Pamilican Island

Pamlican Island

What a place! Pamlican island sits about a mile or two off of the south eastern shore of Bohol Island proper in the middle of the deep blue and greens of the Bohol Sea. It has long been a centre of the whaling and dolphin hunting industry in the southern Phillipenes, but with a ban on whale and dolphin hunting in 1998 by the government the people have had to look for other ways to make money and the chief one is whale and dolphin watching excursions.
The island itself is fairly low and accessiable only by boat it is home to around sixteen hundred people that belong to around two hundred and fifty families and consits of a few houses grouped around the beaches. There are no docks or anything, the boats are simply drawn up on the white sand beaches that go almost all the way around the island.
The water is almost perfectly clear and covered in bright corals. Huge brain corals and delicate fan coral litter the ocean floor up to around two hundred yards off the island where the sea floor drops off in a wall of coral to about a hundred feet.
We were lucky enough, after our very successful dolphin watching expidition, to go snorkling along the drop off. The boat and our guides took us out about a hundred and fifty yards off shore were we donned masks and hit the water.
The clear, blue green water was incredibally crystaline. When I first splashed I thought I was only in about five feet of wet stuff becuase it was so clear but in reality the ocean floor was about ten feet down. All around me I could see fish of all kinds swimming around.
It looked like a veritable aquirium down there. All manner of fish were swimming around, fish whose names that I did not know, stripped and spotted with all differant colours. As I hovered on the surface I saw groupers and sea snakes moving with total freedom through the warm water. As I moved over the wall of coral twoards deeper water I could see huge schools of tuna and other fish that did not come into the shallows with the smaller fish. This was truely one of the greatest experiences of my life.
After snorkling for a couple of hours we went on shore to eat lunch and explore the island.
Lunch was laid out on a table under a small roof, tuna steaks and salad were on the menu along with some chicken soup, excellent.
After lunch we were able to explore the ruins of the three hundred year old Spanish fort that once watched over the Bohol sea and hung out with the locals for a little while before heading back up the Loboc river and home to Nuts Huts.

Pictures-
1. Dolphins are incredibly hard to photograph, the little bastards keep bumping and moving through the water and appear when you least expect them to. I took a lot of shots of the dolphins and this was the best I could get. If you blow the pictures up you can get a better view of the four dolphins in front of the boat.
2. I took this picture while treading water in about ten-twelve feet along side of the boat. Probably one of my most favorite pictures taht I took on this trip I really likeit for the simple view of the ocean.
3. The ruins of the three hundred year fort that used to guard these waters against threats against the Imperial Spanish empire.
4. A shot of some of the residents of Pamilican Island.
5. Gerald, a mute boy that hung around us as we were eating lunch.