Manta Bowl

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What you'll see (10)

Striped Eel CatfishPlotosus lineatusseen 2× near here

Longspined PorcupinefishDiodon holocanthusseen 1× near here

Yellowtail WrasseDiproctacanthus xanthurusseen 1× near here

Blacksaddle TobyCanthigaster valentiniseen 1× near here

White-spotted PufferArothron hispidusseen 1× near here

Sharpnose SandperchParapercis cylindricaseen 1× near here

Black Longspine UrchinDiadema setosumseen 1× near here

Emma's HypselodorisHypselodoris emmaseen 1× near here

Goldbelly CardinalfishOstorhinchus apogonoidesseen 1× near here

Pacific Ocean Crown-of-ThornsAcanthaster solarisseen 1× near here

Planning a trip

6–8 days

worth going for

Long flight and a domestic connection.

2,524km from Singapore — about 18h each way, so two of those days are travel. the only logged site in the area.

When people dive it

Busiest Jun · almost nobody dives it Feb, Mar, Jul, Aug, Sep, Oct, Dec.

From 315 logged sightings — when divers are in the water, which is not quite the same as when visibility is best.

Dive Crew is a dive group from Singapore. Members plan trips here, log their dives, and share their photos of each site.

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Monsoon

October is the worst of the season here.

Two monsoons from opposite directions, so which coast you are on matters more than which month it is. Typhoons overlay both.

Habagat — southwest monsoon

Rough on the west-facing sites — Coron, El Nido, Apo Reef. Anilao and the east coast are sheltered from it.

Typhoon season

Storms cancel boats at a few days' notice anywhere north of Palawan.

The year here

JFMAMJJASOND

Best here: February, March, April, May.

The Philippines. Written by hand from how the season actually runs, calibrated against what the boats do, since a season that disagrees with the operators is wrong however good the meteorology behind it. It describes most years, not this one: the forecast above is what knows about next week.

Moon and tides

Waning gibbous

70% lit · day 20 of the lunar month

Neap tides

Neap tides — the smallest range of the month, so the weakest currents. Easy conditions and usually the clearest water, though a drift site may barely drift.

New 10 Oct Full 26 Oct

Phase computed here, not fetched. This is the spring/neap cycle, which sets how hard the water moves — not a tide table: no free source publishes high and low water for Southeast Asian reefs, and the range peaks a day or two after the moon does, by an amount that varies with the coast. For times on the day, ask the operator.

Getting there

~11h 39m

door to water, each way · 4 legs

FlightCebu (CEB)~5h 45mFlight time plus the airports at both ends. A connection adds to it.Find flights →
Transferthe jetty~3h 24mFor Malapascua, Moalboal and Oslob.Directions →
Ferrythe crossing~2hAt this distance the last stretch is a scheduled crossing rather than a dive boat, so book it before the flight — a missed sailing usually costs a day. Which crossing it is has been worked out from the distance and not from a timetable; ask the operator.
Dive boatManta Bowl~30 minThen the dive boat out from the island.

📍 Manta Bowl on Google Maps 🧭 Route from Cebu

Times marked ~ are estimated from straight-line distance and will be roughly right at best. The road legs are the ones Google Maps answers properly; it will not plan the ferry or the dive boat at all. A dive site's coordinates put a pin in open water, so the map link drops you on the site, not on a jetty.

Details

Island: Masbate
Country: Philippines
Marks: 12°36.742'N 123°42.486'E
Position: 12.6124, 123.7081
Note: Moved 150 m off the OSM position, into the water

Site website →

Where it is

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Nearby

Sightings and photographs from iNaturalist contributors, research-grade records within 6km, under Creative Commons licences. Counts are what divers and snorkellers have bothered to log — a common fish with few records is common all the same.