Swimming with the Whale Sharks at Oslob, Cebu City, Philippines

By JC - December 27, 2017

There are a lot of "resorts" where you can go and buy the tickets for the whale shark and they'll bring you there on a small jeepney or mini-van. But you can go straight to the Whale shark watching spot and buy your tickets there. The issue is that you might not have places to park if you are driving. Do note that for the beach resorts, there might be an additional 100 pesos as an "entrance" fee to the resort in addition to the tickets.

It starts with sort of an orientation by the Dept. of Tourism to ensure that we take care of the Butandings (Whale Sharks) e.g. keep at least 4 meters distance and no touching.

And then you have to wait for your turn. We were there like 9.30 and the line was really long, took us almost an hour waiting for our turn. This is because there are limited boats and so you guys take turns.

You will only get to stay for like 30 minutes (as soon as the boat stops and the boatman asks you to swim, the clock starts ticking).

Again, You only have 30 Minutes to engage with the Whale Sharks.

Tips:

If you wanna snorkel, bring your own Snorkel. What they rent out has been used by so many people and they don't even sterilized it. Also they are not good ones.
If you can swim, you can take off your vest so you can get better pictures.

Where: Aaron's Beach Resort (map) at Natalio Bacalso Avenue, Oslob, 6023 Cebu

Time: Woke up like 4-5 am and took 2.5 hours to get to where the whale shark watching is.

Actual Spot for Whale Shark watching (here)

Price:

There is a difference for Filipinos and foreigners in terms of pricing. 1 USD is roughly 50 Pesos.

Activity	Price in Pesos	Price in USD
Pricing for Locals
Watching (stay only on the boat)	300	$6
Snorkeling with the Sharks	500	$10
Scuba Diving	1000	$20
Pricing for Foreigners
Watching (stay only on the boat)	500	$10
Snorkeling with the Sharks	1000	$20
Scuba Diving	1500	$30

How to get there?

There are various options to go to Oslob and takes like around 2.5 hours to get there.

Take a local bus to go there from Cebu

Check for bus schedules here.
Where: cebu south bus Terminal
Costs: around 150 pesos or $3-4

Rent a car with a driver

Cost will be the car cost + Whale Shark tickets
Might be cheaper than doing solo travel on a package tour

Day trips / local tours

e.g. http://www.oslobwhalesharks.com/
They can be costly but obviously easier for tourists
But it can cost from 2K to 6K pesos ($40 to $100) depending on how many people there are in your group so can be costly.