Early the next morning after we arrived in Dumaguete from Puerto Princesa, Preston and I caught the pump boat from Malatapay to Apo Island.

The early morning clouds had already cleared over Mount Talinis, and gave us a great view of Negros Oriental province.

They put Preston down as "Bro" on the Apo dive shop schedule board. Preston might have corrected them to point out the spelling is "brah".

"Bro" and me.

Here is bro on the pump boat out to Cogon point. Ok, I'll stop the bro thing now.

The visibility wasn't as good as it usually is at Apo, but we were still able to see this school of fish cruising over the corals.

Preston was getting used to the Filipino style of diving at this point I think.

I'm not really sure what this triggerfish was doing on the bottom here, but it was probably eating. Sometimes I've seen them go after the fins of divers with their sharp beaks. It's sort of funny to watch from a distance, that is unless it happens to you!

The school of jacks was in their usual spot on Cogon Point, but this time some of them were gathered on the bottom. It was hard to tell what they were doing, it really reminded me of trout spawning, but I'm told that the jacks spawn much higher in the water column, so maybe this group was just hanging out with each other.

When they are ready to spawn they will pair up like these two.

I was a little late on the draw when this trevally swam by very close.

The damselfish were swarming around this branching hard coral.

Here's another Apo Island clown fish.

And another clown fish shot.

This is a pair of tomato clown fish.

The sunset over the Mindanao Sea was great as usual from the balcony at Liberty's resort.

Preston and I had a great dinner in Liberty's very homey dining room.

The next morning we took a snorkeling trip in the Apo Marine Sanctuary where we came across the school of juvenile jacks that will eventually move to Cogon or Coconut point.

On his second dive on Apo, Preston drew the backwards "Q" wetsuit. They didn't put him down as "Backwards Q" on the chalk board, this time they used his name.

I can't remember why I was making this strange expression.

On our second dive we did Coconut point, where we found this swarm of small sea cucumbers attached to a sponge.

These bright yellow corals look kind of grey unless they are lit with the flash from the camera when you are deep underwater.

And here's a couple more clown fish.

And another tomato clown!

And Preston.

Preston may have been close to running out of stuff to read, but I don't think he was deprived enough to read "Private For Hold". Pretty vague title I must say, though from the cover you can tell it's, you know, classy.

In the afternoon we climbed the hill up to the Apo lighthouse to catch the sunset.

There are some cacti growing at the top of the island.

Like clockwork, another great sunset over the Mindanao Sea.

The last night we were on Apo we ate dinner at the resort next door to Liberty's.

Early the next morning we had a boat to catch back to Dumaguete for the next adventure.

Luckily the sea was calm, so we didn't get too soaked on the way back.