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 I figured it's time to do another gallery of my favorite underwater shots from around the Philippines. The last year and a half of my time there was quite eventful and included with some additional highlights from my favorite Apo Island, there are some shots of the enormous whale sharks from Donsol, a monkey named Moy swimming in the surf at El Nido and a tiger shark from Tubbataha. (Click
here to see the photo essay--63 photos) |
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 In April 2006 I was very lucky to be invited by Angelique Songco, the manager of the Tubbataha UNESCO World Heritage Reef, to join her staff aboard the WWF research vessel Minerva (thanks again Angelique!). We spent spent a week in the middle of the Sulu Sea with Angelique and her amazing staff of Park Rangers who make huge personal sacrifices to spend three months at a time protecting the reef from poachers from as far away as China. The reefs of Tubbataha are the most spectacular I've ever seen, with visibility sometimes reaching 120 feet and a huge variety of large pelagic fish, sharks, and more sea turtles in one day than I think I had previously seen in the past year. (Click
here to see the photo essay--26 photos) |
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 Since
I've been taking underwater photos of the reefs in
the Philippines for over a year now, I decided it
might be high time for a retrospective on some of
my favorite highlights. Sixty photos is kind of an
arbitrary number, but after going through all the
photo journals from the last year, it's the number
I came up with! (Click
here to see the photo essay--60 photos) |
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 After
touring Kenny and
his family around Dumaguete, we headed out to
the Apo Island Marine Sanctuary to go snorkeling.
After lunch I took a short dive at Apo's Katipanan
dive site for the first time. In addition to seeing
the usual mind-boggling diversity of fish and invertebrate
species, we also came across a small hawksbill sea
turtle munching on soft coral, as well as a large
green turtle placidly cruising the edge of the open
water dropoff. (Click
here to see the photo essay--26 photos) |
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 Before
our friend Noriko, a JICA volunteer from Japan assigned
to help teach new pottery methods to local people
in Dumaguete, returned home we planned a group dive
to go to Apo. It was a trip just for the day, but
we left early in the morning from Silliman Beach and
got in two great dives on Apo's Cogon and Coconut
Points. (Click
here to see the photo essay--35 photos) |
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 After
two great dives in the Balicasag Marine Sanctuary
(see photo essay below), Kris and Kristen
wanted to compare it with Apo Island. They had heard
a lot about Apo, but hadn't had a chance to visit
there yet. As it turned out their friend Emily from
college was in the Philippines too, so we all went
out for an overnight at Liberty's and got in two dives
on Apo at Cogon and Coconut Points. Pam from our Peace
Corps batch and Alex from the batch that arrived a
year ahead of us were also on Apo with Pam's mom and
sister, so we had a great group.
(Click here to see
the photo essay--22 photos) |
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 Although
I don't get there very often, Balicasag Marine Sanctuary
in Bohol is one of my favorite spots for underwater
photos besides Apo Island. I'm especially fond of
taking photos of the clown fish that live in the distinctive
green anemones in the Black Forest section of the
island. In May, Kris and Kristen came through the
Visayas and we met up for a reunion dive there.
(Click here to
see the photo essay--32 photos) |
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 In
April I visited the Apo Island Marine Sanctuary with
some scientists from the Silliman
University Marine Lab where I work, to help re-stock
giant clams there. The lab has several large saltwater
tanks that are used to breed the endangered clams
in captivity and then release them back into the wild
for communities that request to have clams in their
marine sanctuaries. (Click
here to see the photo essay--35 photos) |
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 Our
first stop in Dumaguete when my brother Preston came
to visit was Apo Island. He wanted to experience some
of the best diving the Philippines has to offer, and
to me Apo is the best place that I've ever been to.
We tried out Cogon and Coconut points, and although
the visibility was much lower than normal we still
saw some great stuff. (Click
here to see the photo essay--32 photos) |
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 Preston
and I decided to start off the visit to El Nido with
a dive trip. Barely 24 hours after he had arrived
in the country, we were suited up with scuba gear
and underwater to see the different varieties of sealife
that live around Palawan. I'm still biased towards
Apo Island being my favorite place to go, but the
inter-island boat trip alone was worth the price of
admission. (Click
here to see the photo essay--36 photos) |
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 The
last field trip for Dr. Johnston's class in the Philippines
was a return to Sumilon Island. This time the students
had underwater writing tablets and took down observations
about whichever species of fish or coral they chose
to study. Meanwhile I circulated around and took more
photos of the many different species that live in
Sumilon's sanctuary. (Click
here to see the photo essay--22 photos) |
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 The
highlight of Dr. Johnston's field trips in the Philippines
was the overnight trip to Apo Island. As part of the
background info for the course, everyone read a chapter
about Apo in "The Enchanted Braid", a book
about threatened reefs worldwide. We did a dive on
the Chapel site during the day and night to compare
the species that are present at different times of
the day. We also took an afternoon trip to the Marine
Sanctuary to do some snorkeling.
(Click here to
see the photo essay--24 photos) |
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 As
a contrast to the reefs of Sumilon Island, Dr. Johnston
took his class to Siquijor to snorkel a seagrass environment
and also see the Tulapos Fish Sanctuary. I came along
for the trip and took some photos of a jellyfish and
other critters that live in shallow water environments
like the seagrass bed. (Click
here to see the photo essay--13 photos) |
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 In
January, the Silliman Marine Lab hosted a group of
American marine biology students for a two week study
abroad program sponsored by Bethel College in Minnesota.
Aside from getting a chance to escape the Midwest
winter, the students had the opportunity to see some
of the best reefs in the Philippines and learn a little
about the issues facing their continued survival.
The first stop on the reef study was Sumilon Island,
just a short boat trip from Dumaguete, and a place
that until then I hadn't had the chance to visit.
(Click
here to see the photo essay--23 photos) |
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 In
the first week of January I visited Apo with Corey
and Jason from my Peace Corps group. We did one dive
with Mario, Apo's barangay captain on Cogon Point.
We saw more turtles on this dive than any other I
have ever been on, and one of the shots from this
trip was used for the Apo
Island post card livelihood project.
(Click here to see
the photo essay--23 photos) |
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 While
he was here visiting the Philippines, my friend Steve
got his scuba certification while I was attending
a Peace Corps training outside Manila. Since my site
in Dumaguete is only a short trip from Apo Island,
one of the best dive spots in the country, Steve and
I stayed at Liberty's
on the island and had a couple memorable dives over
the last weekend he was in the Philippines.
(Click here to see
the photo essay--37 photos) |
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 Since
Apo Island is so close to Dumaguete, volunteers who
pass through from out of town usually want to go out
for a visit. In late September, I helped Katie Bradley,
a fellow PCV to learn a little about taking photos
underwater (although I'm still in the learning phase
myself!). Hanes Roberts, one of my buddies here in
Dumaguete who is assigned to the Silliman University
Center for Tropical Research arranged for us to dive
with a divemaster he knows who is just getting his
business off the ground (we were the first to use
his gear!). As usual, Apo did not disappoint, and
we saw a huge variety of healthy undersea life.
(Click here
to see the photo essay--34 photos) |
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 Just
a short boat trip from Dumaguete is the island of
Siquijor. In September 2004, Kyle and Melissa Rickert,
two volunteers from my group had a house warming party
for the nipa house they built themselves to live in
during their two year Peace Corps service. Just before
the house warming festivities kicked off, Daniel Simon
and I went over to nearby Kiwi Dive Resort for a look
at Siquijor's reefs. (Click
here to see the photo essay--22 photos) |
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 In
July Corey Ridings, a Coastal Resource Management
volunteer from my Peace Corps group invited me to
her site in Bicol to take photos of the San Miguel
Island marine sanctuary. The local barangay captain
was under pressure to open the sanctuary up to fishing,
and the photos that I would take would be used to
give the local decision makers a view of the undersea
world just in front of their doorsteps. As it turned
out, thanks to Bicol University's Tobacco campus staff
and Corey, a front page story ran in the Sunday
edition of the Philippine Daily Inquirer that also
included five of my photos from the trip. The
paper runs nationwide and has the largest circulation
of any paper in the country, so it was great publicity
for the sanctuary and the rural fishing community
trying to live sustainably there. We're hoping that
this small victory helps to preserve the sanctuary
that the local people have worked so hard to protect.
(Click
here to see the photo essay--31 photos) |
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 A
typhoon (hurricane) hit the Philippines in July 2004.
Most of the damage was in the northern "typhoon
belt" around Luzon, but the Visayas where I live
took some damage from the edge of the storm. High
winds and heavy rains pounded the countryside and
even caused a landslide that destroyed part of a resort
on nearby Apo Island. The scientists at the Silliman
Marine Lab in Dumaguete where I am assigned were asked
to do a post typhoon damage assessment, and they invited
me to come along. (Click
here to see the photo essay--33 photos) |
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 The
marine sanctuary on Balicasag Island has been one
of my favorite places to go diving here in the Philippines.
A few other volunteers and I met up there in July
for two great dives to see the thriving sea life there.
As usual, I missed seeing a turtle and a big school
of barracudas because I was staring at the bottom
and taking pictures of clown fish. I really need to
do a better job of looking ahead of me the next time
I get over there! (Click
here to see the photo essay--22 photos) |
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 In
May 2004 I visited Apo
Island, a tiny former volcano located about 45
minutes by pump boat from a small fishing village
south of my Peace Corps site in Dumaguete. In 1986,
the forward thinking residents of Apo
Island teamed up with the Silliman
University Marine Lab to establish a marine sanctuary.
Since then the island has become synonymous with sustainable
eco tourism in the Philippines, and has even become
a model for best practices in creative solutions to
difficult problems facing the Philippines today. We
stayed at the community based Liberty's lodge, a simple
hotel set perfectly into the steep volcanic hill of
the bay. We were lucky enough to dive in the Apo sanctuary,
which was a psychedelic kaleidoscope of brightly colored
corals and an incredible diversity of fish species.
(Click
here to see the photo essay--34 photos) |
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 These
are some of my favorite underwater photos from the
Balicasag Island Marine sanctuary. The island is a
short boat ride from our Peace Corps training site
in Bohol and very near where I received my scuba certification
on Panglao Island.The people who live on the island
fished the reefs surrounding the island to the brink;
however they established a marine sanctuary and now
things have rebounded dramatically.
(Click here to
see the photo essay--17 photos) |
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 One
of the many highlights of Peace Corps training was
getting my scuba certification on Panglao
Beach. Our instructor was a ex-military, taekwon-do
grandmaster, and extremely dedicated environmentalist
named Holger
Horn. People told me I should have gotten my certification
before I left the U.S., but I must say I'm lucky I
didn't! (Click
here to see the photo essay--24 photos) |
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