The Experience of a Lifetime, Diving in the Caribbean

With the astounding variety and myriad of Marine life and intriguing breaks and the addition of crystal-clear waters it is no surprise that diving in the Caribbean is an experience to be savoured.

It is said that you never ever forget the moment when you first put on your diving gear to prepare for your very first full dive in ocean waters. Perhaps the apprehension has something to do with the fact that you are possibly aware of what you might meet in the shadowy depths below. That having been said perhaps a tinge of apprehension mixed with a slight dose of fear is no bad thing in these circumstances.

The particular area of the Caribbean that we are looking at in this article concerns the coast around the Cayman Islands and Jamaica.

Between them, Grand Cayman and the smaller islands of Little Cayman and Cayman Brac provide more than 150 shallow dives, wall dives and wreck dives for divers to choose from. Enough to keep the average holiday diver more than busy.

Grand Cayman is noted for its wall dives and these come in all shapes and sizes ranging from gentle slopes to fearsome almost precipice like drops that plunge more than 1200 ft into the depths of the ocean below. Cayman Brac has shallow reefs that go on for miles but possibly the highlight of diving off Cayman Brac is the aptly titled Bloody Bay Wall which plunges more than 1200 feet into the oceans depths. Divers refer to the wall in almost reverent terms and it is easy to know why.

What is quite interesting with regards to the whole diving experience of the Cayman Islands is the fact that the government and the authorities have gone to such great lengths to provide such an all round experience. These events include buying old and scrap boats (and by boats I mean small ships) to actually sink and help provide diving locations. Such is the nature of the sea that these locations have become colonized by Aquatic flora and fauna and are quite remarkable in themselves.

The whole diving scene in the Cayman Islands is so well-organized that there is a minimum amount of time wasted getting from one first-class dive to another. Indeed most of them are probably not more than 10 to 15 minutes travel from whichever hotel you happen to be staying at. It is because of this that the Cayman Islands have become world-famous for its diving which in the last 20 years they have developed into a fully fledged tourism destination. They would appear to have everything, fantastic beaches, excellent accommodation with all that you would expect in terms off additional features such as tennis, golf etc and of course water sports.

Taking this all into consideration and in addition to the world-class facilities available this is still a destination when the main sites still are actually underwater.