Team DIVEPlanet Scandinavia - Palau | Hvor dykkere får alle våte drømmer oppfylt

Day notes

Avreise med Qatar Airways til Manila via Doha

Day notes

Ankomst Palau om natten mellom 20-21. mai

Ved ankomst dag 3 på reisen er vi endelig fremme og her blir vi møtt av representanter fra Fishn Fins og det er transfer til vårt hotel i sentrum av Palaus største by, Koror.  

Vi har planlagt at vi blir hentet etter frokost og sjekker inn hos Fishn Fins (for de som ønsker legger vi opp til 2 dykk i nærheten av Koror på ettermiddagen, eller de som ønsker å sove ut kan gjøre dette og avtale tid når dere vil bli hentet for å bli tatt med ned til dykkersenteret. Det er dessuten ubegrenset dykking på husrevet.

Dykking på Palau
Vi har splittet oppholdet på Palau med 7 netter landbasert dykking + 7 netter liveaboard med Rock Island Aggressor og inkludert totalt +/- 38 dykk under oppholdet på Palau + da evt ubegrenset dykking på husrevet.
Dykkingen med Fishn Fins vil dere bli hentet på hotellet hver morgen og tilbringer hele dagen ute på revet og returnerer tilbake til dykkersenteret ved 4-tiden hvor det er tid for noen kalde forfriskninger i dykkersenterets egen bar før dere blir tatt med tilbake til hotellet og har resten av kvelden fri.

Vi bor sentralt og det er gangavstand til en rekke restauranter og man velger selv hvor man vil spise. I tillegg tilbyr de fleste restauranter som ligger utenfor byen gratis transport til/fra deres spisesteder og vi anbefaler at dere drar nytte av dette og ser litt mer enn bare det som ligger i sentrum. I tillegg er det en del gode drikkesteder som er vel verdt et besøk.

Det er lagt opp til at vi får med oss gytetiden til snapper fisken eller Pukkelhodepapegøyefisk. Dette finner sted 2-3 dager før full eller nymåne (dette inntreffer 30. mai i 2022, nymåne). Det er et tillegg for dette og avreisen fra hotellet vil være ved 5-tiden om morgenen og dere er i vannet ute på Blue Corner ved soloppgang.

Day notes

Joining Rock Island Aggressor
Guests who are already on island may board the yachts any time after 4:30 pm on Sunday. Please notify the Reservations Office of your arrival time and/or hotel reservations to assist in transfer to the yacht. The boats dock directly in front of the Palau Royal Resort. At the end of the charter the staff will assist organizing transportation to either the airport or hotel if you are extending your stay. Be sure to remember the suggested 24-hour no-fly rule when planning your departure.

Sample Itinerary for 7 Night Itineraries:

• Sunday – Prearranged pick-up from Palau hotels 4–5 pm for transfer to the yachts for boarding. Yachts depart the mooring Mon 6:00 am.
• Monday-Saturday – Diving begins Monday morning until Saturday around noon. Cocktail party at 6 pm with dinner ashore.
• Sunday – Check out is at 8:00 am. The staff will assist organizing transportation to either the airport or a local hotel if you are extending your stay

Day notes

Depart Rock Island Aggressor in the morning at 8 am and make your way to Fishn' Fins, you can have a day rest or go straight to Fishn Fins for another day of diving. Check in at the hotel will be after 12:00. No transfer is arranged, but we can get someone from Fishn Fins to pick you up and either take you to the dive shop or the hotel.

We have included 3 daily dives with Fishn Fins 30/5, 31/5 & 1/6 - this can be extended or you can use the extra day on 2/6 to explore some of the many waterfalls and land sights (recommended)

Day notes

Time to depart Palau and you have a transfer to the airport around 18:00. Upon arrival in Manila no transfer has been booked (you can walk to the hotel in around 11 minutes (or you can get a Yellow Cab) outside the terminal building.

Day notes

Early breakfast and make our way back to the airport for the flight to Cebu. In Cebu we will be met by the representative from our dive partner on Malapascua Island. The road transfer to the north of Cebu takes around 3 hrs. At Maya New Port we will get onboard a traditional filipino boat and taken across the channel to the island of Malapascua.

During our stay on Malapascua we have included 15 dives, but this is also a great place for night dives so we will most likely add a few more to this schedule while on the island.

Diving on Malapascua
An amazing dive destination with some of the best and most varied scuba diving the Philippines has to offer. The diving highlight at Malapascua Island is the close encounters with the elusive and graceful Thresher / Fox shark. The daily shark action at Monad Shoal is unique in the world. There is no other dive site on the planet that offers this kind of an experience on the planet. On a good day you might also see an Eagle or Manta Ray.

The Thresher Shark dive experience offered in Malapascua is one of the most unique places to dive in the world. Thresher Sharks, or Fox Shark, have a distinctive long thresher-like tail that can be as long as the shark itself. They also have large eyes to help them see in the deep dark depths where they live in tropical waters. In the morning, Thresher Sharks will come more shallow to a natural cleaning station at Monad Shoal around 30 metres. It is at this unique site that recreational divers can see these normally elusive sharks on nearly a daily basis.

Devocean Divers does a Thresher Shark dive every morning leaving Malapascua Island around 5am. The boat trip to Monad Shoal, about 25 minutes away, makes for a great place from which to see the sunrise and have a coffee. It’s at this early hour when the Thresher Sharks are still at Monad Shoal and the light is not yet too bright for its big sensitive eyes.

These sharks can grow up to 6 meters, including the tail. They feed on schooling fish and squid. Their long tail is actually used to stun their prey. They first use the long tail to gather the school of fish nicely together and then it will use it’s tail to whack into the school, stunning a few prey that it then feeds on.

The dive site that the sharks are seen on is called Monad Shoal. It’s an underwater island that goes from 14 meters all the way to more than 200 meters. The natural cleaning stations are at 28 meters. Nitrox is recommend at this dive site as it doubles your bottom time and therefore, your chance to see more sharks.

So why does the Tresher shark come to Monad Shoal? In the world and the underwater world it is common practice that people and things help each other out. Especially if it benefits both parties. It’s nothing different with the Thresher shark. It comes to the reef to let small reef fish (wrasse) eat dead skin and parasites from its body. They also clean small wounds, the sharks gills and even they even go inside the mouth to nibble away left overs that are stuck between the sharks teeth.

Sometimes when going to the dive site you can see the shark breaching the surface. They do this because when one of the cleaner fish gets to deep into the gills it irritates the shark. At first it tries to shake the fish out but if all else fails it will breach and hopefully the small wrasse fish will get hurled out at some point.

Not only the Thresher sharks come to Monad Shoal to get cleaned. We often also see eagle rays (in formation) and Oceanic Manta rays!
Do keep in mind that it is mother nature and there are no guarantees to see the shark. Sometimes there is the occasional person or group that is just unlucky. There is no fixed pattern that enlarges that chance for you to see them. Being there first or arriving as last boat makes no difference in chance to see them.

There are a few guidelines for those that which to see the Thresher Sharks. If you do not follow these guidelines, you will not be permitted to continuing diving with Devocean.

Day notes

A relaxing morning in Malapascua before we start to make our way back to Cebu Airport for the start of the journey back to Oslo. We depart Cebu back to Manila where we connect with Qatar Airways back via Doha.

Extension option to see the Sardine Run at Moalboal
Pronounced Moh-al Boh-al, this small town in Cebu is a very diverse scuba diving destination in itself. The creatures range from the humble nudibranch to the mighty whale shark. It is perhaps best known for the vast school of sardines that so many divers enjoy here. You can expect pristine fields of coral, healthy walls and a huge variety of fish and reef creatures. With famous dive sites like Pescador Island and Panagsama Reef, Moalboal is among the best places to dive in Cebu.

• A protected marine park, Pescador Island is located in the Tañon Strait. Here you will dive a steep and dramatic wall and encounter a great variety of fish. Off the wall in the blue you may see schools of sardines, midnight snapper, big-eyed trevally, barracuda and tuna. Sharks include whitetips and maybe even a passing thresher shark, particularly in the deeper sections of the wall which drops to as much as 600m. In the shallower sections there is a lot of colour and life. Smaller reef fish include red toothed triggerfish, surgeonfish and fusiliers. Innumerable little chromis, anthias and damsels flit all around the reef flat. It is also worth looking out for frogfish, lionfish and anemonefish. The island features a number of caves and tunnels to explore, most notably a large cave on the northwest of the island known as The Cathedral which ranges in depth between 37m and around 15m
• Panagsama Reef is truly the sardine dive in Cebu, sometimes referred to as The Sardine Run, however the sardine baitball is seen here in the same spot year after year, and need not be chased down. Thousands of these tiny fish form one big school and represent a banquet for hungry trevally and barracuda as well as sharks, including thresher sharks. If you are in the right place at the right time, you can see these predators feeding in the baitball, dashing in at great speed to pick off a single individual.
  Away from the baitball, this reef has much else to delight. On the steeply sloping reef are gorgonian fans, soft corals and sea whips protruding out far into the water. Resting turtles, frogfish, pipefish, blue-ringed octopus and myriad crustaceans are all possible sightings. Keen-eyed divers can find pygmy seahorses on fans clinging on with their prehensile tails. Panagsama Reef makes an excellent night dive and is worth diving more than once to experience it both in daylight and after nightfall.
• Tongo Point is a steep and heavily decorated wall that reaches to a mere 2m from the surface at its top. Large branching corals grow out from the wall offering shelter to little schools of razorfish. They are many ledges and crevices all over the wall. Green and hawksbill turtles can be found resting here. Moray eels, scorpionfish and octopus lurk in fissures on the reef.
  Tongo Point is one of the best sites for finding pygmy seahorses, sometimes several on the same pink sea fan. It is also well known as a great site to see flame fire shells, otherwise known as electric clams. When you watch it seemingly strobing white light, it is hard to believe electricity is not on display! Other creatures regularly seen here include banded sea kraits, schools of reef squid, batfish and nudibranchs.
• Sunken Island is a site that can only be visited at certain times of the year and the current needs to be assessed before entering the water. Even then the site is not for beginners although it is much-loved by experience divers, especially those with cameras. The currents that wash around this submerged island which starts at 22m and drops deep, bring food to large numbers of fish.
  There can be fantastic school of jacks, barracuda, tuna, snapper and grouper here. Expect plenty of blue-toothed triggerfish and, unusually a school of lionfish on the reef top. Spanish dancers and frogfish are also common, however, divers mostly value Sunken Island for the big stuff in the blue. This can mean manta rays and sharks, maybe even a whale shark.

So maybe you are keen to see some more (prices coming soon)

Day notes

Arrive Oslo in the afternoon

The fun is over for this time, come and join us on our next adventure......Epic Expeditions to come will be our long advertised sailboat dive expedition into the heart of the Pacific Ocean in 2024, stay tuned.