Diving in Carriacou

In 2016, when we were in Paros, we completed the PADI Open Water Diver course so that we would be able to dive when we got to a good location in the Caribbean or, indeed, anywhere else. Carriacou, we discovered, has some of the best and most unspoilt diving in the Caribbean and so we decided that it was an opportunity not to be missed. So, on Monday 29^th January, after spending the best part of the previous day mugging up on diving theory, we went diving. What a fabulous idea that was!

Nicky (left) and Mike in action   

We had signed up with one of the local dive schools for 2 dives and Mike Brooks (ex Royal Navy) took the two of us into the water whilst André manned the dive boat (and got drenched in some torrential downpours whilst we were diving).

Wreck on ‘The Whirlpool’ dive site – home to several spiny lobsters   

The first dive we did is known as ‘The Whirlpool’, a reef dive just to the southwest of Mabouya Island. After a short time over sand at the bottom to settle back into the environment, we followed the reef down into deeper water towards a wrecked fishing boat. As we approached we swam over a large area of sand, home to a colony of garden eels. These small creatures live in the sand, sticking their heads and most of their bodies out of their holes so that they look like question marks standing on the sand (they stand about 5cm high). As we approached they shrank down into their holes in a sort of inverse Mexican Wave, presumably stretching back out again when we were safely past. The wreck itself was great, with lots of fish in and around it, but the best part was peering in through a break in the stern and looking at the lobsters that live inside.

From the wreck we continued along the reef, which just seemed to get better and better. All around us were interesting hard and soft corals, thousands of reef fish of all sizes, colours and patterns, including (cue theatrical hiss) a lionfish, and we even saw a moray eel hiding in a crevice. As the dive progressed, and Mike led us back towards the dive boat, we swam through a ‘bubble garden’, where volcanic gases escape up through the sand, and across an area of turtle grass but, unfortunately, we didn’t see any turtles. Mind you, following a day of rain and with quite a lot of surge from a recent storm lifting sand off the bottom, the visibility was only about 5m so the turtles may have been out there, playing hide and seek with us, just outside our bubble of visibility.  [Ed: we actually saw a turtle briefly from the boat during our surface interval between dives].

Diving in the surge with the soft corals swaying back and forth   

‘The Whirlpool’ was great dive to get us into the swing of things and it was far better in terms of the amount of sealife we saw than anything we had ever done before but there was even better to come when we moved over to ‘The Sisters’. These 2 large rocks have reasonably strong currents flowing around and between them and so they teem with fish. We stepped off from the dive boat and swam in a figure of 8 around the pinnacles.

Again, we were treated to an amazing array of corals and fish, even more fish here than at the other dive site which we would hardly have felt was possible. It was just like swimming in an aquarium, albeit an aquarium hurtling around on the back of a fast-moving lorry as we were pushed back and forth in the surge. Our fish and coral identification is abysmal and there were so many beautiful fish in all colours and sizes that to not name them seems to imply that they weren’t there but they were, and in absolute profusion. Those that we could recognise, however, included 3 more (cue theatrical hiss) lionfish [Ed: huddled together in a crevice, clearly they know they’re bad ‘uns and should be hunted], 4 more moray eels, loads of angel fish and lots of spectacularly large azure tube coral, gently glowing ‘UV-light’ blue and looking rather like it had been unexpectedly relocated from a nightclub. And then we swam around a corner and into the movies: there, just hanging out in the blue, a little above us and silhouetted against the pale surface, was a small school of barracuda, each fish probably about 2ft long. Fabulous! But a lot of the fun of the dive, along with the oohing and aahing at the wildlife was working with the current. At times we just drifted along, watching the reef go past us and then finning back into the current to hold station when there was something we really wanted to look at, but to complete the circuit we also had to fin quite hard in places to make progress into the current. The best part was ‘the swim through’ between the 2 pinnacles, where we zipped between the rocks with the current behind us. We zig-zagged our way between huge boulders being accelerated through by the current and being pushed back and forth by the surge too. It was more like a fairground ride than a dive.

And then, sadly, we had to return to the surface where the dive boat was waiting for us and make our way back to the shore to wash the kit, grab an end-of-day beer and relive some of the sights we had seen. What a tip-top way to spend the afternoon!

Tyrrel Bay, Carriacou