Almost everything in Moalboal is within fifteen minutes of Panagsama Beach, so you barely lose any time getting from one plan to the next. You still will not squeeze all of it into your days, and you do not need to. Most backpackers stay three days and leave with two or three experiences they will never forget.
A few things really belong on the list: getting in the water with the sardines, one day in the canyon, and one morning out of bed before sunrise. The tour desks along the coast road sell plenty more, and those are good fun if you have a whole day spare. The best thing here, by the way, is five metres off the beach and costs you nothing.
So where do your Moalboal days go, and what do you save for next time?
Want the practical side first, like how many days you need, where to sleep and how to get there? That is all on our Moalboal page.
The Sardine Run from the beach
This is the reason you come, and nowhere else makes it this easy. You walk into the water at Panagsama Beach, swim five metres, and below you hangs a swirling wall of millions of sardines. No boat, no guide, no tour: just you and a snorkel.
It costs nothing. A snorkel set is about €3 to hire and that is the whole bill. The shoal is there all year round, which is rare for the Philippines, and the water is clearest in the morning.
Go on your very first morning, before you plan anything else. Then you know how it works, and for the rest of your stay you can just wander back in whenever you feel like it.
Our verdict: €3 for a snorkel set and you are swimming straight into the shoal, so do it on your first morning
Canyoneering at Kawasan Falls
For a lot of backpackers this is the highlight of their whole trip through the Philippines. You jump, slide, climb and swim your way down a gorge of turquoise water towards Kawasan Falls. The jumps go up to about ten metres.
The tour is a day trip with about three hours of jumping, and lunch is included. You can skip any jump that feels too high: just tell your guide, there is a walk around every one, and nobody bats an eyelid.
Do not plan it right before a long bus day. Canyoneering is harder work than it sounds and most people are in bed early that night.
Our verdict: a must, even if you are not an adrenaline junkie
Sea turtles on the seagrass
Turtles graze just off Panagsama Beach almost every day, on the seagrass right next to the sardine cloud. Your chances of meeting one are high, and there is nothing to book and no boat to catch.
This one is free too: you walk in along the same stretch of beach as for the sardines and swim a little further along the shore. Take your time, because every now and then they come up to breathe and glide right past you.
Stay at least three metres away and never touch them. It sounds obvious, but along with badly run canyoneering tours it is exactly what goes wrong here.
Our verdict: combine it with the sardines and it does not cost you an extra day
Diving at Pescador Island
Moalboal is one of the best dive spots on Cebu, and Pescador is its best known site: a small island fifteen minutes out by boat, with a wall all the way round and schools of jacks and sardines hanging off it. Along the coast the wall starts shallow too, so you do not need to go deep to see a lot.
Two dives cost about €45 and Open Water is enough to join. You can snorkel at Pescador as well, from about €15. January to May gives you the best visibility, up to thirty metres in the driest months.
No certificate yet? This is a great place to get one. There are dozens of dive schools along the coast road, offering everything from a try dive to a full PADI course.
Our verdict: a must if you dive, otherwise snorkelling from the beach gives you plenty
Sunrise at Lambug Beach
This is our own favourite in the area and hardly anyone does it. Lambug Beach is about an hour’s ride from Moalboal: a long white sand beach looking out at the mountains of Cebu, with barely a tourist on it. At sunrise you have it almost to yourself.
You need a scooter, about €7 a day, and you have to leave in the dark. That is exactly why it is so quiet: everyone else who gets up early here does it for a tour, not for a beach.
Make it a half day. Ride back slowly along the coast after sunrise and you are home in time for a snorkel or lunch.
Our verdict: riding out in the dark is exactly why you get this beach to yourself
A beach day at White Beach
Panagsama has rocks instead of sand, and White Beach is where you get the sand. It is the most popular beach around and the place to spend a day doing nothing without staring at a coast road full of dive shops.
Entry is about €0.50 and it is fifteen minutes from Panagsama by scooter. Beyond that there is not much to organise: swim, lie in the shade and stay until the sun goes down.
Do this the day after your canyoneering. Your body will be ready for it, and you will not feel like getting back in a van anyway.
Our verdict: a good one, and half a day is just right
Sunset along the coast road
Moalboal’s sunsets are some of the best on Cebu, and you do not have to hunt for the right spot. The whole coast road along Panagsama looks out to sea, so wherever you sit, you are sitting in the right place.
The sun drops into the water at around quarter to six, at roughly the same time all year. It costs nothing and the beach bars are built for exactly this: a beer here is about €1.20.
Keep your last evening free for it and eat along the same road afterwards. It is the most relaxed way to end a day spent in the water.
Our verdict: free, and good all over again every evening
Got time to spare in Moalboal?
The sardines need no boat
The desks along the coast road will offer you a boat trip to the Sardine Run, but the shoal is five metres off the beach and you can swim there in two minutes. All you need is a snorkel set for about €3. Put that boat money towards Pescador Island, where a boat really does get you somewhere you cannot swim to.
Tumalog Falls at your own pace
The day tour that strings Oslob, Tumalog Falls and the sardines together spends a big part of the day in a van to the other side of Cebu and back. If you want to see Tumalog Falls, go on your own by scooter: you set your own pace and you get the waterfall at its quietest.
Whale sharks: know what you are booking
Swimming with whale sharks sounds like the best day of your trip. At Oslob the animals are fed so that they stay in the same spot for the boats, and that is why a lot of travellers come away with mixed feelings about it. If you want to see big animals in the wild, Pescador Island with its turtles and sea snakes makes for a better and more honest day.
Canyoneering at Kawasan
This is one of the best days you can do from Moalboal: jumping, sliding and swimming down the gorge to Kawasan Falls. Choose your operator on quality rather than price, because here it really matters whether your guide has helmets, life jackets and insurance. And give it a miss right after heavy rain, because the canyon can close when the river is high.
Our top five in Moalboal
Only got a few days? These are the five we would do no matter what:
- The Sardine Run from Panagsama Beach, ideally on your first morning
- Canyoneering down the gorge to Kawasan Falls
- Sea turtles on the seagrass, from the same stretch of beach
- Diving or snorkelling at Pescador Island
- Sunrise at Lambug Beach, on a scooter you set off on in the dark
Still got time after that? A day at White Beach is the nicest way to recover, and a try dive with one of the schools along the coast road is the most fun. And every evening ends well on its own if you are sitting somewhere along the coast at quarter to six.
So what do you really have to do in Moalboal?
Honestly? Nothing on this list is compulsory. Moalboal is not a place with sights to tick off, it is a dive village where almost everything happens in the same patch of water. Travellers who stay longer than planned rarely do it because there was still something left to see.
If we had to pick just one thing: the sardines. Walk into the water, swim five metres and let that cloud swirl around you. It costs a €3 snorkel set and ten minutes, and it is the bit of Moalboal you will still be telling people about a year from now.
And get up early once. Ride to Lambug Beach in the dark, sit down in the sand and watch the sun come up from behind the mountains of Cebu with nobody else around. That is a better memory than any tour.
