St. Vincent and the Grenadines has always touted its fabulous sailing, snorkeling and day-chartering, but it is not widely known for its spectacular diving. Throughout the island chain you can snorkel through a “bat cave,” dive over geothermal vents, or take a night dive on a wreck with hundreds of lobsters. Visitors often feel so at home that they return year after year, and divers return to see rare seahorses, pipefish and frogfish.
Mainland St. Vincent offers stunning diving with dive operators at Blue Lagoon, opposite Young Island at Villa, Paradise Beach and Richmond Vale. The impressive landscape of St. Vincent continues underwater with dramatic wall dives full of black coral and azure sponges steeply shelving away to volcanic sand. St. Vincent has been a well-kept secret among divers interested in photographing our unusual marine life. The abundance and variety of rarely-seen creatures earned St. Vincent the nickname Critter Capital of the Caribbean and the island was voted as having the best Caribbean diving by Sport Diver magazine.
As spectacular as the diving is in St. Vincent, the Grenadines are not to be outdone, with easily accessible wrecks and pristine reefs full of nooks and crannies to search for lobster, cleaner shrimp and eels.
The island of Bequia has two dive shops both located on the Belmont Walkway. The close proximity of the dive sites makes diving easy and rewarding. Bequia’s leeward coastline is fringed by a sloping reef where divers may find themselves surrounded by schools of creole wrasse, blue tangs and dozens of other curious species.
Heading further south, fabulous diving and snorkeling is available in the turquoise waters around Mustique, Canouan, the Tobago Cays, Mayreau, Union, Palm and Petit St. Vincent (PSV), with dive shops in Mustique, Union and PSV.
Snorkeling within the Tobago Cays Marine Park almost guarantees you’ll find hawksbill and green turtles. You can float lazily on the surface and watch them grazing on the turtle grass while keeping an eye out for southern stingrays and eagle rays that pass by. More adventurous divers and snorkelers will head over the horseshoe reef to glimpse nurse and reef sharks or dive on the World War I gun-boat wreck, Purini, near Saline Bay, Mayreau.
St. Vincent and the Grenadines continues to promote its marine resources with an emphasis on conservation. Throughout the pandemic several dive shops used the down time to establish coral nurseries. Located in St. Vincent, Bequia, Mustique and the Southern Grenadines, the nurseries are already producing coral to be replanted and offer visiting divers opportunities to volunteer. If you would like to get involved, contact your local dive shop for more information.
