Dive-Monster Rhoody

The resort mend it good with us and we could not order cold beer so we went to bed around 8:30 pm what is a kind of ok as we needed to be up for our dive at Monad Shoal in the morning at 6:00am to see the Thresher sharks at Monad Shoal.

We had a new guide this day who also gave us a good briefing before the boat departure. The ride to Monad Shoal took about 40 Minutes and the boat anchored on one of the many mooring lines. Monad Shoal has most of the times some surface currents,  so it’s a good thing to be ready when entering the water, either to go down immediately or to hang on the line until the rest is ready to dive.

The mooring-line goes down to about 22 meters. Down at the plateau is no current anymore and the guide navigates us to a cleaner-station where the Thresher Sharks are supposed to come to get their morning cleanup done by cleaner wrasses. Not this time. We were kneeling in the sand for about 35 minutes in 3 different spots but none of this wonderful creatures showed up. The visibility was also rather poor, so we ended the dive rather disappointed.

Back on the boat we decided to skip the afternoon div on the same spot to see the Mantas as it is just no fun to sit in bad visibility watching green soup and staring into the nothing.

Kim and I decided rather to have a walk up and down the beach to gather Information for several web-projects and give the Thresher sharks another try the next morning. The beach of Malapascua is soft with sand and it is a real postcard scene. Life is slow and relaxed.

We found a couple of nice Resorts on our way and will definitely stay in one of them whenever we visit Malapascua Island again.

Here some impressions of our walk.

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At 9:00 am we were ready to start our 2 diver day-trip to Gato Island, just before Malapascua with Exotic Dive resort. Some pack-lunch and water had to be organized individually. I actually like that as I don’t wanna eat much on daytrips and see no need to pay for a buffet. All in all I appreciated that we just need to pay the additional Marin park fee for Gato Island and not some ridiculous high daytrip-fees like in many resorts in Dumaguete when going to Apo Island.

The briefing was held by our guide in the restaurant of the resort and included all basic information needed. The Bankas are of Exotic are really big and there was plenty of space available for I think all together 15 divers plus guides.

The groups were kept small with a maximum of 5 divers. The boat ride to Gato Island took less than an hour, the sea was calm and the sun was out. A perfect day for diving.

Our first dive at Gato Island was on a sloping Reef with plenty of coral formation and a nice seascape. Our guide had a wonderful slow pace and made sure during the whole dive that all is god and that we see enough during the dive. Plenty of nudibranches, some sleeping white tip reef sharks and a free-swimming  banded sea snake plus the usually coral reef life made the dive very interesting an there was no minute I felt bored in any way.

After about 45 minutes I entered the Banka again and it was time for some Water. The sun was already and my sunburn was guaranteed. In my opinion the lunch break was a bit stretched and too long before we got ready for the second dive.

The second dive was along a coral covered wall with a gentle drift. That’s my diving, being absolutely lazy, no effort at all. The bottom of the wall was about 25 meters with some wonderful big blocks to explore and swim through. Highlight of the dive were the 3 white-tip which were swimming around in the open and it seemed that they couldn’t care less who is around them.

After the dive we entered the boat and when all divers were back we headed towards Malapascua.

In the diveshop we signed up for the Monad Shoal Dive at 6 am next morning to see the Thresher Sharks. All in all a wonderful first diving day and time for a rest.

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There is nobody really willing to work on Malapascua as it is the day of the local Fiesta. That might be also the reason why we had a tiny rental boat instead of one of the big boats from the Resort.

We met about 6pm in the Restaurant of Exotic Dive Resort and filled in the usual paperwork. Zoe the manager the dive-shop welcomed us and asked about our dive-plans. Of course we wanted to dive Monad Shoal for the Tresher Sharks and Mantas. Mike is an Open Water Diver and she explained us that the shop-policy does not allow OW divers there as it is a deep dive with 24 meters.

Being an SCUBA PADI Instructor and knowing the business I do agree to a certain point. I certainly would not take Open Water Divers to 24 meters on their first dive with me. And that is also the perfect Scenario to sell an Advanced Open Water course.

Even I wanted to be the Instructor for his AOW, I recommended to go for it with Exotic Dive Resort. Diving Monad Shoal to see Mantas and Thresher Sharks is the whole point of this trip. So Mike signed up for the Advanced Open Water course and got the manual to do his homework. As we can’t go tomorrow to Monad Shoal we signed up for a daytrip with 2 dives at Gato Island where Mike can go for his fish ID and the navigation part of the course. The Trip leaves at 9 pm and we go for 2 dives.

After all is done we finally can start our family reunion and order some cold beverages. The Menu for our dinner included some curry, sweet sour chicken, Sinigang, no salad as they were out of stock and a lot of rice. About 9:30 pm we needed to sign our bill as the restaurant want to close… hmm ok, still strange to kick out 5 people willing to spend money but not allowed to.  At least when they claim themselves to have a high standard.

off for holiday… cheers

Rhoody

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I thought I could have a quiet night in Cebu and sleep early after I got a text from Kim that his flight arrives around 11:30 at night. I welcomed him and Mike at the front desk at Eddies Hotel. They looked pretty tired but the decision was done to have a quick drink in a bar. Still safe as it is not Angeles City … The bars in Cebu closing at three.. We went to Vikings and ordered some beer . For what ever reason the bar did not close and we were there way past 5 am… Welcome to the beermonsters world.
After a good sleep we had our pickup arranged by Exotic Dive Resort in Malapascua at 12 o’clock. The driver and we were a kind of in time and were on our 4 hour trip to the north of Cebu.
After we arrived there and our luggage was unloaded the driver left and we were surrounded by porters who pointed us to a little boat at the end of a “pier” made out of a pile of rocks. There was nobody there who identified himself as send from Exotic Dive Resort and so we carried or gear to that funny little boat. We put it down on the end of the pier, maybe 2 meters away fro the nose of the small bangka. The boatcrew did not move one centimeter to help us. So we paid 200 Peso that the porter carry our bags the 2 meters.  We basically had no other choice at all and a big thunderstorm was about to come in.

The transfer of Exotic Dive Resort is charged over 11,000 Peso and you have to carry your own crap around. That’s a bit strange, but the story continues. We checked into our rooms and the room is large and convenient with balcony,  the bed is a little hard but big and ok, and the chicken and dogs under my door are obviously all here to welcome me at Exotic Dive Resort

more to come

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I am on my way to Cebu where I meet up with my friend Kim to head for some dives to Malapascua.  After packing my stuff I headed to the Dumaguete Airport and after 100 plus one promises to my girls that I will take care and to be a “good boy” I went to the check in to find out that my luggage doubled my ticket-price.  I wonder if it’s possible to buy 2 tickets and fly alone, but having 30 Kilogram free luggage. They charge 100 peso per Kilo, so with a ticket-price of 700 Peso  and 1200 Peso for exceeding by 12 Kilo it would make sense and safe a lot to buy 2 tickets for one person.

The rebuild terminal of the Dumaguete Airport has at least a working Aircon. And after sweating my ass of while falling in line and checking in I was freezing in the waiting area. The flight with a brand-new propeller machine of Cebu Pacific left the Dumaguete Airport at 7:20 in the morning and was actually very convenient and about 20 minutes in the air … only.

Kim booked for us “Eddies Hotel” and the taxi from Mactan to the Hotel in Cebu City was 150 Peso (Taximeter).

Mission of the day  was do get to the immigration in Cebu and to run to Asia Divers to get some Spare-parts for my regulators. About 9:30 I got into a Taxi and headed towards Mandaue, where the immigration office is located. Even there were many people there it worked pretty fast and with less costs I was expecting. After only 1.5 hours I was done and on the way to Asia Divers.

A quick lunch at a Thai place at the SM Mall I went back to Eddies Place where I needed a rest. Now it’s about 7 :pm and my friend Km is soon to arrive. I am pretty hungry and I am sure we gonna have one or two cold ones later.

Just while typing that Kim txt me that his Cebu Pacific flight is delayed…  new departure now 21:30. He won’t be here before 11:30. I guess he isn’t in a good mod, like always when he gotta fly with Cebu Pathetic.

So I will have my dinner alone now in the Hotel Restaurant and have a cold one afterwards…

So business is done and tomorrow the fun hopefully starts with our trip to Malapascua.

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