Dive Review of Magic Island in
Philippines/Moaboal

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Magic Island: "Very Nice Resort With Lots of Wall Dives", Jun, 2022, by John Crossley, FL, US ( Sr. Contributor 28 reports with 11 Helpful votes). Report 11979 has 1 Helpful vote.
No photos available at this time
Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations		Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling	N/A
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	In the past 15 years I had three visits to Moaboal, but to less quality resorts than Magic Island Dive Resort. In 2019, I had a great week at the Magic Oceans Dive Resort in Bohol, so I thought I'd try it's brother/sister resort, Magic Island, in Cebu. It is long and winding 3 to 4 hour drive from the Cebu/Mactan airport, but the transport was comfortable. Overall, Magic Island is very much like the Magic Oceans resort in style and layout, but just a bit smaller. Everthing is clean and attractive, with very little walk needed between rooms, restaurant, and dive center. The cottage style rooms are great but not very big. There is a wide range of food choices, which are excellent and portions are pretty big. One night a local music duo sang for two hours and they were amazing. Most of the dives here were wall dives, but unfortunately a lot of the corals have been damaged by recent typhoons. Currents along the wall ranged from none to modrately strong. Sometimes it was difficult to stop to photo macro critters along the wall. These included nudibranches, ghost pipefish, coral crabs, orangutan crabs, small eels, and a pygmy seahorse. Turtles appeared on a several dives and I saw the largest black & white banded sea snake I've ever seen....surely 7 feet long and thick as a baseball bat. The big attraction dive was the school of millions of sardines schooling along the wall like a moving river of fish so thick you could not see through to the other side. These sardines used to school around Pescador Island a few miles off-shore, but they moved to the Moaboal wall. The dive boat crew was great, but the panga style boat gave me a couple problems due to my knee injury & surgery two years ago. There was a cross-beam to support the panga's outriggers and it was a difficult barrier for me to climb over to get across to the dive gear. The dive ladder had a first step too high to reach by foot when coming up from a dive. A knee could reach it, but that was painful. Overall, the Magic Resorts are a great dive operation, with Magic Oceans resort in Bohol featuring muck dives for macro critters, and Magic Island featuring wall dives. I'll try thier Malapascua resort next year.
Websites	Magic Island [same]Magic Island Dive Resort
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	Over 1000 dives
Where else diving	Australia, Fiji, Truck, Yap, Palau, Bali, Lembeh, Hawaii, Florida, Red Sea, Soloman Islands, PNG, Caymans, Bonaire, BVI, Philippines and others
Closest Airport	Cebu/Mactan	Getting There	Most likely connect in Manila and fly to Cebu. Resort will arrange a transfer, about 3-4 hours by car or van.
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, dry	Seas	calm, currents, no currents
Water Temp	84-°F / 29-°C	Wetsuit Thickness	1
Water Visibility	40-80 Ft/ 12-24 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	?
Enforced diving restrictions	Stay within no-deco limits
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	None	Mantas	None
Dolphins	None	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	> 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish	N/A
Large Pelagics	N/A
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter		Boat Facilities
Overall rating for UWP's		Shore Facilities
UW Photo Comments	[None]

Report currently has 1 Helpful vote

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Dive Review of Magic Island in Philippines/Moaboal

Magic Island: "Very Nice Resort With Lots of Wall Dives", Jun, 2022,

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Magic Island in
Philippines/Moaboal