Nobody sees 7,641 islands. Pick the right nine.
Which El Nido boat actually gets inside the Big Lagoon. What the Oslob morning really involves. Whether the canyon at Kawasan is worth a five o’clock start. Every tour in the country, reviewed.
In the Philippines you book boats, not days.
El Nido sells its lagoons as Tours A to D. Coron runs seven stops before the lunch is laid out on the sand. Boracay leaves at dawn for the sandbars and is back before the heat. Same idea, four completely different mornings.
In the Philippines, the cheapest day out is often the best one.
Boat mornings, canyon days and whole islands, laid out by what they cost. This ladder is worth reading upward as well as down.
A shared banca to the lagoons, a walk through the walled city, a waterfall and a jeepney home.
The standard day: a full island-hopping run with lunch on the sand, or the canyon at Kawasan.
Two islands in one day, a private banca, or Oslob and the falls with the driver waiting.
Chartered boats, the expedition between El Nido and Coron, and the long runs north to the terraces.
The days people fly to the Philippines for.
The lagoons, the sharks, the canyon, the hills, the river under the mountain and the walled city. Six days most trips get built around, and the best way to book each.
Cebu fits the whole country into one province.
Sharks off Oslob at first light, a canyon and a waterfall by lunch, a wall of sardines a stone’s throw off the beach at Moalboal, and a Spanish fort waiting back in the city. Nothing else in the Philippines packs so much into so few hours of road.
What everybody actually books in the Philippines.
Every review →These are the boats and the buses that fill up first. Here is what each morning really involves.
1
Island Hopping Tour A Lagoons and Beaches
El Nido Tour A in Bacuit Bay hits Secret Lagoon, Shimizu Island, Seven Commandos Beach, and Big Lagoon kayaking, with lunch.
From · $23
Read our review →2
Underground River Full-Day Trip
from $48
3
Underground River Full-Day Trip
from $50
4
Premium Chocolate Hills, Tarsiers & River Experience
from $43
5
Coron Ultimate Tour: 7 Destinations with Lunch & Transfers
from $46
6
Whale Shark Swimming & Kawasan Falls Canyoneering
from $124
7
Private Boat Hire with Guided Tour and Lunch on Beach
from $142
8
Cebu Moalboal: Kawasan Canyoneering Adventure with Lunch
from $47
Whale sharks: what the Oslob morning actually involves.
At Oslob the sharks are fed from small boats to hold them in the bay. That is why the site is argued over, and why some operators elsewhere will not sell it. What you are booking is a numbered time slot, a briefing and roughly half an hour in the water. The rules are the same on every boat and the boatmen enforce them: no sunscreen, no touching, four metres of distance. Most tours pair the morning with Tumalog Falls or the Moalboal sardines on the drive back.
- 1Whale Shark Swimming & Kawasan Falls Canyoneeringfrom $124
- 2Oslob Whale Sharks, Tumalog Falls & Sardine Snorkelingfrom $106
- 3Whale Shark Swim and Kawasan Canyoneering Tourfrom $106
Palawan is three towns with a lot of water in between.
El Nido for the lagoons, Coron for the wrecks and the karst lakes, Puerto Princesa for the river that runs under a mountain. The crossing from El Nido to Coron takes a full day by fast boat, or three if you do it as an expedition and sleep on beaches.
- 1Island Hopping Tour A Lagoons and Beachesfrom $23
- 2Underground River Full-Day Tripfrom $48
- 3Underground River Full-Day Tripfrom $50
Three things that only happen in the Philippines.
Reefs and waterfalls turn up all over the tropics. A million sardines off a public beach, a river you paddle under a mountain, and a thousand hills that change colour in April do not.
The Moalboal Sardine Run
Walk off Panagsama Beach, put your face in the water, and a shoal several storeys deep turns as one animal. No boat is needed and the sardines are there most of the year; the tours exist to add the turtles, Pescador Island and a tank if you want one. Mornings are clearest, and the shoal drifts along the drop-off with the current.
- 1Oslob Whale Sharks, Tumalog Falls & Sardine Snorkeling★★★★★★★★★★ 4.3 · 343 reviews
- 2Oslob Whale Sharks, Moalboal Sardine Run & Turtles★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 266 reviews
- 3Whale Shark & Tumalog Falls & Sumilon Sandbar & Pescador Island with Sardines★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 223 reviews
The Puerto Princesa Underground River
A paddled banca takes you into a limestone cave system running under the St Paul range. Tours go about a mile and a half in and back out again, by torchlight, with the guide naming rock shapes. Daily numbers are capped and every visitor needs a permit arranged beforehand, which is why nearly everyone books it as a full day out of Puerto Princesa rather than turning up.
- 1Underground River Full-Day Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.3 · 1,460 reviews
- 2Underground River Full-Day Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 1,039 reviews
- 3Underground River Day Trip from Puerto Princesa City★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 261 reviews
The Chocolate Hills
More than a thousand near-identical limestone mounds spread across the middle of Bohol, grassed over and green for most of the year. They turn the colour they are named for at the end of the dry season, roughly March to May. Every countryside loop stops at the Carmen viewpoint, usually between the tarsier sanctuary and lunch on the Loboc river.
- 1Premium Chocolate Hills, Tarsiers & River Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 804 reviews
- 2Premium Chocolate Hills, Tarsiers & River Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 215 reviews
- 3Chocolate Hills and Countryside Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 175 reviews
Kawasan is a canyon first and a waterfall second.
All canyoneering tours →Whale Shark Swimming & Kawasan Falls Canyoneering
Read our review →Cebu Moalboal: Kawasan Canyoneering Adventure with Lunch
Read our review →
Canyoneering Experience in Kawasan Falls with Lunch
Read our review →The Philippine bookings that will not wait until you land.
Most of this country can be arranged from the guesthouse the night before. These cannot. They run on permits, daily caps and boats that leave once.
- 01Underground River Full-Day TripEntry is capped every day and needs a permit issued in advance. The full-day trips out of Puerto Princesa hold one for you.
- 02El Nido to Coron: 3-Day 2-Night Island-Hopping ExpeditionThe multi-day boat between El Nido and Coron sails on set dates with a set number of bunks. Miss it and the alternative is a flight.
- 03Small-Group Weekend Hiking Tour to Banaue-Ifugao from ManilaIt is an overnight bus each way from Manila and the trips run to a weekend schedule, not a daily one.
- 04Full-Day Tour in Corregidor and Bataan War Memorial from ManilaOne ferry crosses Manila Bay in the morning and the island closes when it sails back.
Habagat season in the Philippines: if the boats stay in, go inland.
From June to October the southwest monsoon can close a jetty for a day at a time, and the north takes typhoons between July and November. The answers are inland and under a roof: the walled city in Manila, the Bohol countryside loop, lunch drifting down the Loboc, the tarsier sanctuary, a cooking class in Makati. Amihan, the dry northeast wind from November to February, is when everything sails.
By base — where you will actually sleep
Cebu265 tours
Manila163 tours
Bohol99 tours
Boracay81 tours
El Nido80 tours
Coron77 tours
Puerto Princesa72 tours- Every base →
By experience — what kind of day is it?
Manila is a walled city with a modern one built around it.
Intramuros is four hundred years of Spanish stonework and you can cycle the whole of it in a morning on a bamboo bike. Binondo next door is the oldest Chinatown anywhere, and it is eaten rather than looked at. Whatever is left of the evening happens up in Makati.
Latest Philippines tour reviews.
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