snouts is stimulated. During this state, some so-called
shark whisperers can even balance a shark, tail up, on
the palm of their hand. There are only a handful of
places in the world where divers can get close to sharks
without the use of an attractant, and shark diving brings
many tourists to the Bahamas. Shark fishing is banned
in Bahamian waters, a nationwide shark sanctuary.
One day Stuart Cove picked me up in a fast, 45-foot
rigid inflatable boat (RIB), and we cruised quickly out
of Nassau harbor past three giant cruise ships that had
docked for the day. We motored 10 miles east of New
Providence to the
Lost Blue Hole
. Beginning at about
40 feet below the surface, it is 100 feet in diameter and
drops down to more than 200 feet deep. I’m told sharks
and rays frequently swim inside the hole, but the star
of my dive this day was an unperturbed turtle that was
eating sponges on the hole’s walls.
An aerial perspective is really required to get a true
sense of the unusual geology of a blue hole; for this I
was equipped with a DJI Phantom 2 Vision+, a small
quadcopter that carries an integrated, gimbal-stabilized
camera that shoots 14-megapixel stills and 1080p HD
video. It beams back live video to a smartphone, which
you use to control the camera during flight. Sending the
Vision+ in the air a few hundred feet showed the true
nature of the blue hole — a lone indigo spot in the huge
blue-green expanse of the ocean.
ELEUTHERA
My second stop was
North Eleuthera
, a long, thin barrier
island exposed to the open Atlantic Ocean on its eastern
shore. Eleuthera is about 110 miles long, and at its thinnest
point is barely wider than the span of the road. Home to
about 10,000 residents, Eleuthera is one of the Bahamas’
main agricultural centers and is known for pineapple
farming. I boarded a water taxi for my final destination,
Harbour Island
, home to the famous Pink Sands Beach,
among the most beautiful beaches in the world.
The diving off North Eleuthera was wild.
Tarpon
Hole
is home to about a dozen large, shiny tarpon,
cruising the area like a gang in their ’hood. Strong
surge at the Blow Hole crashed against rocks, creating
turbulent clouds of air down into the water column.
I have seen surge action create similar phenomena at
Malpelo and Roca Partida in the Revillagigedo Islands.
They are reminders of the unstoppable power of the
ocean and are beautiful to witness and photograph.
That late afternoon, Boyd, a co-owner of Valentines
Dive Center, drove me to the southern point of
Harbour Island with Nora, his 6-year-old daughter.
Nora screamed in delight as our golf cart raced up
and down the small bumps that constitute the most
extreme altitude changes on the island. I wondered
what Nora would think of the steep hills we have
in San Francisco, my hometown. The south end of
the island is virtually untouched and features some
old cannons buried in the brush and sand. The raw
tropical beauty and vast beaches make this a popular
wedding and honeymoon destination.
The next morning I made a couple of dives at
Current Cut
, a narrow channel with raging currents
estimated to be 6-10 knots. The dive plan was
straightforward: Jump in, descend, ride the current
through the passage, and surface. The estimated dive
time was 10 minutes (the shortest dive plan I’ve ever
encountered), and the distance traversed was 2 miles.
We saw numerous eagle rays (none would let me get
close), and all the narrow cuts at the bottom of the
channel were full of jacks, angelfish and other fish hiding
from the current. Current Cut is a thrilling dive, best
done on an incoming tide for optimal water clarity.
Dive operators will drop divers in the water a few
times since the dive is so short. I did three more dives
that day, including dives at
Hammerhead Point
(no
hammerheads for me that day, though)
, Split Head
Reef
and the
Arimora wreck
.
At its narrowest point, Eleuthera is scarcely 100
yards wide. At that point is a bridge called the Glass
Window Bridge, striking a dramatic contrast between
the dark blue water of the Atlantic Ocean and the
bright turquoise shallows to the west. My trips to the
Bahamas in the past have been liveaboard-based shark
expeditions, so having the chance to explore two distinct
regions was a real treat, both topside and underwater.
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69
An aerial view of the famous
Glass Window Bridge, which
separates deep, dark-blue
water from the bright turquoise
of shallow, sandy water at
Harbour Island, N. Eleuthera,
Bahamas.
The silhouette of a hawksbill turtle
(Eretmochelys imbricata) forms in front
of a sun ball at Eleuthera, Bahamas.
