also learnt that something I thought could only be done in the bathroom could also be done when bobbing on the surface of the sea… Needs must!

Dive #8

White Beach

This was a very different dive

Muck dive. Sandy slope.

We saw three frogfish, cuttefish, tiny mantis shrimps, nudis and a very excited blue ring octopus protecting its eggs.

Once we got back to the resort we had a dip in the pool before lunch.

Lunch was BBQ seafood kebabs, with a delicious red (?) rice and lettuce. Richard followed that with a huge bowl of mango ice cream and chopped banana.

Dive #9

White Beach

A different part again. The problem with muck diving is that often photos end up looking a bit drab. So, I set myself a mission, to only take colourful pictures. Did pretty well actually.

We saw a tiny orange frogfish, nudis that looks a bit like marshmallow, shrimps in soft coral, mimic octopus,  a teeny tiny yellow spotted unicorn nudi which could only have been about 2-3mm.

A very enjoyable dive.

We went for a swim as soon as we got back. Had drinks in the pool. Richard had a negroni and I had a mango and banana juice.

Afterwards, we looked at photos. Sorted Richard’s that we were going to keep. Deleted the ones we didn’t… Then realised that I had deleted them all… Oops! Luckily, I realised and told him just before he formatted his SD card. Obviously had to redo it, which took extra time.

Dinner was prawn pasta (pasta shaped like earlobes – orecchiette) followed by fish in a caper sauce with vegetables (similar to ratatouille). Richard had a tiramisu for pudding. Made him happy, me?  not so much. Insert a very sad face here… VERY SAD!!!! Should have taken a picture but I couldn’t bring myself to… VERY, VERY SAD!!!!!!!!!!

Dive Day #2

What will today bring?

Well, chocolate croissants, fresh fruit, banana pancake, scrambled eggs and bacon for a start (because we ordered them last night). No skimping on the food here!

Dive gear and cameras all prepped, the new BCD did what it needed to though I have to say that wearing only a rash vest, it did feel a little large on me. No worries about that when diving at home then!

I started with 8 kilos (which they converted to 16lbs!) and immediately dropped it to 6 kilos (well, 12lbs) and today I might drop more, we shall see.

On dive 3 yesterday I did get hit with cramp. This caused me to immediately up my water consumption (I know I dont drink enough and apparently, it has to be water, Red Horse and coffee don’t count) so, non stop water for me from now on.

I’ve also taken to drinking the beer in a glass full of ice in an attempt to increase water consumption whilst simultaniously enjoying really cold beer, it’s a win-win situation!

We’ve been diving!

There was a slight shenanigan before we set out as, because of boat swap arrangements, our weights were on the “other” boat.

It’s all because the others were going to Verde island but then they were not because the island had become ‘closed’. Anyhow, the twin 140’s on the back of our boat meant that we soon rejoined our weights and headed off for our diving.

Dive #4, Sabang Wrecks

Various wrecks just off shore from the main resort area.

A sandy bottom with bits of broken boats! One of which still had the twin engines standing proud of the seabed along with various bits of stainless which had not quite been completely consumed by the wild life.

Jo saw a Peacock Mantis Shrimp, I saw various nudi’s and some frog fish.

For the second dive we headed back to Coral Gardens?

This was a slightly deeper dive on as sandy slope with many critters including hairy shrimp, frog fish, nudi’s, pipe fish and cuttlefish.

Disappointingly no biscuits on the surface interval. Then again, it’s Pizza for lunch day and they are massive!!

Well that’s all dealt with, we have 70 minutes until the next dive, hopefully it’s enough!!!!

Back on board for the afternoon dive. We head out of the bay and turn west.

Dive #6 White Beach

This was a muck dive and what a corker it was!

We saw plenty including hairy frog fish, lots of octopus (hiding in lots of places) nudi’s, scorpion fish, bob tailed squid, pulsating jelly fish and ambon scorpion fish.

I was an excellent muck dive.

We head back to base. I have no idea what speed we do but the twin 140’s were set to max, the water was flat and we held on tight!

We get back and head straight for the pool.

Now then, the pool is situated in a garden and is surrounded on all sides by grass and flower beds. There we are, bobbing about as you do when I spot the mother of all crabs scurrying around at the bottom of the pool like it knows ot should not be there!

After searching around for a suitable stick, we arm ourselves with a collection of sandals and Crocs and proceed to encourage this thing to the surface in an attempt to return it to land.

It’s having none of it and puts up quite a fight.

Eventually we got it moved to a higher level and finally out on to the grass where it proceeds to skulk off without a single word of thanks!

After servicing cameras and hanging up we stuff we head out for dinner which tonight featured:

Toasted breads with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, tagiatelli bolognase and a carpaccio of beef with salad and chips!

Shortly after that we retired and fell almost immediately to sleep!

Dive day #1

Woke up about 5.45. Not too bad. Nine hours, off and on.

Setting up camera stuff before breakfast, always a little stressful on the first day. All went well, unlike the devastation that happened on our first morning, last time we came to Fishermen’s Cove. The look on Richard’s face when he had to tell me that a large proportion of our camera kit had stayed at home. A never to be repeated experience!

Oh no! Fluffy socks! No where to be seen, probably because I forgot to pack them. Anyway, Darryl and Dianne to the rescue, socks will be available at Buceo when we get there.

Breakfast was great. Fruits (half a mango, quarter of a pineapple and a banana) followed by crisp bacon, scrambled eggs and toast.

Meeting at 8.30 to do the paperwork followed by a check dive. Let’s hope I can remember what to do.

Check in at 8.30 to do the paperwork then diving.

We are with Joseph again.

Dive #1 Sinandigan Wall

Right around the other side. We never got to dive this last time as it was too rough.

30 degrees in the water – lovely!

We had plenty of current fish and nudis (flabelinas and a beautiful risbecia). Also we saw a Napoleon wrasse and a large grouper.

Back round to Sabang bay for the surface interval. Tea and kalamansi for me and coffee for Richard. Bonus, biscuits that I can eat!

Dive #2 Not sure where we dived, will find out

Spent most of the five at about 20-23 metres. Quite a lot of shimmering water – thermocline! Brrrr! Water temperature went all the way down to 29 degrees!!

We saw Coleman shrimp on a fire urchin, yellow leaf fish, banded sea krait (snake) which took a liking to Richard’s fins.

Back to the resort, a quick dip in the pool before a delicious lunch of BBQ chicken with the most amazing rice and salad greens. Food here is fantastic! Richard had a pannecotta for dessert.

I have fluffy socks! Thanks to Darryl and Dianne. They are not here yet but will be next Friday!

Dive #3 Not sure where we dived, will find out

Muck dive on a sandy slope. A most excellent dive. We saw lots.

We saw three seahorses, four cuttlefish, two robust pipefish, nudis, frogfish, porcelain crab and a green turtle.

Followed by a relaxing dip in the pool where the water temperature was 33 degrees. Chatted with other guests.

After a little camera work we had a drink and dinner.

Dinner was fresh bread with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, homemade pasta pesto then prawns with potatoes. Another pannecotta for Richard for dessert.

Time for an early night…

Off we go again on what turned out to be a most leisurely travel experience.

We were picked up about 20 minutes before the allotted time (always nice) and we had an uneventful trip to Heathrow though it was not without the usual (and expected) abuse from our favourite driver!

A short walk into Terminal 4 and we joined the swiftly moving queue at the Bag Drop.

We were quizzed in some detail regarding the quantity of batteries that we had stashed in our carry on baggage and were told in no uncertain terms that we had exceeded our limit several times over (I checked this later and it was absolutely true) but they suggested we just shared them between us and to be prepared for rejection at security.

We put on a brave face, passsed through security, nothing mentioned, go figure?

Anyhow, nice seats, plenty of room, A380!.

Good food/drink and movies. Dont ask me what I watched, can’t remember!!

Before long we arrive at Abu Dhabi for a 3 hour rest (about 2.5hrs too long IMHO).

Next up, a plane load of residents heading back to Manilla. On older plane but still plenty of room. This was the 8.5hr stretch so I dozed through several more movies and then we were descending in to Manilla, clear skies and plenty of sunshine.

Passport control and baggage reclaim took an hour and a half and it seemed that they had just one luggage belt running for several flights.

Regardless, we left the airport and entered the furnace (thank goodness our van had good A/C).

More dozing bought us quickly to the ferry terminal at Batangas. We were met by our appointed representative who organised our bags and escorted us in to the terminal. Despite everything being organised for us (and paid) both Jo and I were asked for more money for transporting our baggage, local scammers trying their hardest!

Inside the terminal we get our tickets and make the 3.00pm ferry (which did not leave until 3.30pm!).

Chatting to some locals on the way, all very convivial!

We arrive at PG, pay our visitors entry fee (jobs for the boys?) and were presented with our transport.

Last time we came here we had a massive Jeepney. This time, another example of local transport;

We are whisked (as much as a tuktuk can whisk) away on our 5 minute transfer to Fishermen’s Cove where are are made most welcome.

We have the same Garden room as last time, super lovely, all bags emptied then straight in to the pool where we meet the other guests (all three of them!) Maggie from North Wales (BSAC diver) Bennie and Matt (both from Australia).

To say the resort is quiet would be an under statement!

Dinner was most excellent (pre set menu here) and consisted of pasta with clams (so very tasty!) followed by carpaccio of fish (they must have super sharp knives here), oh, and I had a panna cotta, lovely.

All washed down with mango and banana smoothie and a Red Horse.

Then sleep, 9hrs! ZZZzzz…