The Bahamas are not your ordinary, everyday tropical islands. No matter your personality or travel style, a Bahamian vacation will not leave you unfulfilled. For nature-lovers, you’ve got adorable swimming pigs and flora and fauna for miles; for beach bums, you’ve got a shoreline so stunning even Johnny Depp couldn’t resist frolicking along it; and for adrenaline junkies, there’s nothing more thrilling than hand-feeding a shark.
You can indulge in all this and a whole lot more with one visit to this Caribbean fantasy land. We understand it’s difficult to decide how to spend your time in such a perfect paradise, so we’ve brought you three suggestions you must do while in the Bahamas.
Book a Boat Tour
The Bahamas are made up of hundreds of islands and one of the best things you can do during your trip is book a boat tour. Spending the day island-hopping over tranquil sky-blue seas is not only the perfect warm-up to the Bahamas, but it’s a way to see and do the most during your trip. Book an excursion according to your preference; reef discovery on a snorkel tour, deep sea fishing on a charter or a secluded island getaway.
Perhaps the most noteworthy (and Instagram-worthy) is the three-island tour known as the Exuma Escape. On this trip, visitors are promised interaction with amazing wildlife like the endangered iguanas of Allen Cay, the friendly nurse sharks of Staniel Cay and the famous swimming pigs of Big Major’s Cay.
Dive with Sharks
The marine life beneath the Bahamian waters attracts celebrities like Rob Gronkowski and Will Smith, shark attack survivor-turned shark activist and motivational speaker Paul de Gelder, and some of the world’s most famous and talented free divers. The main draw for the rich, famous, or just the water-obsessed is the huge population of sharks – specifically tiger sharks and hammerheads. Stuart Cove in Nassau is the place to go if you’ve got a nagging adrenaline itch to scratch. This Nassau-based dive shop offers multiple shark-centric programs from shark feeding, photography and up-close and personal encounters with reef, hammerhead and tiger sharks!
Make Tracks in Lucayan National Park
Out of the three national parks in the Bahamas, Lucayan on Grand Bahama is the obvious favorite. Less than a 30-minute drive from Freeport, 40 glorious acres impress visitors with one of the world’s largest chartered underground cave systems, pristine mangroves explorable by lifted walkways, an unspoiled beach so spellbinding it was featured in The Pirate of the Caribbean and more flora and fauna than anywhere else in the country. Water babies should bring their snorkeling and scuba gear and explore the rich marine life beneath the surface while land-dwelling visitors can easily fill a day by exploring several of the accessible caves, strolling along miles of white-sand shoreline and viewing native birds and plants.
Of course, no visit to this park is complete without a visit to Gold Rock Beach where Johnny Depp pranced around as the delusional yet irresistible Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest!