Adventure Sports

Above: A mountain guide stands on the 

summit of Mount Apo, the Philippines highest 

mountain , after leading hikers up from Lake Agco

at the roadhead.

For many years virtually the only well developed adventure sport for visitor was diving, but recently other leisure activities have started to be offered, including, surfing, kite boarding, mountain biking, sea angling and white water rafting.

The Philippines has some of the best dive sites in Asia, its protected reefs a magnificently chaotic jumble of corals, home to a wonderful diversity of brilliantly colourful fish. Every beach resort has well organized ddive operations, offering plenty of diving opportunities, including globally recognize training and qualification courses.
Still on the water, windsurfing and kit-surfing have started to take off, particularly along Bulabong Beach on the east shore of Boracay, At its best during the onshore winds of the northeast monsoon, Bulabong has become a major venue for international competitions.

Above : Kite-Surfers prepare for a day's action at Bulabong Beach, on the east shore of Boracay Island, the Philippines' premier windsurfing and kite-surfing venue

Below: A boatman steers his banca away from White Island, an increasingly popular sandy island off Camiguin Island, Mindanao.

A diver rises up a submarine cliff
towards the surface, at Tubbataha
Reef,  of the Coast of Palawan.

Further south, the Siargao Islands, off the northeast coast of Mindanao and exposed to the full swell of the Pacific Ocean, have beacom known as the Philippines' premier surfing hotspot. Discovered in the 1990s by Australian surfing scouts, Siargao is particularly renowned for the so-called Cloud Nine surf break. Sea angling is also growing in popularity here, taking advantage of the area's deep Pacific waters.
Mountain hiking is increasingly available and although it is possible to arrage your own hikes (always take a guide), specialist operators also regularly organized hikes up several of the country's volcanoes , including Mount Apo, the Philippines' highest peak.
Two of the great bonuses of doing anything in the Philippines are firstly the fact that the vast majority of the population speak good English, and secondly that Filipinos  are almost without exception wonderfully friendly, helpful and hospitable to visitors, making getting around both a joy and relatively easy. All visitors need are a little patience, a sense of humor and the enthusiasm to get stuck in and enjoy themselves!