Scuba Diving, Palau

Most of us scuba dive for the chance to go eyeball-to-eyeball with large sea turtles, sharks, manta rays, eels, and all those kaleidoscopic fish and coral. Then there are others like the two Mainers I came across last week who scuba dive as part of their work. Diver Ed, on the outskirts of Acadia National Park, spends the winter doing 8 dives a day hunting for scallops. In the summer, he acts as a naturalist taking families on boat rides off the Bar Harbor coast to find starfish, sea cucumbers, Jonah crabs, and, of course, lobster. He dives to depths of 40 feet to find these critters lurking on the shelf of the sea. Guests aboard his boat get a close up look at the sealife from the large HD camera Diver Ed brings down with him, with images projected back to the boat. He even has a microphone that can be used underwater so he can talk while filming. Richard Carney of Brunswick, Maine, dives during the summer to collect sea glass. He then comes back to terra firma to create glass lamps using the sea glass he found. Read the recent story on Carney in the Portland Press Herald.
 

Palau is one of those locales, like Fiji and the Red Sea, discussed only in clandestine conversations between avid scuba divers. To reach it, you have to travel five hours from the West Coast to Hawaii, another seven hours to Guam and yet another 90 minutes to this cluster of 200 sparsely populated islands, which Jacques Cousteau called the best scuba diving site in the world.  From your home base on the capital isle of Koror, head to the Big Drop-Off, considered the best wall dive on Earth. It starts in knee-deep water and then abruptly plummets almost 1,500 feet into an abyss. Nearly as mind-boggling is Blue Corner, a large coral cavity where three ocean currents meet. Hunker down and watch schools of tuna, white-tip sharks and 3-foot-tall giant clams (where’s the melted butter when you need it?)

Those white-tip sharks are protected, along with hammerheads, leopard sharks, and more than 130 other species fighting extinction in the Pacific Ocean now that Palau has created the world’s first shark sanctuary. The country has banned shark fishing on 237,000 square miles of ocean, so divers can expect more up close views of those pearly whites.
 

As the leaves start to fall on the trees in my backyard in Boston, my mind turns to the winter sports of skiing and warm weather locales of the Caribbean, South Pacific, Central America, South Africa, and Australia. To get you excited, I’m going to devote this week to my Top 5 Adventures in the Caribbean. Most people think of the Caribbean as that ultimate warm weather escape.  Find a spit of sand, get your daily dose of sunshine, and then cool off in the turquoise waters.  Yet, there’s another Caribbean that attracts more active travelers who are not content whisking away their hours on the beach.  They come to hike and mountain bike in the tallest mountains east of the Mississippi in the Dominican Republic, to dive with an assortment of fish in Bonaire that could rival any aquarium in the world, to try their luck bonefishing in the waters off Eleuthera, Bahamas.

A mere decade ago, Bonaire was known only to scuba enthusiasts—a clandestine gem discussed in hushed conversations with other serious ocean lovers (types who come out of the water with seaweed in their hair).  Now that the secret is out, travelers are learning that nature thrives here both above and below the water. The reef’s proximity to shore is ideal for divers and snorkelers who want to swim with blue and yellow queen angelfish and orange trumpetfish in waters with visibility of 100 feet or more. Bonaire’s semi-arid landscape is home to some 200 types of birds, including one of the world’s largest colonies of pink flamingoes (numbering some 15,000). Overlooking one of the island’s loveliest beaches is the Harbour Village Beach Resort. Heinekens and gouda are the sustenance of choice on this Dutch colony, but if you prefer gourmet, go with the resort’s La Balandra Bar and Grill. 
 

Drive down U.S. Highway 1 from Miami to Key Largo and you’ll quickly be devoured by tacky gift shops, which soon give way to somewhat less tacky dive shops. Thankfully, there are more than enough sites to accommodate all these grouper groupies with some two dozen dive sites situated on the famed Molasses Reef alone. Molasses oozes with coral heads and every Caribbean fish imaginable. Afterwards, check into the Upper Keys most fashionable retreat, Cheeca Lodge, located on the laid-back island of Islamorada. Cheeca will reopen in a new four-story main lodge next week, almost a year after a New Year’s Eve bash burned down the structure. This 27-acre (intensely landscaped) ocean playground offer guests every type of water activity imaginable, including fishing for the 10- to 14-pound bonefish. Cheeca’s boats make half-day runs out to the Florida Bay flats where you have a good chance of hooking one of these elusive critters.
 

I first dove off Taveuni, Fiji, on the way to the Great Barrier Reef after recently being certified in the Cook Islands. It would end up being far more memorable than any of my dives on the Great Barrier Reef. It’s not just the multi-colored coral they dub the Rainbow Reef or the myriad of neon-colored fish that provide divers with a kaleidoscopic view of the sea. No, it’s the big boys like white-tip sharks, sea turtles, and manta rays that make you feel like Jacques Cousteau. No wonder Jacques’ son, Jean-Michel, has his own resort in nearby Savusavu. He’s no fool.
 

On terra firma, Grand Turk is a sleepy former British outpost, where you stroll past the Victorian homes on Front Street in a matter of minutes. Underwater, Grand Turk is home to the Wall, where without warning the reef plummets to a mind-boggling 7,000 feet to mark the edge of the Turks Island Passage. On the rim of this great blue abyss, it’s not uncommon to see humpback whales migrating in winter, hawksbill and loggerhead turtles swimming gracefully and unafraid, and herds of spotted eagle rays, with wing spans upward of eight feet, their thick black tails churning behind. Better yet, the dive sites are all less than a five-minute boat ride away on the leeward side of the island. Here, the reef is protected by strong winds and current, allowing divers of all abilities to access one of the most pristine locales in the Atlantic. Try the Tunnels, where you hit the reef at a depth of 65 feet, go through a tight chute and get your first glimpse of the Wall’s dramatic plunge.