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Siquijor Island: Getting Around the Island
There is a story that follows Siquijor everywhere, embedded so deeply in how Filipinos talk about the island that it precedes most travelers’ actual arrival by weeks. Siquijor is the island of witches, of folk healers and love potions, of dark magic practiced in villages where fireflies appear in numbers that seem impossible and the mango trees are supposedly old enough to remember things that humans have forgotten. The story is not entirely fabricated — the island does have a genuine tradition of folk healing, of hilot practitioners and herb medicine and rituals that predate both Spanish colonialism and the Catholic church that overlaid it — but the way the story circulates has produced a reputation that keeps a specific kind of traveler away and attracts a different specific kind who arrives expecting something theatrical.
Both groups are responding to a fiction. The reality of Siquijor is simultaneously more ordinary and more worthwhile than either the mystical reputation or the resulting disappointment suggests. It is a small island — roughly 340 square kilometers — in the central Visayas, with waterfalls that genuinely justify the trip, coral reefs that have recovered better than most Philippine marine environments due to the low visitor pressure that the witch island reputation inadvertently created, empty white sand beaches that on any other Philippine island would be packed with resorts, and a population of approximately 100,000 people who are, by most travelers’ accounts, among the more genuinely welcoming communities in an archipelago already known for hospitality.
This guide is built to cut through the mythology in both directions and give you what you actually need to visit one of the Philippines’ most underrated islands.
The Actual Geography
Siquijor sits south of Cebu, west of Negros Oriental, and north of Mindanao, in the Bohol Sea. It is one of the smallest provinces in the Philippines by land area. A single circumferential road of approximately 72 kilometers circles the entire island, making getting oriented straightforward in a way that larger Philippine islands are not. The interior rises to Mount Bandilaan at 624 meters, covered in secondary forest that is more intact than most Philippine lowland forest environments due to the relative absence of agricultural pressure and logging that more heavily visited islands have absorbed.
The western coast has the most developed tourism infrastructure — the town of San Juan, where most guesthouses and dive shops cluster, sits on this coast — while the northern and eastern coasts are quieter with beaches that see a fraction of the visitors. The interior is the least visited part of the island and contains most of the waterfalls, the older villages, and the folk healer communities that the island’s reputation is built around.
Getting There
Siquijor is reached by ferry from several nearby ports. The most common routes are from Dumaguete on Negros Oriental, which takes 45 minutes to one hour on a fast ferry operated by Oceanjet or similar services at a cost of 200 to 300 pesos ($3.50 to $5.50 USD), and from Tagbilaran in Bohol, which takes around two hours at comparable cost. Less frequent services run from Cebu City for travelers coming directly from the main hub without stopping in Dumaguete first.
Dumaguete is the practical gateway for most travelers. It is reached from Cebu City by either a one-hour flight with Cebu Pacific or Philippine Airlines (book in advance for 800 to 2,000 pesos one-way) or by a combination of ferry and bus from Cebu that takes four to six hours and costs roughly the same. Given the time involved in the overland-and-sea combination, the flight is worth the price differential for most travelers working within a two-week Philippines itinerary.
The Dumaguete to Siquijor ferry schedule changes seasonally and by operator, so confirm current departure times at the Dumaguete port or through updated Philippines travel forums rather than relying on schedules published in any written guide including this one.
Getting Around the Island
The standard approach is renting a motorbike from your guesthouse or from rental shops in San Juan. Rates run 300 to 500 pesos per day ($5.50 to $9 USD) for a semi-automatic bike, with similar caveats about checking tire and brake condition that apply anywhere in Southeast Asia. The circumferential road is well-paved for most of its length, though interior roads leading to waterfalls and mountain villages vary between rough concrete and unpaved gravel depending on recent municipal maintenance.
A full circumnavigation of the island by motorbike takes three to four hours without stops, meaning you can cover the entire perimeter in a single day and use subsequent days for interior exploration and specific beaches or waterfalls that merit return visits. This is one of Siquijor’s practical advantages over larger Philippine islands: it is small enough to understand completely in a week, large enough to reward staying longer than a weekend.
Tricycles — the Philippine motorized three-wheeler — operate on fixed routes between major towns and can be chartered for specific trips at negotiated rates. For travelers who are not comfortable on motorbikes, a chartered tricycle for a day’s touring runs 800 to 1,200 pesos and gives you a driver who knows the road and can navigate the unmarked turns to waterfall trailheads that first-time visitors routinely miss.
The Waterfalls Worth Finding
Siquijor has more waterfalls than its size would suggest, fed by the interior mountain springs and the forest cover that has maintained catchment areas that more deforested Philippine islands have lost.
Cambugahay Falls near Lazi is the most visited and justifiably so. A series of three tiers of blue-green water dropping through forest with natural swimming holes at each level, accessible via a 150-step staircase from the road. Entry costs 30 to 50 pesos. Rope swings have been installed at the upper tiers with varying degrees of structural confidence — test before committing your full weight. The falls are genuinely beautiful and busiest between 10am and 2pm; arriving at 8am or 3pm gives you significantly more of the experience to yourself. This is the waterfall that ends up on most Siquijor photographs, and the photographs do not exaggerate the color of the water.
Lugnason Falls near San Juan requires a short hike through privately managed land with a small entrance fee, generally 20 to 30 pesos, and offers a single-drop waterfall into a deep pool in a narrow canyon. Less spectacular than Cambugahay in pure visual terms but less visited, and the canyon approach gives it a more enclosed, wilder quality.
Lagaan Falls in the municipality of Enrique Villanueva is the most remote of the well-known falls and requires a 20-minute hike from the nearest road access. A local guide is useful here not for safety reasons but for navigation — the path is unmarked in sections and branches without obvious indication of which branch is correct. Guesthouses in San Juan can connect you with a guide for 300 to 500 pesos for a half day.
The unnamed falls and springs in the interior above Lazi and San Juan reward travelers who ask specifically at guesthouses for directions to places not in any guidebook. Several exist. The quality of discovery in finding a waterfall by following a local family’s directions, written on a piece of paper with hand-drawn landmarks, is different from the quality of arriving at a rated attraction, and not inferior to it.
The Beaches and the Reef
Siquijor’s beaches on the western coast near San Juan are good by Philippine standards — white sand, palm trees at the margin, the typical visual grammar of Southeast Asian beach — but not exceptional in isolation. What makes them worth time is the reef immediately offshore, which in sections has recovered to a quality of coral cover that is increasingly rare in heavily dived Philippine waters.
The relative absence of mass dive tourism that has affected Malapascua, Moalboal, and even parts of Apo Island has allowed Siquijor’s reef to maintain fish populations and coral structures that more visited sites have degraded. Sightings of sea turtles on the reef near the island’s southern coast are consistent rather than lucky, hawksbill turtles in particular appearing regularly at cleaning stations that experienced local divemasters know specifically.
Two or three established dive shops operate in San Juan, offering two-tank dive packages for approximately 2,000 to 2,500 pesos ($36 to $45 USD) including equipment. These are not budget prices by Philippine standards — Moalboal in Cebu offers comparable prices with more dive site variety — but the quality of the marine environment on specific Siquijor sites justifies the trip for divers who have already done the main Philippine circuits and are looking for something in better condition.
For snorkelers, the reef at Salagdoong Beach on the island’s eastern coast is accessible from shore at a beach managed by the provincial government, with an entry fee of around 50 pesos. The coral in the shallows here is genuinely good and requires no boat to reach.
The Folk Healer Question
This requires honest treatment because it is both the most distinctive aspect of Siquijor’s cultural identity and the aspect most likely to be mishandled by travelers who arrive with either cynicism or performative credulity.
The mananambal tradition — folk healing combining herbal medicine, ritual, prayer, and elements that predate and exist alongside Catholic practice — is real and functional for the communities that practice and use it. During Holy Week, the town of San Antonio hosts the annual gathering of folk healers who come to prepare their medicinal concoctions using hundreds of plant ingredients collected from across the island. This is the most accessible public manifestation of a practice that otherwise operates within communities in private contexts.
Seeking out a folk healer as a tourist activity is possible and, when done correctly, is a legitimate cultural encounter. The correct approach involves going through a trusted local intermediary — your guesthouse owner is the right first contact — rather than showing up at a practitioner’s home unannounced. It involves genuine curiosity about the practice rather than treating the healer as entertainment. It involves respecting that what you are observing is someone’s livelihood and belief system, not a cultural performance staged for visitor consumption. And it involves accepting that the most meaningful practitioners are not necessarily the ones most accessible to tourists.
The ghost tour and witch tour products marketed in San Juan are a different category — they are tourism products designed for traveler entertainment using the island’s reputation as a hook. They are not inherently problematic but should not be confused with actual engagement with the mananambal tradition. They are the equivalent of a Dracula tour in Transylvania: thematically connected to something real, but several steps removed from it.
Where to Sleep
San Juan on the western coast is the accommodation hub with the widest range of options. Budget guesthouses start at 400 to 700 pesos per night ($7 to $13 USD) for a fan room with private bathroom, rising to 1,200 to 2,500 pesos for air-conditioned rooms with beach access. A small number of boutique resorts on the western coast charge 3,000 to 6,000 pesos for genuinely comfortable rooms with the design quality and pool infrastructure that justify the price for travelers who want comfort alongside the island’s natural attributes.
Staying outside San Juan materially changes the quality of the experience and is worth considering for any stay longer than four days. Lazi on the eastern coast has several guesthouses near the Spanish colonial church — one of the oldest in the Philippines, completed in the 19th century, with a convent that is considered among the finest examples of Philippine colonial religious architecture — and the surrounding beach and interior are quieter than the western coast by a meaningful degree. Maria municipality in the south has similar characteristics.
Accommodation quality across the island has improved noticeably since 2022 as a new cohort of guesthouse owners has invested in better mattresses, functioning air conditioning, and reliable wifi, responding to the gradual increase in digital nomad visitors who stay longer and have higher baseline expectations than short-term beach tourists.
Food and Cost of Daily Life
Siquijor is inexpensive by any Philippine standard, and Philippine standards are already low by regional comparison. A full meal at a local carinderia — the self-service rice-and-viand style restaurants that are the foundation of Filipino everyday eating — costs 80 to 150 pesos ($1.50 to $2.80 USD). Restaurant meals in San Juan aimed at tourists run 200 to 450 pesos for a main course, which is still modest by Southeast Asian tourist destination standards.
Fresh seafood is the culinary focus that makes the most sense here. Grilled fish bought at the morning market in Siquijor town and eaten with rice and vinegar dipping sauce is the meal that most represents the island’s food identity. The kinilaw — raw fish cured in vinegar and ginger in the Philippine style, similar to ceviche — made with morning-caught tuna or yellowfin from the Bohol Sea is as good as any version in the Visayas when freshly prepared.
Daily budget for a traveler self-catering breakfast, eating at carinderias for lunch, and eating at mid-range restaurants for dinner runs 600 to 1,000 pesos ($11 to $18 USD) per day excluding accommodation and activities.
Budget Breakdown: One Week on Siquijor
Return flights Cebu to Dumaguete cost 1,600 to 4,000 pesos depending on timing and booking window. Return ferry Dumaguete to Siquijor runs 400 to 600 pesos. Seven nights accommodation in a fan room in San Juan costs 2,800 to 4,900 pesos. Motorbike rental for five days runs 1,500 to 2,500 pesos. Food for seven days at the budget described above runs 4,200 to 7,000 pesos. Two-tank dive package on two separate days costs 4,000 to 5,000 pesos. Waterfall entry fees and miscellaneous across the week add approximately 500 to 800 pesos.
Total range excluding accommodation upgrades: 14,500 to 24,800 pesos, approximately $265 to $450 USD for a full week including all transport from Cebu. This represents one of the more complete island travel experiences available at this price point anywhere in Southeast Asia.
What Siquijor Is Not
It is not Boracay. It does not have the white beach infrastructure, the nightlife, or the density of international amenities that the Philippines’ most famous beach destination offers. Travelers who arrive expecting that will be disappointed by the relatively limited restaurant variety, the quietness of San Juan after 9pm, and the absence of organized water sports beyond diving and island hopping.
It is not Palawan. The landscape drama of the Bacuit Archipelago’s limestone towers and the underground river are genuinely spectacular in ways that Siquijor’s gentler topography does not match. For first-time Philippines visitors choosing between regions, Palawan answers a different question.
What Siquijor is, specifically and without qualification, is one of the few Philippine islands where the reef is recovering rather than degrading, where the tourist infrastructure is developed enough to make staying comfortable without being so developed that it has erased the texture of the place, and where the combination of waterfalls, marine environment, cultural distinctiveness, and practical accessibility by budget transport creates a week that costs less and delivers more than almost any comparable destination in the Visayas. The witch island reputation that kept it quiet for decades is, from a traveler’s perspective, an inadvertent gift that has preserved something worth arriving for.
