Bahamas Getaway 2025

Walls, Wrecks and Warm Water!

Eight Active Divers did a “getaway” to Nassau on New Providence Island August 9 -13, 2025.  The 181-mile journey takes 25 minutes once you get in the air from Florida. That day we all had weather delays, so we spent more time sitting in airports than flying. But we all got there in time for our scheduled orientation meeting (and Happy Hour)!

It was easy to get distracted from talking about the  details of the diving we were going to be doing while sitting in the lobby bar overlooking the pool area of Breezes Bahamas, an all-inclusive resort.
	After an hour of getting to know each other and answering all the questions about diving the next day, we were ready for dinner. There were three specialty restaurants on premise and the one open that Saturday night was “Munason”, with an Asian-fusion inspired menu.
Luckily, this was the off-season, and the hotel was not crowded at all, so we were able to be seated for dinner right away. After a very good meal and a long day of travel, we were all ready to go to our rooms and get ready for the next day.

At 7:30 the next morning we met at the entrance for our pick-up from the dive shop. As I reminded everyone, we were now on island time, so our bus could be late. Surprisingly, it was close to being on time, but that was the exception, as the remaining days were on “Island Time”. On our 25-minute ride to the shop they gave us all the usual paperwork to fill out to save time at check-in. Along the way we stopped at other hotels to pick up more guests. Once at the shop, the check-in went very smoothly.

		Stuart’s Cove is a popular and busy Dive operation and very well laid out to get people and gear on the four dive boats they operate. We were on the “White Bungi”, a large twin diesel dive boat. We had plenty of room for our gear and even better, plenty of shade. Fortunately, we were on this boat for the next three days.
The boats would leave for two dives and then return to get fresh tanks. We had two morning dives the first day, two morning dives and two afternoon dives on the next day, and then we finished with two morning dives the last day for a total of eight dives on the trip. The crew would change when they came back but they were always good. The routine was that we do a wall dive for the first dive that would end coming up either to a reef or a wreck to finish. The second dive would either be a wreck or a reef and maybe a shallow wall, as well.
So, what about the diving? That’s what we came for (and maybe a little beach time) after all. As always, the visibility in the Bahamas is excellent with that deep blue Caribbean color and it’s something I always look forward to. The water was a pleasant 86 degrees on every dive. Our first dive was on Pumpkin Patch Wall where we dropped to forty feet and went over the wall into a mild current.
We swam against the current and then popped up over the wall and returned to the boat with the current while seeing our first of many Gray Caribbean Reef Sharks.
			Sharks were on virtually every dive we did, sometimes close and sometimes in the distance, but always there! In general, the visibility was 60 to 100 feet.

The second dive was on the Wilaurie wreck, built in the Netherlands in 1966 and used for mail delivery until 1988, when it sank in heavy seas.  The next morning, we started our day with the Palace Wall followed by the James Bond site. Seven Bond movies were filmed in Nassau including Thunderball with the famous scene of Bond eluding three enemy frogmen by ducking into a sunken ship and emerging through a hole in the hull before a grenade explodes. Our divemaster guided us to follow that famous path in Thunderball through the hull and we all evaded the enemy frogmen!
That afternoon we dove on Heineken wall (across from the brewery) with some of the strongest down currents I have ever experienced. All of us were happy when that dive ended as it seemed we were diving into the current on the outbound and return trip.
We followed that with a dive on the David Tucker, a PT boat sunk in remembrance of a sailor lost in combat with Cuba. When we first got in, we saw some rays in the distance but as we all descended it became clear that there were twelve large spotted eagle rays swimming in unison, looking like a squadron of airborne rays. When I returned home, I looked up what that is officially called and what we observed was a “Fever” of rays. This was the first time in over 33 years of diving that I have ever seen anything like this!

The next morning, we dove Sand Chute Wall, which was a beautiful, deep wall followed by a reef. To finish off the morning we dove on the Long Island Lady which is a wreck surrounded by parts of a DC-3 intentionally sank for the movie “Into the Deep” with Jessica Alba. Wow! Eight great dives, pleasant weather, great accommodations with food and drinks included, all for less than 4 nights in the Keys. Will there be a repeat of this trip?? Don’t be surprised if you see another Bahamas Getaway like this in the future!

Dan and Daryl