Bantayan and Malapascua are two tropical islands on the north of Cebu island.
Bantayan has amazing beaches and is great for snorkelling and exploring the island
and Malapascua is a heaven for divers and people who like small islands with friendly locals.
Bantayan is the bigger one to the west and Malapascua is the tiny one to the east.
We loved both of them.
The journey to these islands can be a bit complicated and ours wasn’t easy either. To get to Bantayan and/or Malapascua from Cebu city you need to go to the North bus terminal and take a bus to Hagnaya Port for Bantayan or a bus to Maya Port for Malapascua. These buses run every half and hour 24 hours a day, there are aircon and non-aircon ones and the journey takes about 5-6 hours to either port.
From Hagnaya port you’ll take a ferry to Bantayan (170php). You’ll find the schedule and ticket prices here: https://www.bantayanisland.org/ferry-schedule-and-prices/
From Maya port you’ll take a ferry to Malapascua . Once there, go to the little ticket booth at the end of the pier and they will help you get the next public boat. There is no fixed boat schedule as the boats wait until they are full to leave. The last boat usually leaves around sundown. Price for a public boat is P50.
We set off from our previous destination, Port Barton on Palawan at 11am with a minivan heading to Puerto Princessa. The journey took about 5 hours. We had a flight with Air Asia from there the next afternoon to Mactan airport in Cebu (£42 per person). We chose to spend one night in a hotel close to the airport in Puerto Princessa so we don’t end up missing our flight. Buses in the Philippines always run a few hours late, so we wouldn’t advise anyone to take up a long bus journey on the day of a flight.
The hotel in Puerto Princessa was surprisingly nice and comfortable, although Veronika got food poisoning from the dinner we had at its restaurant. Hotel link here
We arrived from Puetro Princessa to Mactan airport in the evening so we stayed in Cebu city for the night. The hotel we stayed at was 15 min walk to the North Bus Terminal: link
We chose to go to Bantayan first, then after a few days move onto Malapascua. Our bus to Bantayan started from the North Terminal in Cebu at 9:30am and we arrived in Santa Fe, the main town on island around 4pm. Be prepared as the bus ride is a very bumpy journey. You’ll stop once on the way for a toilet break and food, but all you can get there is pastry and instant noodle soup.
Then to get to Malapascua from Bantayan (or the other way round) you have two choices:
a) Safe choice: This will take a whole day’s travel. You’ll need catch a ferry from Santa Fe (on Bantayan) back to Hagnaya Port on Cebu island, then take a tricycle to Bogo city (60php) and catch a bus to Maya Port from there (they leave about every hour). Once at Maya Port, catch a boat to Malapascua. If you start at 9am, you’ll get to Malapascua around 4pm. To do this the other way (#Malapascua to #Bantayan) just reverse the steps.
b) Quick choice: This will only take 2-2.5 hours. Ask any boatman on Bantayan to take you to Malapascua with their pump boat for 1500-2000php. It will be a wet and exhausting ride, we did it and felt like we spent the afternoon on a high cycle in the washing machine. We chose this option because we didn’t have much time.
Keep an eye out for our next post. In it we'll tell you about our stay both on Bantayan and Malapascua, you'll find out about the fun things we did and what we saw on these islands and why we loved them so much.