Dinagat Island

Here's another post related to our previous vacation. This post is only focused on our stay at Dinagat Island located at Mindanao, Philippines. I posted more photos taken by my Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra.

Some of the photos included in this post are already posted in the Leyte Vacation (Galaxy S21 Ultra) post. I just added them here in this Dinagat Island compilation blog post.

It's cloudy and the wind is strong during our 2-hour boat ride to Dinagat Island. The boat ride is wavy to the point that I almost puked due to sea sickness.

Thankfully the weather cleared and the sea calmed before we arrive at our first stop, because I'm at my limit to vomit.

We arrived at Jelmar's Resort.

We stayed here for a whole day.

The place have a really nice view. You'll be surprised that the entrance here is just 20 Pesos per person, but expect the prices on the convenience store or what we call "tindahan" here are more expensive than the city.

There are many smaller islands here and the water is very clear.

I rarely see these views because I live in a city there are less nature and more pollution.

I only see these in travel magazines and shows.

Anyway, the beach resort looks nice. The water is not that high even though you're far away from the beach. Here, you can literally swim with the fishes... and other aquatic creatures, like jellyfishes, starfishes and sea urchins. Just be careful not to get stung by a jellyfish.

So many sea urchins here. I think those are the edible type.

That's an unusual-looking starfish. It got spikes.

There are many fishes here but I didn't see any large fish around.

We started the island hopping and tour the next day.

First we went to the island rock formations.

I got some wallpaper friendly photos here.

Nature caused these formations.

Rain and water currents made these nice erosion patterns. It's like carvings made by nature.

We just stayed here for a short while to take some photos and swim a bit. We didn't have the opportunity to roam around this island.

Time to move to another place. While going to our next destination, we saw more small islands.

These smaller islands makes an impression that they are part of a larger island that got separated due to erosion caused by water currents.

Next stop, Lake Bababu.

The lake is featured in some TV shows.

The lake is pretty difficult to reach because it's hidden on the mountain. You need to trek 500m going up and another 500m going down. Adding to the difficulty the trail is rocky, muddy and slippery because of the rain. Good thing that there are guide ropes to hold on while trekking.

We can see the lake from here but we're not there yet. We still need to descend 300 meters.

We arrived at the lake. This place is peaceful. There are no other sounds except for the birds, insects and the lake's water.

The locals made a raft here and there's a rope that goes from both sides of the lake, so that we can navigate to the center of the lake.

We are instructed not to bring potential trash here. Because this lake is being preserved and must remain clean.

The lake's water is heavy because it's not sea water. I didn't try to swim because I'm not a good swimmer and the lake is really deep.

We went back to the beach and we had coconuts. After swimming for a bit, I got stung on my knee by a small jellyfish. It's not a deadly jellyfish so I'm safe. They just poured vinegar on my knee while on the way to this place seen on the photo above. 

We went here and walked for 5 minutes for the beach to check out the underwater cave.

I'm no stranger to underwater caves. But this one, while smaller than the one I saw years ago, got a nice stalagmite formations.

The water is cold and deep so I left my phone and other gadgets on a nearby rock so that I can swim properly.

This is our last stop, the Blue Lagoon.

The place is small and got a white beach. Looks very nice

The water is not that deep. It's shallow so it's easy to go on the center of the lagoon without having to swim.

This is another wallpaper friendly shot. While the lagoon have shallow waters, it's very rocky making it hard to walk. By the way there are so many medium to large-sized crabs here, so careful while walking on the lagoon. After taking some photos and having fun, we went back to Leyte.

Dinagat Island is a beautiful place. The water and air is clean and there are so many wonders here made by nature. I'm happy that I saw these places with my own eyes. It made me feel that I'm in one of those video games that I've played. We plan on going back here. If you plan to go to Dinagat Island, prepare some good amount of money, obviously even more if you're from Manila or other country. Remember, the entrance fees around the island is cheaper than the boat ride. The boat ride is around Php.1,000.00 to Php.2,000 per person.