dive coron
Coron Island is considered as top 10 best scuba diving sites in the world. It is the third-largest island in the Calamian Islands in northern Palawan in the Philippines, known for good rocks formations and shipwrecks making it famous for wreck diving. It contains numerous island with beaches.
Our Safari boat will take you from Puerto Galera to Coron and Apo Reef. You can snorkel in a clear blue water and experience real life along the way. Our professional and enthusiastic team aboard will ensure you have a memorable and enjoyable diving experience with us..
DIVE SITES
A Japanese Seaplane Tender 118 m long located between Culion & Busuanga Islands, near Manglet Island.
Akitsushima Maru is a sea plane tender that was originally bombed in Truk lagoon. This vessel is a 118 meters long and 16 meters wide. She is in 36 meters of water and rests on her port side. You can still see the crane which was used to move the seaplane ‘Emily’ down at 36 meters on the sandy bottom. To the right of the crane you can see some AA guns with unexploded ordinance next to the guns. There is a large crack caused by a bomb hit where you penetrate into the engine room. The wreck has a crocodile fish on the starboard hull and many schools of razor fish around the sea fans.
The definitive name of this wreck remains a mystery to this day but it's a Japanese freighter 137 meters long, lying on its starboard side.
Okikawa Maru was a civilian tanker, she was destroyed by 70 dive bombers that sent her to a watery grave near the island of Buswuanga. At 168 meters long she is biggest of the Coron wrecks. At a depth of 26 meters with the shallows at only 10 meters she is a dive for most levels of ability, the can be some current so please take this into consideration.
This wreck was also a gunboat or submarine hunter. The stern breaks the surface at low tide.
D Cathedral Cave is one of the highlights of diving around Coron Bay. There is an entrance to the cave down at 7 meters, this opens up into a wonderful cavern where you have some natural light that comes in through a hole through the limestone. You can go the surface of the cave and take out your regulator while looking at the amazing formations inside. You can even see some bats if you are lucky.
This wreck features black coral, finger sponges and a variety of soft and hard corals encrusted along its long hull. This is also a popular training site for advanced and wreck diving classes.
The Olympia Maru was a Japanese freighter built by the Mitsubishi Company. She rests upright in 100ft/30m of water. When she was sunk there was 19 crew on board. She is 122 meters long and 17 meters wide. You can see some great hard coral formations on the main deck. Look out for Scorpion fish who are well camouflaged. There are many gorgonian sea fans which are home to many schools of small reef fish. It is very easy to penetrate the cargo holds for divers with the correct dive training.
You can see a large whip corals, giant groupers, basket sponges and white sea ferns adorned with razorfish.
Irako Maru is a refrigeration ship that could feed an army of 25,000 soldiers for 2 weeks at a time, she was 147 meters long and 19 meters wide. Air group 31 hit her with multiple bomb blasts and she is one of the deepest wrecks in 42 meters of water.
The East Tangat wreck has lots of large open holds that make easy penetration with pipework and valves to be spotted.
East Tangat gunboat is in very shallow water with the bow of the vessel at only 5 meters below the surface. This gunboat or submarine hunter is full of interesting nudibranch and flatworms. This dive is perfect for open water divers and even snorkelers can have a great view of the wreck.
This is a beautiful wreck dive experience.
In excellent condition, this huge sunken ship usually has about 20 metres visibility and ideal diving conditions. In the cargo rooms hold Japanese cars and trucks can be found and provides shelter to batfishes, fusiliers and trevallies
The Kogyo Maru was built in 1938 by Uraga Dock Co Ltd, Uraga, Japan for Okada Gumi KK. The ship was 6353 tons, 129 mts long, and 18 mts wide. She was powered by two oil fuelled steam turbines (517Nhp) geared to a single shaft.
Kogyo Maru was a navy supply ship, she rushed from Manila Bay during an attack and despite the crews attempt to camouflage the vessel she was attacked by dive bombers and sank with the loss of 39 men on the 24th September 1944. The cargo holds are full of construction materials including a bulldozer, cement mix and bags of cement. The deepest part of the wreck lies in 34 meters of water. You can see schools of Jacks and Tuna on the shallow side of the wreck at 22m.
The Barracuda Lake is not very far from Coron town.
You will have to walk up 20 wooden steps to reach the lake platform. There is a serious thermocline that happens at around 18 meters, with temperature reaching 100f. There is some weird and wonderful marine life to be found in the lake including some inquisitive Catfish and shrimps. It is a good chance for underwater photographers to get a close-up of the big barracuda. A dive that you should not miss!
Its local name is Siete Picado, and it is one of the most popular reef dives around Coron because of its close distance to the town.
An excellent diversity of fishes like many kinds of anemone-fishes, batfishes, cuttle fish, barracudas, groupers, angel fishes, emperors, moray-eels and the giant clams, the rare mandarin fish, turtles, lobsters, seahorses, nudibranch and rays, sometimes even eagle-rays, makes this dive-site to a perfect spot for underwater photography .The outstanding features of this reef are large formations of pristine staghorn coral and table corals and, to the eastern side, gorgonia fans. Some of the small islands connect underwater via small saddles. There are schools of reef fish and juvenile barracuda and small Napoleon Wrasse together with three Green Sea turtles.
