OH PUERTO!
Puerto Galera is a busy town on the beautiful Muelle harbour located at the northern tip of a large Filipino island called Mindoro. Surrounded by tiny islands and pristine beaches, the waters teem with marine life and coral. It is still considered one of the safest and most convenient natural harbours in the world and is often used as shelter for large oceangoing vessels in typhoons.
CHINA ARRIVES
“Surrounded by tiny islands and pristine beaches, the waters teem with marine life and coral.”
The ‘Port of Galleons’ first became popular among seafarers in the prosperous years of trading during the 10th century. Chinese records show frequent trading with the indigenous Mangyan people. The beautiful rivers cascading through the mountains were rich in gold, which the Chinese traded for delicate glazed porcelain. The islands were abundant with other bounties such as jade, coral, shells, birds, rattan and many other treasures that attracted an abundance of foreign traders.
Puerto Galera became a regular stopover for merchant vessels sailing along the important trade routes of the Near East, Indian coast, Indo-Chinese coast, China, Philippines, Sumatra, and Java.
In 1983 an Australian diver by the name of Brian Holman, discovered a 15th Century 'balanghai', a Malayan sailing vessel containing hundreds of pieces of blue and white Ming Dynasty pottery in the Manila Channel approach to the harbour. Puerto Galera became massively popular within the dive community as a result of this and after salvaging
