Have Internet Will Travel A blog about travel freelancing in the Philippines

When we were planning out the Central American leg of our trip, visiting Roatan was high on the list of destinations. We’ve often heard what a haven for scuba divers it is, both due to the location (a quick 2 hour flight from Miami) and the cost. Roatan is one of the cheapest places to get dive certified in the world and the fun dive prices are also amongst some of the lowest.

When we arrived in Roatan, we found a range of dive shops. From small shore based dinghy operations and speed boats, up to large 20 person capacity boats that will do day trips all over the island. We decided to go with Coconut Tree Divers, one of the larger, central shops which was close to where we were staying. They’re the only shop in the West End that do 4 dives a day which fits well with our shifting schedules during busy work weeks. They’re a highly social bunch and we had many good stories and nights out with our dive masters and fellow divers. They really went out of their way to make sure we were well taken care of from gear to dive site selections.

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We arrived in Roatan in early March just as the last of the seasonal storms were coming through. Scouting out a place to stay for a few months we found a large range of options and locations but we quickly focused on 3 areas on the west side of the island due to their proximity to grocery shopping, beaches, entertainment, and dive shops. The island is quite hilly, so a car or scooter would be a necessity in many areas if you don’t want to be taking a taxi 10 times a day.

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Since arriving in Costa Rica nearly 6 months ago, we haven’t been scuba diving much compared to the 80+ dives we did last year in Southeast Asia. We did a 2 dive trip to the Catalina Islands from Tamarindo a couple months ago where we saw a few eagle rays, a school of jacks, and 3 or 4 white tip reef sharks, but the visibility was really poor and with the Papagayo wind in full effect since then, we haven’t attempted another dive until this last weekend when we decided to take a quick trip to Playas del Coco.

We got on the local bus to Liberia at 9am which meanders in and out of each town on the way to it’s destination; picking up and dropping off school children, workers, and food and drink vendors as it goes. Liberia is approximately an hour away from Tamarindo by car, but the local bus takes anywhere from 1.5 hours to 2.5 hours to get there. We got off the bus before Liberia at the turn off to Playas del Coco (shortly after Filadelfia) and switched buses. Our next bus came along within 45 minutes and we continued on through Sardinal. Within a half hour, we had completed our 3.5 hour journey arriving at Coco.

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Here’s just a taste of the what we saw diving at Sipadan. David, one of the guys from our 2nd day of diving had a Canon Mark II 5D in an underwater housing and was shooting video in HD. He was nice enough to give us the footage and I’ve edited together a little piece from the day. Check out all the turtles, sharks, and the barracuda tornado!

View on YouTube

Just wanted to let everyone know that the rest of the Sipadan & Mabul pictures have been uploaded! You can check them all out here.

I’m a spoiled scuba diver. I started diving last October in the Philippines when I realized that my motorcycle habit wasn’t going to be fulfilled and was instantly fascinated with the underwater world. Over the last year, I’ve done around 80+ dives (not too shabby for a recreational diver!). While I’ve enjoyed almost every dive, the first 40 or so tend to be the most memorable since they took place in the Philippines.

The Philippines pretty much had it all as far as I was concerned. Great macro and muck diving in the Dauin area. Fantastic wall dives at Siquijor. Beautiful soft corals and schools of fish at Apo Island. Turtles at Moalboal and sharks at Malapascua. It’s a package that was hard to beat. Traveling through Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia, I never came across a place with the diversity that the Visayas offered. Sure, there were some amazing hi-lights along the way like the whale shark in Thailand and manta rays in Indonesia, but never matching the sheer range of corals, creatures, and dive opportunities. Until Sipadan…

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Monday was a travel day. It took us almost 11 hours to get from Penang to the Perhentian Islands off the east coast of Malaysia. One taxi, two planes, a mini-bus and one very bumpy speed boat, and we finally arrived.

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After 5 weeks on Koh Tao, we decided it was time to move on. We’ve had a great month relaxing, diving, and catching up with a few friends (Becca, Jacob and Patrick who we met in the Philippines, as well as Kenny and Ben, friends from Vancouver).

The highlight for this week was undoubtedly the Whale Shark. We had heard one had been spotted a couple of times over the last few weeks, and we’d been trying to arrange a trip to Sail Rock, almost since we arrived, but for some reason none of the dive shops could make it happen. Until last Friday…

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Our internet connection has been out for the last 5 days, which means the posting around here has been even lighter than normal. Luckily work’s been pretty slow for the most part, so we’ve been taking a little break from the online world.

Once again we’ve settled into a bit of a routine here, and while it’s nice for us to chillout and not be constantly on the go, it does make for some pretty boring posts. So in an effort to keep things interesting, and because I missed “Foto Friday“, I’ve decided to turn this into a picture post.

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This week we got settled into our new apartment. It was a lot harder to find a monthly rental than we expected, especially one with internet. Most places that had internet didn’t do monthly rentals, and the few places we found that did do monthly rentals, didn’t have internet. We did however manage to find a place. It’s not perfect but so far we’re quite comfortable here.

It’s a one bedroom apartment, a couple blocks off the main strip of town, on Koh Tao. It’s right on the beach and we have a little balcony overlooking the water as well as a great rooftop patio, both of which make up for the fact that our kitchen only has a microwave. Luckily the food in Thailand is great, and most of it is quite cheap, so while we love to cook, we probably wont be doing much of it over the next month or so. Unless anyone’s got some great microwave recipes.

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