I had initially planned this as a warm up to the Atlantis Azores Tubbataha liveaboard, with a chance to do some diving while adjusting to jet lag. It turns out that Atlantis Puerto Galera is terrific in and of itself. It provides the benefits of a liveaboard, including five dives a day, all meals and dive staff handling of gear, along with fabulous diving. The resort faces the South China Sea on the Sabang waterfront, with a short walk to the dive boats, with typical trips of just a few minutes to the dive sites. The usual offering is two morning reef/wall dives, an afternoon muck dive, followed by a reef dive and then a night dive. Sea life is abundant with healthy hard and soft coral, sponges (especially large barrel sponges) and sea fans. A selection from my dive log includes nudibranchs, spadefish, anemones, pipefish, octopus, eels (several free swimming during the day), scorpionfish, shrimp, puffers, cuttlefish, triggerfish, sharks, frogfish, sea snakes and many more. We enjoyed a night dive with mandarin fish and got to see them mating, but only with red light, as they are very shy with white light.

We added a day trip to Verde Island with three wonderful dives there. Verde Island is often called the “Center of the Center of Marine Shorefish Biodiversity.” We had lunch on shore at a very pleasant beach side grotto.

The Atlantis restaurant is terrific, with a wide ranging breakfast menu (and artfully crafted coffee drinks), soup or salad to start lunch and dinner, and four main dish options for each meal. They also provide a Mongolian Barbecue as a lunch or dinner option. Service was terrific. The wait staff knew our names and preferences from day one.

The resort is crafted into the hillside with curving stucco walls (even inside the rooms), lush greenery and a central swimming pool. We also took advantage of the spa for massages. Rooms are air conditioned with large showers. Free wifi is provided throughout the resort.

Facilities for diving are great, with a large gear room, rinse tanks, hot showers and a separate photo room. All dive staff were great. We were very impressed with Rodil, our guide for most dives.

We were sad to leave but definitely plan to return!

Photos are at the link below.