February 22, 2009 - Filed under Drinks, Planning, Scuba Diving, Travel, Weekly Report
With a week left before we head to Thailand, we’ve attempted to mark off the last few random things remaining on our Philippines checklist…
#1. Try San Miguel Strong Ice
We’ve never seen anyone drinking it. Is it a cider? Nope, it turns out that it’s yet another pale pilsen. This time its ice filtered and packing a bit more of a punch. 6.3% alcohol, making it a close second to Red Horse Strong Beer.
Posted by: Shim
February 17, 2009 - Filed under Scuba Diving, Underwater Photography, Weekly Report
The battery pack on my strobe light broke again. This is the second time it’s happened in the last 6 months and as you can probably imagine I’m less than impressed. It couldn’t have come at worse time either. We’re nearing the end of our stay here in the Philippines, and there isn’t enough time to get a replacement shipped before we leave so, it’ll have to wait till we get to Thailand. I’m really bummed as there were a couple of dive sites I wanted to return to, to capture a few last shots to remember them by.
Despite this, Mike and I did a couple of dives this week anyway. It’s still beautiful and I love it, but I kept wanting to take pictures of all the cute little critters. I think it’s definitely gonna take me a while to get used to diving without my camera. Hopefully I can figure out how to replace it once we get to Thailand, but until then here are the last of my underwater pictures.
Posted by: Shim
February 3, 2009 - Filed under Drinks, Eats, Entertainment, Scuba Diving, Stuff to do, Weekly Report
It’s likely due to our limited time left in the Philippines that this week we attempted to be a little more social with a few of our local friends. We’ve been busy working and preparing for the next phase of our trip, but no excuses! Parties must be partied…
Early in the week we had Patrick from Dive Society over for a lasagna dinner accompanied by a few bottles of wine. He’s given his notice at the dive shop where he works as a dive instructor and will be becoming a nomadic yogi rambling through Bali in the near future. We hope to meet up again in Thailand in a couple months. Patrick is also an illustrator. Check out his portfolio site if you’ve got a minute.
Posted by: Shim
December 29, 2008 - Filed under Scuba Diving
We’ve been diving in and around Dauin for about 3 months now, and figured it was about time we let you all know a little bit more about the dive sites in the area.
There are about 13 dive sites along the coast of Dauin, 8 of which are marine sanctuaries, and another 12 sites at the nearby Apo Island (not to mention several more sites at Siquijor – which I’ll try to do in another post). There are several great walls, steep slopes, gradual slopes and huge coral gardens all teeming with life. A macro lover’s paradise, as most of the creatures here are on the small side, however there are plenty of turtles, and it’s been said an occasional manta sighting at Apo.
All the dive sites are easily accessible from which ever resort you choose to stay at, ranging from a shore entry in front of your resort, to a 5-10 min boat ride. The sites at Apo can be reached in about an hour and are generally done on a two dive trip. The water temperature is usually around 27°C and diving here can be done all year round.
Considered to be some of the best diving in the Philippines (with a few sites considered world-class), you definitely wont get bored diving in Dauin.
Posted by: Kelly
December 16, 2008 - Filed under General, Planning, Scuba Diving, Stuff to do
We’re becoming a bit more familiar with the area now that we’re settled in and starting to explore the surrounding areas a bit further. Our friends back home in Canada and some of our newer readers have asked for more information about visiting the Dauin and Dumaguete area. Rather than try to rewrite all the great information already available online, I thought I would compile a list of some of the resources we’ve come across and found useful. Sure, it’s a little biased towards scuba divers, but there’s lots of great accomodations and general information too. We’ve found the forums particularly helpful. Feel free to post in the comments section if you have any specific questions about the area that we might be able to help you with, or suggest a resource we might have missed! Read More…
Posted by: Shim
December 9, 2008 - Filed under Scuba Diving, Underwater Photography, Weekly Report
This week was all about the diving. We had a bit of a break from the work side of things and decided to take advantage of it while we could. At the beginning of the week we did a couple of dives around Dauin. One at the Pier, which was a little bit busy for our liking, and then one by ourselves on the House Reef, which we’ve become quite fond of. There are a few schools of larger fish and a resident turtle who’s there pretty much every day. Also a few weeks ago the boys from the dive shop relocated their old speedboat which sank a few years ago, to just inside the reef. It’s become home to a bunch of groupers and a few bat fish already. The added benefit of the house reef is that we can dive it whenever we want, since we don’t need a boat to take us there, which means we’re usually the only ones on it.
Posted by: Kelly
November 24, 2008 - Filed under Scuba Diving, Stuff to do, Weekly Report
It’s starting to feel like we actually live here now, and not just like an extended vacation. We’re starting to get into a bit of a routine and things are feeling really comfortable. It’s also been almost a month since we’ve done anything really ‘touristy’. So when Cita, the woman who owns our house, asked if we wanted to join her and some friends on a day trip to Bias, to go dolphin watching we jumped at the chance.
Dolphin watching in Bias has been on our list since we got to Dumaguete, but we hadn’t managed to make it up there yet. We hadn’t figured out the best way to get to Bias and arrange the boat trip, and we also weren’t sure when was the best time to actually see dolphins. The ‘tourist trail’ in the Philippines is significantly under-developed compared to a lot of countries we’ve travelled to. It can be hard to find specific information on arranging travel and sorting out details, so when Cita invited us along, we were quite happy to let her do the organizing. Read More…
Posted by: Shim
November 18, 2008 - Filed under Scuba Diving
Since I learned to scuba dive it’s become apparent that I need a dive computer. They’re just too useful. Keeping track of your dive time, adjusting your O2 levels for Nitrox dives, watching your no-decompression time. All these things can be estimated the old fashioned way by using the US Navy dive tables, but it’s just too much effort when you can use a dive computer instead.
Kelly bought herself a Suunto Mosquito dive computer before we left, anticipating the amount of diving she’d be doing. They’ve recently been discontinued, so she got a great deal on it (around $350CDN, usually $500). It’s a nice watch sized dive computer that she can wear anywhere, with all of the common dive planning and analysis features.
Since learning to scuba dive, I’ve been using a Suunto Gecko which is a large display, entry level dive computer that I’m renting from the dive shop. It’s basic, but has both air and Nitrox modes and logs all the depth and time information about my dives for my log book. Read More…
Posted by: Shim
November 18, 2008 - Filed under Eats, General, Scuba Diving, Weekly Report
We love the new beach house we’re renting. This week has been all about getting set up in our new place. We went into town on Tuesday to stock up on food and get a few other essentials. We had a rice cooker in our last rental at the resort and I don’t know how we survived without one before. They’re invaluable! They take the guess work out of making rice and go into warming mode when the water has been absorbed or evaporated. Not to mention how light and fluffy the rice is. I recommend everyone get one.
I finally found a French press to make coffee at HyperMart, which is the local Costco equivalent of a warehouse with everything from appliances and furniture to groceries. Now if I could just find a decent supply of ground coffee. I’ve found I can buy a small bag or two now and again at the market, but it’s sometimes hit or miss. Whole beans are available in many markets, but I haven’t found a coffee grinder yet. Freeze dried instant coffee is the norm here. I want no part of that. Programmers need high test rocket fuel to function. Read More…
Posted by: Shim
November 11, 2008 - Filed under Scuba Diving, Weekly Report
Another week gone by. Week 10! I can hardly believe how fast time is flying. This week was mostly spent working and looking for a new place to live. Both of us had a few work projects on the go, and finding a new home has been top of the list for a couple weeks now. I’ve actually been a bit surprised at how hard it’s been to find something decent. I realize we have a lot of things on our list of wants/needs, but for some reason I thought it would be a little easier.
Much like we did when we first arrived in Dumaguete, we checked out a couple of cafes where they have a few listings posted. One place in particular, the “Why Not Bar”, seemed promising at first, but we quickly realized most of their listings were for show, and not much was actually available. We did a few more searches online, and even resorted to the old fashioned walk/drive around looking for ‘for rent’ signs. Just as we were beginning to give up and start looking at other options, (such as heading to Thailand earlier than we thought) we found something. It turns out, as with most things in life, it’s all about who you know. Read More…
Posted by: Kelly
