Monad Shoal Malapascua, Cebu

Monad Shoal
Malapascua, Cebu
The local fishermen didn’t use to know what to make of the whip-tailed sharks with small heads that they would sometimes see breaching the waters off Malapascua Island. Now they know that the elegant, if oddly shaped, thresher sharks are the main reason why divers flock to their small island, off the northern tip of Cebu. The threshers, usually found in the deep, surface to recreational-diving depths on top of Monad Shoal, where divers have learned to lie in wait. Take a second dive on Monad in the afternoon, as manta rays take over the shoal.