Banca Boat on Apo island

This is one of the small banca boats taking passengers from Malatapay / Zamboanguita to Apo Island, the banca boat is the main boat prevalent all over the Philippines, you will see banca boats in every province from north to south. The banca is a smart design with the bamboo outriggers preventing them from tipping over even in rough weather.

I wish they had some bigger bancas in Malatapay to take passengers over to Apo Island, not because we are a huge group, but I always prefer the bigger banca boats, they are a lot more stable in the water and a lot more comfortable.

The ride over to Apo Island is only 30-45 minutes though, so we manage with the smaller boats even though the sea between Malatapay and Apo Island can be pretty rough, we all got very wet when we crossed over to Apo yesterday morning. We should have know because the waves were also a bit higher on our beach than normal, but we had to go to Apo yesterday, it was the last day for my visiting tourist friend.

This looks like one of the smaller bancas from Malatapay, this thing will seat 6 persons and cost you P1500 for the whole day, they drop you off on Apo in the morning and take you back to Malatapay around 3.30-4pm in the afternoon.

Apo Island Pictures