Gato Island, although small, offers stunning dive sites known for its sharks, seahorses, nudibranchs, cave or cathedral.
| Name Dive Site: | Gato Island |
| Inserted/Added by: | threshersharkdivers |
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Gato Island is one of our most famous dive areas around Malapasqua. It is a marine reserve and sea snake sanctuary and has at least five dive sites with a huge diversity of marine life. We are constantly seeing new creatures. At all sites you can see such things as banded sea snakes, cuttlefish (often while mating), seahorses, nudibranchs, frogfish, moray eels, scorpion fish, squid and big-mouthed mackerel. There are many whitetip reef sharks in residence at Gato, as well as bamboo and cat sharks. The coral is in good condition and the rocky island has many interesting underwater rock formations, overhangs, and swim-throughs.
You are 95% guaranteed to find whitetips sleeping under rocks at Whitetip Alley, and if you are lucky you will see them circling around you. Other life here includes banded boxer shrimp, crinoid cuttlefish, seahorses and scorpion fish.
At the Guardhouse, drop down to 24m to find the extremely rare pygmy seahorse, both pink and yellow. Then work your way back along a wall where you can find lionfish and many nudibranchs, including the beautiful Spanish dancers, up to 30cm long. A painted frogfish is currently in residence.
As Nudibranch City implies, we find nudibranchs galore at this site. Also around are lots of hermit crabs and scorpion fish.
The Cave or more accurately, The Tunnel is a journey underneath Gato Island and come out the other side! This 30m tunnel houses all the usual cave dwellers like crabs and lobsters. You should also encounter some large puffer fish. Most of exciting of all, the cave is home to whitetip sharks! You may see them hiding in a corner as you pass by inches from their face, or see their silhouette as they circle near the exit. If you are careful and move slowly, they will swim straight by your face. The sight is simply breathtaking, not for the faint hearted and for experienced divers only.
At the Cathedral you can explore several amazing rock formations Gato is famous for. It is a great place to see sharks - we have seen as many as 15 whitetips circling. It is also possible to see blue-spotted rays.
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- Thresher Shark Divers, Malapascua Island, Cebu
Thresher Shark Divers
| Thresher Shark Divers www.thresherdivers.com 00639276123359 | Malapascua Island 6013 Cebu |
Daily thresher shark dives, giant manta rays, hammerheads, macro & muck dives, reefs & wrecks, walls & drift dives and much more. TSD is a PADI 5 Star IDC Center and offers complete dive packages, a full range of PADI courses up to Instructor level, technical diving and Dive Pro internship programs.
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