North Point
A current-swept soft coral garden off Malapascua's northern tip, worked as a drift over broken rock, with one overhang big enough to fill a dive.
Last updated August 2026
The dive
The entry is negative. There is surface current to get through, so the descent starts as you hit the water, before the group has gathered on top of it.
Underneath, the ground breaks up. Rock formations and canyons run through the reef, and they are where the animals are: scorpionfish wedged motionless, lionfish under the ledges, frogfish in several colours. Nudibranchs are on the coral throughout. Seahorses get named here as well, though nobody diving it puts a species to them.
From there the dive goes one of two ways. Taken as a drift it moves over the coral heads and through the canyons, from about 6 metres at the reef top down towards 27 where the rock gives out into sand. Taken slowly it collapses to one feature. There is a rocky overhang here big enough to occupy a diver for a full tank, and choosing it over the drift is not settling for less.
What makes it special
Almost all of this island's macro is worked static. You hold position over a slope and go through it slowly, because that is what finding a candy crab takes. Here the water is carrying you the whole time.
Fire urchins carrying their zebra crabs, candy crabs matched to the colour of the soft coral around them, frogfish in several shades: none of it is unusual for Malapascua. Finding it while the water pushes you along is.
Water moving hard is normally the reason to write a reef off for close work, and here it is the reason there is anything to look at. The soft coral cover is thick because of the current, so the condition that makes the diving demanding is the condition that built the site.
Know before you go
The macro here is down in the cracks and under the overhang. A torch is recommended for a daytime dive on that account, and a diver crossing the open coral in ambient light will go over most of it.
Set your maximum before you get in. The reef runs from 6 metres down to 27, and the drift is deciding where on that band you end up. There is no floor waiting to stop you.
Carry an SMB and put it up before you come up. The current is what this dive is built on and it has been described as switching direction, so surfacing away from where you started is the normal outcome here, not the accident.
Ask which North you are booked on before the boat leaves. Three separate dives on this coast are sold as North Point, North Wall and North Rock by different shops, and the depths and the briefings are not interchangeable.
One thing the short boat ride hides: this dive is minutes from the beach, but the island has no chamber in service, so a problem here sits as far from treatment as one out on the shoals.
Why Dive North Point
What makes this dive site stand out.
- The rocky overhang
One feature big enough that a diver can spend a whole dive on it and go nowhere else
- Current makes the corals
The soft coral grows the way it does here because the water moves hard across the tip
- Macro on the move
Most macro around this island is worked static on sand. This one is done drifting.
- Broken ground through the reef
Rock formations and canyons holding scorpionfish, frogfish and lionfish
- Six to twenty seven metres
A wide band on a drift, so you pick the profile once you are already in the water
Depth & Profile
Location
11.3508°N, 124.1161°E
Conditions & difficulty
Summary
The water sets the grade. Current runs strong, a negative entry is advised to get through it at the surface, and a 21 metre depth band on a drift means the profile is decided while you are already moving.
Safety considerations
What can go wrong here, and what divers do about it. Conditions change - take the briefing from the operator on the day.
- Current: Strong current is the normal state here, and it has been described as changing direction during a dive.Dive it as a drift, keep the guide in sight, and carry an SMB so the boat has something to aim at when you surface.
- Surface and boat traffic: Surface current is strong enough that a negative entry is the standard way in, so the descent begins before the group is together.Settle the buddy pair and the plan before the roll, because there is no surface time in which to do it.
- Depth: The reef runs from 6 metres to 27, and on a drift the profile gets chosen while moving.Agree a maximum before the entry. The slope offers no natural stopping point.
- Overhead: The overhang and the cracks through the rock are dark enough that a torch is recommended in daylight.Light them from outside. No route through any of them is described anywhere and none should be planned.
- Remote location: Malapascua has no working recompression chamber, and the facility contracted for the mainland municipality is still under construction.Insurance that covers hyperbaric treatment, and a conservative profile on a dive that invites a deep one.
Marine Life
Regulations
Daanbantayan designates eleven protected areas by municipal ordinance and this dive is not among them. Some of the dives around it are, so the absence here has been checked and is not an omission.
Frequently Asked Questions
How deep is North Point?▾
The reef is published as running from 6 metres down to 27, and the dive is also sold on a 22 metre chart, so both are describing the same slope from different ends. Figures around 18 metres circulate for this name and match neither. What matters practically is that 6 to 27 is a 21 metre band on a drift: the shallow coral garden is an entry level profile and is sold as one, while the bottom of the range is past entry level limits. Pick your number on the boat, because the reef will not pick it for you.
Which North is North Point? There seem to be several.▾
Three separate dives on this coast are sold under similar names by different shops: North Point, North Wall and North Rock. They are not alternative names for one site. The depths differ, the briefings differ, and a figure quoted for one of them regularly gets attached to another. Before you pay for the trip, confirm which of the three is actually on the boat plan for the day.
Do you need Nitrox at North Point?▾
No, and the recommendation you may have seen is not for this dive. A 36 percent mix travels around with the North Point name and belongs to North Rock, which is a different site. Nothing published for this dive asks for Nitrox. The one piece of kit that is specifically recommended here is a torch, and it is recommended for a daytime dive.
Is North Point a marine protected area?▾
No. The municipality of Daanbantayan has designated eleven protected areas by municipal ordinance, and this dive appears in none of them. It is also absent from the eighteen sites in the reef monitoring survey that covers this coast. That is worth stating plainly, because several dives within a few kilometres of it are designated, and silence on a page usually means nobody checked. Here somebody did.
How strong is the current at North Point?▾
Strong enough that the whole dive is planned around it. A negative entry is advised so you get through the surface layer instead of being pushed off the site while the group assembles, and once you are down the reef is worked as a drift. It has also been described as changing direction, which is the argument for staying with the guide and for carrying your own marker buoy. If you dislike being moved along, this is not the site to spend an hour photographing one nudibranch.
How long is the boat ride to North Point?▾
That depends entirely on where you leave from, and the published figures are far apart. One shop puts it at 5 minutes and another at 15 to 20 for the same named dive. Both are plausible for a small island with departures from different beaches, and neither can be relied on for planning a day around two or three dives. Ask the shop taking you.
Every dive has a story. Share yours.
Log your dives - notes, photos, conditions and the marine life you saw - and share them as one public diver profile. What you share helps the next diver, too.
Log every detail
Depth, duration, conditions, gear, buddy, notes — all in one place. Import from Suunto and other dive computers.
Track marine life
Record species sightings on each dive. Build a personal catalogue of everything you've seen underwater.
Your public dive profile
Share your dive history, stats, and experiences with a profile page you control. Show the world where you've been.