This post is about my paradise vacation to Coron, Philippines in December 2011. It’s chunked into sections similar to a travel guide for convenience and ease. I am hoping this info will be as useful as possible for people traveling to Coron in the near future. The WikiTravel site for Coron is a bit outdated, so here is more up-to-date info. I’ll probably update WikiTravel as well.

Scroll down to the “Diving” section to view the video about my experience diving in Coron.

For those of you who haven’t given much thought about traveling to the Philippines, think about it. There are hundreds of beautiful islands to explore. And, it’s cheap. Boracay remains one of the top vacation destinations for English teachers in Seoul. Bohol is also becoming popular. My boyfriend Eric and I chose a little more off the beaten path place called Coron.

How We Got There – Flying to Coron

Eric and I took a flight from Incheon to Manila, and then from Manila to Coron. The lines moved painstakingly slow in Manila. We were waiting in line to check in for almost an hour, and there were only about seven groups in front of us. If you book with Cebu Pacific Air, you will probably have a layover before your flight to Busuanga (Busuanga is the island where Coron is located.). The good thing about Cebu Pacific is that it’s located in a better terminal (terminal 3), so it’s not as dodgy as other terminals. We spent the night there sleeping on the floor near the shops and restaurants, and we felt safe. (*TIP for Cebu Pacific – Book your seats ahead of time to be in the front of the plane. You will have more legroom. Cebu Pacific skimps on legroom).

The island of Busuanga is an hour flight from Manila. Coron Town, the populated area of Busuanga, is about a 40-45 minute bus ride from the airport. If you can, arrange airport pickup before you arrive or else you might have to wait for a ride to pick you up.

The airport itself is tiny. You enter and exit the plane via stairs, and you are surrounded by greenery on all sides. Baggage claim consists of a little area that is a small section of a room.

First Impressions – Don’t Be Alarmed

Upon arrival, Coron doesn’t leave a wonderful first impression –There are no beaches within walking distance, and everything looks run-down. It was much more third world than I had imagined, with motorized tricycles everywhere and scarcity of air conditioning. The downtown area is very small, and you can walk around it in a matter of minutes. Despite all this, its majestic beauty will leave you almost speechless by the end of your trip.

It’s not until you get away from the commotion of Coron Town that you begin to realize its true beauty. Islands upon islands stretch as far as the eye can see. Many of them have their own white, sandy beaches. Coron Island, which is about a 20-minute boat ride from Coron Town, boasts breathtaking limestone cliffs cascading into clear blue-green water.

Getting to the Islands

The one thing that surprised me the most about Coron was that in order to see all of the surrounding beauty, you have to take a tour or hire a boat. There are numerous tour companies that offer tours to different islands and even to El Nido (*TIP – If you plan on going to El Nido from Coron, trips often get canceled because of rough seas. The boats are not equipped to handle large waves.)

Most tour companies offer similar tour options, with no more than 10 people to a tour. We took a liking to a company called Nice in Paradise. They had a friendly staff with good “buffet” lunch (fried whole fish, crab, pork, rice, salad, seaweed, bananas, water, soft drinks). Their boats also seemed a little nicer than some of the other tour companies. Nice in Paradise also had a boy working for them on the boat. He swam like a fish and seemed to really enjoy working. He claimed he was 14, but he looked and acted no more than 12 to us. Labor laws are probably not enforced too much here.

We booked our tours a day or two beforehand. It’s not hard to find tour companies to take you out, and there is no need to book way ahead in advance. Tours ranged from about 650-1300 pesos, and they are usually all day. Prices varied depending on which tour we took. Snorkel rentals were 100-150 pesos. Be careful in the snorkeling areas because there are tons of sea urchins. There are jellyfish in some areas, but we were lucky enough not to encounter them. We met someone who had been stung twice, and she had some horrible looking scars. She said it was very painful, and she had to go to the hospital to get treated.

Coron Island Tours

We took two Coron Island tours, which consisted of visiting lakes, relaxing and snorkeling at beaches, and snorkeling at other underwater sites. I’ll list some the highlights in this section.

Coron Island has two very clear lakes that are open to the public. Kayangan Lake is the clearest lake in the Philippines. The visibility is great, and you can see underwater rock formations. It got a bit crowded, but it was still very beautiful. The hike up to the lake takes about 10-15 minutes. You can stop at a gorgeous viewing area, where you can take a shot of the bay with clear blue-green water. If you Google “Coron,” this is the shot that comes up in Google Images.

Barracuda Lake is also very clear. We had Barracuda Lake to ourselves for the first 20 minutes, which was really great. You can snorkel both Kayangan Lake and Barracuda Lake, but you can only scuba dive in Barracuda Lake. They both have unique thermoclines, where if you go deep enough (over 10 meters), the water will heat up rapidly like a natural hot spring. Most thermoclines are the opposite, where the water gets colder at the bottom.

On the tours, we stopped for lunch at Banol Beach one day and 91 Beach another day. They are white sandy beaches on Coron Island, so there are beautiful limestone rock formations on one side, and clear blue-green water on another side. You can relax on the beach here or snorkel. We did both.

Since we went diving, the skeleton wreck was nothing special. As a snorkeler, you can see the wreck, but not well. Our guides threw some food into the water, and tons of colorful fish came swarming to eat it. That was the highlight.

The Twin lagoons were also a big highlight. We boated to a lagoon in a very calm area with clear water, and then we swam under a limestone rock formation to another lagoon with clear water. Again, we were surrounded by jagged rocks and beautiful water.

*TIP – It is a good idea to bring a waterproof camera or waterproof bag on the day trips. There are times when you might have to wade through water to get to the shore or the dock. The last thing you want is a broken camera.

Coral Garden and Siete Picados are fantastic snorkeling spots. Coral Garden was shallow and had tons of beautiful coral, along with brilliantly colored fish, sea stars, sea urchins, anemones, and sea horses (if you are lucky). Siete Picados also had some nice coral, but had even more beautiful fish. Siete Picados is a protected area, which means there is no fishing allowed. The fish were incredible, and I felt like I was swimming in an aquarium. I wish I knew the names of all the fish I was looking at.

Malcapuya Island and Banana Island Tour

We took a whole day tour with Nice in Paradise to Malcapuya Island and Banana Island. The islands are about an hour and a half away from Coron by boat. If the boats were speedboats, the islands would probably be only about half an hour away. Banana Island has a beautiful white sandy beach with clear water. Snorkeling is great there. Malcapuya Island has an even better white sandy beach, but the visibility isn’t great, and there is nothing much to see when snorkeling.

Maquinit Hot Springs is very relaxing after a busy day of sightseeing or diving. Make sure to negotiate with your tricycle driver before he takes you there, and be aware of the closing time. The road to the hot springs is a bumpy dirt road. We managed to fit six people (plus the driver) in the tiny motorized tricycle. We had to get out and walk at one point, so the tricycle could make it up a hill.

Diving

Coron is known for its wreck diving. American forces sank a fleet of Japanese warships during World War 2 in Coron Bay. The wrecks are covered in coral now. If you’d like to hear about our diving experience, watch the video below. I’ll recap it in text as well.

Eric and I became open water certified in Coron. We had never dived before, and we got our certification in two days. Before arriving in Coron, we took the dive theory portion of our SDI (Scuba Diving International) course online.

We dove with a dive company called Discovery Divers because they are a five-star center, and they seemed safe. Marcel, a retired engineer from Switzerland, was our instructor. He was very well informed about safety and diving, which was great. I was super nervous, and he did a good job to try and calm my nerves.

Day 1

We had the whole boat to ourselves. Marcel and his crew took us to an island with clear water, a sandy bottom, and some pretty coral. Other people were learning to dive there too with other dive companies. We learned the following things:

-       how to inspect the equipment

-       how to assemble the equipment and put it on

-       how to clear our masks of water

-       underwater hand signals

-       how to enter the water with a “giant stride” (big step off the boat)

-       the basics of breath and buoyancy

We did two easy dives the first day to get the feel for diving. We made sure to equalize (plug your nose and blow out) and breathe the whole time, since those two things are very important.

We saw some cool coral, fish, and even some squid. I used up more air than Eric the first day because I was so nervous!

Day 2

On the second day of our dive training, it was raining, and I was cold. I was also worried about the visibility, and I was nervous about the “tasks” that we needed to perform in order to get certified. I will list just a few things that we learned/did this day. We did the following:

-       took off the weight belt and put it back on in the water

-       took off our vest (with our tank and breathing equipment) and put it back on in the water

-       simulated being out of air

-       blew air into our vests to inflate them manually in case the inflator stopped working

-       simulated when a diver is too tired to continue and how to help our partner

After we did our tasks, we went for a dive. We dove down to East Tangat Wreck, which is a shallow wreck that’s good for beginners. We went up to 18 meters deep and saw some great sea life, full of lots of coral and beautiful fish.

We also did another dive on day two. We saw Olympia Maru, a huge warship. Our instructor told us that Olympia was much deeper than the first wreck. He told us that all we would see when we were descending was blue and not to freak out. So, we looked at him as we were descending, and before we knew it, we were looking at this amazing coral everywhere moving like a symphony to music. We explored the more shallow areas of the ship and saw so many different fish. I especially liked the lionfish and the coral that looked like brains.

I felt much more relaxed during this dive, and I used less air than Eric! After that, we were officially open water certified.

Right after we climbed back onto the boat, one of the dive masters screamed that she saw a snake. Lo and behold, we looked down and saw a Belcher Sea Snake. Some reports say that this snake is the most poisonous snake in the world!

Day 3

After becoming certified, Eric and I took a day off to island hop, and then signed up to go diving again. I did two more wreck dives, which I will briefly talk about here.

The first dive we did on day three was Tangat Wreck. There was a bit of a current here, and I was a little nervous about my mouthpiece. The left side of my mouthpiece was a little loose before the dive, and the part that I was biting down on ended up breaking off during the dive. My mask also filled up with water as I was descending. We went about 22 meters, although we were only supposed to go 18 meters. I felt okay going deeper, and we saw some great sea life again. All in all, this dive was a little stressful for me because of my mouthpiece.

Eric had to breathe on our dive master’s octopus (the extra breathing regulator) because he was using up more air than the rest of us. Since the dive masters know how to breathe very well underwater, they knew how to conserve air. So, in order for Eric to conserve air in his own tank, he used air from our instructor’s tank for a few minutes.

That day, we did another wreck dive, which was shallow. We saw Lusong Gun Boat. It barely looked like a boat because it was covered so much in coral. We not only saw the boat, but we also saw a nice reef close by. The water was clear, but there seemed to be a lot of particles floating, which made the visibility worse than the other dives. The highlight was probably seeing a huge sea cucumber.

Overall, we had a good diving experience. I’d definitely recommend diving in Coron.

Food – “Expensive” Places and Cheap Places

Eric and I began our trip eating at the touristy restaurants (Sea Dive Resort, Bistro Coron, and La Sirenetta are all recommended), but they were putting dents in our wallets. We hadn’t anticipated spending $5-6+ a meal. I know this is still very cheap, but we were planning on eating $2-3 a meal. So, after a few days, we asked one of our Swiss dive masters if it was safe to eat at the hole-in-the-wall places, and he said yes. It was a fabulous decision.

We ate very cheaply and like royalty, and we did not get sick. The one drawback is that many of the restaurants seem to close around 7pm, and there are only a few options. The places we liked best were the places that had several dishes already prepared and sitting out on display. I know it sounds shady deciding to eat at a place that has food sitting out, but we were perfectly fine. The food was delicious too. You cannot leave Coron without having Pork or Chicken Adobo. It’s a Filipino specialty. If you don’t know what something is, just ask. Many Filipinos speak English.

Also, Go to Coron Public Market for extremely juicy and delicious mangoes. They are safe to eat. All you have to do is peel off the skin, take a bite, and you will be in heaven. The cost was 100 pesos per kilo. If you go when a food shipment has just arrived, you will get the freshest ones, and you will not be disappointed.

The more you explore, the more you find. We found two decent and CHEAP bakeries, where we picked up snacks and breakfast almost every morning.

Princess of Coron

Eric and I stayed at Princess of Coron, an Austrian lodging house, which we booked through Agoda. I highly recommend it. Below is almost a verbatim review I wrote on Agoda and TripAdvisor. I edited the reviews slightly for this post.

Princess of Coron is awesome, and I would recommend it to anyone. It’s about a 5-7 minute walk from the downtown area, which is great. I really liked that it wasn’t near the main street because the main street was super noisy.

The staff is helpful if you need airport pickup or need to arrange a tour. I stayed in a standard room that had air conditioning, a fan, and hot water. Most other accommodations in Coron don’t have air and/or hot water.

The place itself is very charming and is kept looking really nice. The patio near the roof has some tables and chairs, so you can relax with a nice view.

The only criticism I have is that the service is a bit slow, but that is typical of the whole island of Busuanga.

Here’s a tip about the booking: Email them at princessofcoron@yahoo.com to make sure your booking went through. Sometimes their Internet is down, and they double books things.

ATMs and Money

There were two ATMs that I saw. I met several people who used their ATM cards with no trouble at one particular ATM. I don’t recall the name of the bank, but it was near a church, and it was about a 3-5 minute walk from Sea Dive Resort.

Cash is the best way to get around, since most places charge you if you use a credit card. If you can, get bills of small denominations. People don’t like to take big bills.

Toiletries and Shopping

There are plenty of small “stores” that sell sun block, mosquito repellent, and other toiletries. I didn’t look around too much since I brought my own, but it looked like the selection was fine.

You can also buy clothes at Coron Public Market or some other stores, but don’t expect anything high-end. I got a couple nice sarongs and some sandals for a few bucks.

This concludes my post on Coron. If you want a magical vacation, go to Coron during dry season, and hopefully you will love it as much as I did. Check out a small album below!

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