Malapascua Island

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Malapascua is a Philippine island in the Visayan Sea.

It is located about eight kilometers northeast of the island of Cebu and administratively belongs to the province of Cebu. Its length is about two km ( north-south), the width is about 800 meters. Malapascua is a coral island with many coral sand beaches and limestone cliffs that are found mostly on the west side of the island.

The island has about 5000 inhabitants. The Barangay Logon consists of nine villages: Logon (Capital), Tawigan, Pasil, Indonacion, Kaba Tangan, Bakhaw, Bool, Langob and Guimbitayan.

The population lives mainly from fishing and increasing extent on tourism. There are no significant industry on the island, but its own primary school and a high school.

For several years, the island is increasingly exploited by tourism, there arise from year to year more beach resorts and diving schools. Especially popular are dives to the nearby island Gato, which is a nature reserve, with the particularity of an underwater cave and a straight line at the island underwater tunnels, and dives to the " Sunken Iceland " where thresher sharks ( Thresher Sharks ) and good luck manta rays and hammerhead sharks observed can be.

There are on Malapascua for a short time their own small police station, the so-called " Barangay Police", which is to ensure on the island for safety and compliance with the law. But the nature is still not taken seriously on Malapascua. Some are only rarely observed large schools of fish, because this addition to the coveted fish and juvenile fish are killed because of dynamite fishing. The fishermen who use the banned dynamite, usually do not come from Malapascua but from Leyte or even from Talisay, Tapilon ( Cebu ) and are difficult to grasp.

Due to this disturbance of the natural offspring also the livelihood of Filipinos is destroyed to a great extent. Sharks and rays are becoming increasingly rare in the waters around the island because they can not find anything to eat. In addition, many destroyed coral reefs can provide the fish no more habitat.

Administrative town for Malapascua is Daanbantayan on the main island of Cebu.

The journey to Malapascua via Cebu City, thence in an approximately four-hour trip by bus ( or taxi) to the northeast tip of Cebu to Maya. There you can translate a banka (pump boat) in a half-hour ride to Malapascua. In bad weather, no translation is possible.