A towering 'stairway' waterfall in eastern Mindanao where the Cateel River tumbles down a long series of cascades — often described as a natural staircase of dozens of tiers dropping through rainforest.
A small volcanic island off Negros ringed by one of the world's most celebrated community-run marine sanctuaries — famous for resident green sea turtles grazing over coral just off the beach.
The largest contiguous coral reef in the Philippines and the second-largest in the world — an isolated 34-square-kilometre atoll of coral, lagoon, and mangrove in the Mindoro Strait, teeming with sharks, turtles, and rays.
A remote cluster of islands off Palawan's southern tip, ringed by blindingly white and faintly pink sandbars, clear shallow lagoons, and some of the last dugong (sea cow) habitat in the country.
A tiny coral island off Bohol ringed by a protected marine sanctuary famous for its dramatic reef wall, resident sea turtles, and swirling schools of jackfish — one of the country's premier diving and snorkelling sites.
Two thousand years of hand-built rice terraces climbing the Cordillera mountainsides — a living landscape of stone-and-mud paddies, fed by an intricate forest-and-irrigation system, often called the 'Eighth Wonder of the World'.
The country's northernmost islands — rolling emerald hills that meet the sea in dramatic cliffs, stone villages built to withstand typhoons, and a windswept beauty utterly unlike the tropical lowlands.
Massive sandstone rock formations on a remote island where the Pacific Ocean meets the ferocious San Bernardino Strait — sculpted over millennia into cliffs, arches, and tidal pools battered by giant waves.
A vast limestone cave of seven great chambers lit by natural skylights — and the site where the ancient human species Homo luzonensis was discovered, deep in the karst of the Cagayan Valley.
A small volcanic island 'born of fire and water' — home to more volcanoes per square kilometre than anywhere in the country, ringed by hot and cold springs, waterfalls, and the bare white sandbar of White Island offshore.
More than 1,200 near-symmetrical grass-covered mounds spread across the interior of Bohol, turning chocolate-brown each dry season — a karst landscape unlike anywhere else on Earth.
A quiet Bicol town whose plankton-rich bay draws seasonal gatherings of whale sharks — the world's largest fish — met on a strictly regulated, community-run, swim-alongside basis that pioneered ethical encounters in the Philippines.
A bay scattered with dozens of jagged limestone islands, hidden lagoons reached through narrow rock gaps, white beaches, and clear turquoise water — one of the most spectacular karst seascapes in the world.
One of the few pink-sand beaches in the world — a protected island off Zamboanga City whose blush-coloured shore comes from crushed red organ-pipe coral, backed by a mangrove lagoon.
A short, astonishingly deep spring-fed river of sapphire and jade water that surfaces from an underground karst system and flows straight to the sea — its clarity and colour the product of geology, not legend.
A scatter of 124 small, mushroom-shaped limestone islands in the Lingayen Gulf — ancient coral reef, uplifted and undercut by the sea into rounded green-capped islets you can hop between by boat.
A slender, uninhabited coral island in the Camotes Sea famous for its long, curving white sandbar that trails off both ends into clear turquoise shallows — a near-perfect desert island.
A tiered waterfall in southern Cebu whose pools glow an almost unreal turquoise — the colour a gift of the limestone the spring-fed river runs through on its way to the sea.
Often called the cleanest lake in the Philippines — a jewel-clear brackish lake cradled by limestone cliffs on Coron Island, reached by a short climb over a saddle with one of the country's most photographed viewpoints.
A serene highland lake wreathed in morning mist, feeding a chain of seven waterfalls through the mountains — the ancestral home of the T'boli people and one of Mindanao's most soulful landscapes.
A powerful twin waterfall on the Agus River — nearly 100 metres of thundering white water that both dazzles visitors and drives a hydroelectric plant powering much of Mindanao.
A dramatic limestone karst landscape barely 90 minutes from Manila, reborn as a conservation project — jagged rock formations, rope courses, and hanging viewpoints woven through a rainforest being restored tree by tree.
The Philippines' most active volcano and, by many accounts, the most perfectly symmetrical cone on Earth — a 2,463-metre stratovolcano that dominates the Bicol skyline and, as of mid-2026, is in active eruption.
The highest mountain in the Philippines at 2,954 metres — a potentially active volcano whose slopes hold sulfur vents, a summit boulder field, crater lakes, and one of the country's most important refuges for the Philippine eagle.
A jagged, saw-toothed peak crowning Sibuyan — an island so ecologically intact it's called the 'Galápagos of Asia' — offering one of the most technical and rewarding climbs in the Philippines.
A UNESCO World Heritage wildlife sanctuary famous for its eerie 'pygmy forest' of century-old bonsai-sized trees growing on mineral-rich soil — a hotspot of endemic species, from pitcher plants to the Philippine eagle.
Negros Island, Central Visayas / Negros Island Region
The highest peak in the central Philippines and one of the country's most active volcanoes — a forested stratovolcano crowning Negros, ringed by a national park rich in endemic wildlife.
The volcano behind the second-largest eruption of the 20th century now cradles a serene turquoise crater lake — reached by a 4x4 ride across ash-grey lahar canyons and a short hike to the rim.
Luzon's highest peak at 2,922 metres, famous for its dawn 'sea of clouds' — a rolling white ocean seen from a summit of dwarf bamboo grassland high in the Cordillera.
One of Luzon's most famous waterfalls, reached by a thrilling paddled canoe journey up a gorge of jungle cliffs and rapids — where skilled boatmen 'shoot the rapids' back downstream.
A wild, protected island off the northeastern tip of Luzon — rolling green headlands, empty beaches, and a Spanish-era lighthouse on the dramatic Cape Engaño cliffs above the meeting of two seas.
One of the world's longest navigable underground rivers, winding 8.2 km through a vast limestone cave system beneath a karst mountain range before emptying directly into the West Philippine Sea.
A tear-drop island of surf, palm forest, and mangrove — home to the famous Cloud 9 reef break, the glassy Sugba Lagoon, tidal rock pools, and one of the largest mangrove reserves in the country.
Bucas Grande, Surigao del Norte, Mindanao, Philippines
A hidden lagoon system on Bucas Grande Island, entered through a sea cave passable only at low tide, sheltering stingless jellyfish, karst-walled coves, and cliffs you can leap from into deep clear water.
A volcano within a lake within a volcano — one of the world's smallest and most active volcanoes, sitting on an island inside a crater lake that fills a far larger ancient caldera, just south of Manila.
A broad, multi-tiered curtain of water often called the 'Niagara of the Philippines' — up to 95 metres wide, spilling in white sheets through the rainforest of eastern Mindanao, frequently crowned by a midday rainbow.
A pristine, remote atoll system in the middle of the Sulu Sea — nearly 100,000 hectares of coral reef, sheer walls, and open ocean that rank among the healthiest marine ecosystems on the planet.
