Cruising Yacht Charter In The Philippines
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Photo by: John Smart
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Charter Yacht off Mindoro Island PhilippinesThe Philippines is almost virgin territory for yacht charter cruising. Yes, for many decades, people have sailed their yachts around the many islands that make up the Philippine archipelago but there are precious few opportunities for people to charter a yacht in the Philippines.
Why would you want to charter a yacht in the Philippines? Well first and foremost because almost every beach and almost every cove that you may anchor in is new to cruising, in other words, the local inhabitants will be pleased to see you and enthusiastic to tell you about the uniqueness of their locality . . . and there is so much uniqueness here that a book of 1,000 pages would only scrape the surface.
The cruising yacht fraternity is tired of Thailand and tired of Malaysia, because everywhere you go you are just one of one hundred yachts that have anchored there before or (worse) are still anchored there. In Thailand and Malaysia there is no privacy, no expectation for adventure and no uniqueness that cannot be found on any tourist map of the area.
The Philippines is different: yachts arriving are relatively unique experiences for the locality; the people you meet are unique; and, the places, if you take the time to understand, are almost totally unique.
So why has the Philippines remained largely unexplored?
Mostly, the answer to that question lies at the door of MARINA – the government agency tasked with regulating the maritime industry in the Philippines. But that is not the whole story . . . the big picture is that the Philippines (or at least the entities that regulate and promote it) does not understand yacht charter. For the majority of the inhabitants of the country, the idea of owning a sailing yacht is bizarre: why would you want to spend so much money on an asset that could sink tomorrow with a total loss? And why would you want to spend most of each day under the sun, like a fisherman (almost as lowly as a rice-farmer in this 21st century, air-conditioned, ultra-white, consumerist society) but without even fishing?
Even in the dizzy heights of the new Department of Tourism offices in Makati City, the concept of yacht charter is that: it must be an elitist sport that only a very few, very strange foreigners may wish to partake in. When I look at the scores of yachts chartered in Thailand and Malaysia every week I cannot understand why this sport cannot be embraced, especially as the Philippines has 32,000km of coastline and almost as many beaches, many in hidden bays and coves that only a handful of people ever see. Don’t believe me? Just take a look at a recent article published online at CNN, that hopefully-extols the virtues of the Philippines as the next sailing destination, with cruising around Busuanga and El Nido – located in just one small island group at the head of the island of Palawan.
As if to emphasize the lack of understanding of the opportunity that is being missed in this high-value tourism sector, in December 2014 the Philippine Coast Guard presented a letter to an assembly of potential stakeholders in the yachting industry. The letter was intended to indicate new guidelines for safety and supervision of “pleasure yachts” in the Philippines. The document – a draft Memorandum – was simply a regurgitation of the rules and regulations pertaining to commercial passenger and cargo vessels, with the phrase “Pleasure Yachts” substituted at appropriate points. If this Memorandum ever became the law that guided the Philippine Coast Guard to police activities on the water then yacht charter would never, ever happen in the Philippines.
Fortunately, a group of real industry stakeholders are finally putting their thoughts on paper and will soon present a summary to the Coast Guard, for onward transmission to MARINA department. If the recommendations from the stakeholders are accepted then perhaps the Philippines will actually become known as the yacht charter centre of tropical Asia, for is has all of the assets that make yacht charter possible and enjoyable, and we could one-day see the Philippines being promoted to the World as the only place worth exploring by yacht.
Want to know more about yacht charter in the Philippines?
Visit AllSportsPhilippines.com for a simple overview of destinations for sailing around the Philippines or check out Puerto Galera Yacht Club yacht charter information page and see the few Philippine charter yachts currently on offer for the adventurous tourists with a passion for discovering the uniqueness of this truly amazing archipelago.
Want to tell us why you want to charter a yacht in the Philippines? Email Yacht Charter – GetWet style today