Andros Island, The Bahamas
In April/May 1997, I (Ferry) had to go to Florida and The Bahamas on business. Unfortunately, it was not possible for me to take a long time off, but I did have a week and a half of free time in the Bahamas. Mirjam and Emmy joined me there and after a while on New Providence, we went to Small Hope Bay Lodge on Andros Island. Here I did six dives, and Mirjam took a resort course and did a shallow dive after that as well, so she's turning in to a diver too!
Wreck (Marian) on Andros Island
When comparing the diving on Andros to that of the Great Barrier Reef, the most striking difference is the number of fish. On Andros, the reef itself looks very healthy, but it doesn't appear to attract a lot of fish. On the GBR, there were lots and lots of 'common' tropical fish, like parrotfish, butterfly fish, triggerfish etc., on Andros, we had to look for them. But all in all, I had a lot of fun diving Andros, the visibility was very good, temperature of the water nice, and the scenery beautiful. Small Hope is famous for it's 'over the wall' dive, which goes to a depth of 185 feet, but I didn't dive it, so I can't judge how nice it is.
Me on a shallow dive on Andros Island
The two dives I liked most were Diana's Dungeons and The Marion. Diana's Dungeons is a pretty deep dive at 27 meters, with three big swim-throughs/caverns/dungeons. The scenery is absolutely smashing, and it was nice for me because it was my deepest dive by far, and also my first dive with swimthrough-dungeons. The Marion is a small wreck, consisting of a barge, a crane, and a tractor. They lie scattered on the bottom at some 18 meters depth. The wreck has attracted a lot of different corals, sponges etc. You can swim inside the barge, and there are a lot of bigger fish (grouper etc) inside.
Grouper guarding the Marion
On my dive at the Marion, I saw some beautiful big groupers, a spotted moray eel, drumfish, and a scorpionfish, which was really cool, and kind of hard to spot.
A 'friendly' welcome by a native fish
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