Oriental Mindoro

Thousands of islands, white sandy beaches and crystal-clear sparkling blue water make the Philippines the perfect getaway for scuba divers and beach bums alike. Photo-Elaine Yong

By Elaine Yong

With more than 7000 islands, the Philippines has miles and miles of white sand and crystal-clear sparkling blue waters. Its most famous beach, Boracay, is the stuff of legends. So the Southeast Asian country seemed the ideal place to soak up the sun on a “quick” long weekend getaway from Hong Kong.

However, the only last-minute airplane tickets I could get were to Manila and the closest beach to the steamy hot and maddeningly chaotic capital city is Puerto Galera on Mindoro, a 5 hour bus and ferry ride away. But it would be worth the trek, right? After all, everything I had read on Puerto Galera gushed about “splendid beaches”.

As I sat on the cramped and stuffy bus, which looked as if it may have been held together with duct tape, I began to wonder if I’d made a mistake. It took 4 hours to travel a mere 120 kilometres to the Batangas ferry terminal, where I endured another sweltering delay with hundreds of locals.

Finally, nearly 8 hours after leaving Manila, our over-loaded boat puttered into the bay of Sabang Beach, one of Puerto Galera’s beach towns. According to the guidebooks, this isn’t the nicest stretch of beach in the area and I had to admit I was disappointed by the narrow strip of sand, barely peeking above the high tide. Dinghys, boats and jet skis were crammed together like cars in a Costco parking lot. Plus the water looked a bit questionable with a flotilla of garbage bobbing about.

I wasn’t ready to give up yet. A mere 10 minute walk away, Big La Laguna and Small La Laguna are supposedly much nicer, but when I got there, I looked around with growing dismay. I came all the way here by plane, bus and boat for THIS?

But the next day, I found Puerto Galera’s real treasure as I snorkeled at the so-called “Coral Garden” off Long Beach – the amazing scenery UNDER the water. Hard and soft corals in a wide array of jewel tones, and an abundance of reef fish – bright yellow butterfly fish, speckled groupers, iridescent blue-green parrot fish and dozens of others I couldn’t even begin to identify. I felt like a kid in Captain Nemo’s candy store.

Despite the devastating practices of cyanide and dynamite fishing, the diversity of marine life in the Philippines is astounding, and stricter environmental regulations are slowly reversing the damage. While the Caribbean only has 60 species of coral, the Philippines boasts of more than 500.

Pair that with the friendliness of the locals and the relatively low living cost, it’s easy to see why this “slightly off the beaten path” country has become a world-class diving destination. An on-line diving magazine has voted the Philippines one of its top ten dive destinations for marine life and Scuba Diving magazine has named it one of the top five shore-diving destinations in the Pacific/Indian Oceans.

With some of the best diving instruction in the world, I thought I’d stop whining about the miniscule beaches in Puerto Galera and don a wetsuit instead (an especially appealing option after getting stung dozens of times by invisible jellyfish while snorkeling). There are more than 30 dive sites in the area, most of them easily accessible by a 5-minute boat ride.

Full PADI open-water certification courses are about $300US. Complete “learn to dive” packages including accommodations are a bargain at around $400US (4 nights, double occupancy). Certified divers can enjoy “unlimited dive” packages (1 week package include 5 days unlimited diving $272US).

I was the only student for the 1-day “Discover Scuba” course ($60US) and my German diving instructor, Christian, came right to the hotel pool for the first part of the lesson. He has dived all over the world but always returns to the Philippines. “I only go home to Germany to make real money so I can come back and dive,” he laughed. Now, he spends half the year in Sabang as an instructor.

After going through “Diving 101″, which includes frightening descriptions of stretched lungs, the bends and poisonous coral, we hit the pool. I floated around in the deep end, trying to maintain equilibrium, basically swimming in circles making myself nauseous. An hour later, Christian declared, “You’re a natural!” But maybe he says that to all his students.

We walked over to the dive shop, right on the beach, and suited up for my first real dive in Sabang Bay. Christian told me there’s a lot of amazing sea life just offshore. We waded in about 20 metres, popped in our regulators, and ducked under the water.

I saw the same kinds of coral and fish as when I was snorkeling, but when you’re diving, the perspective is totally different. The colours are much more vibrant and the details are literally in your face.

A feisty clownfish (thinking “Finding Nemo”) tried to stare me down in a valiant effort to protect his patch of anemone. I swam to the left, he followed. I swam to the right, he wouldn’t give up. I would have laughed, but it’s hard to do that when you’re underwater.

At one point, Christian gestured to something on the ocean floor. It looked like a skinny brown twig, but upon closer inspection, I realized it was some kind of fish with excellent camouflage skills (I later learned it was a pipefish, related to the seahorse).

Half an hour later, I had a big Cheshire cat grin plastered on my face as we surfaced. So when Christian turned to me and smiled, “Well, what did you think?” he didn’t really need to hear my answer. Puerto Galera may have disappointed me with its beaches, but it more than made up for it with its treasures under the water.