Living There
Scuba diving in the Cayman Islands is one of the most popular tourism activities on this small island. The Cayman Islands offer ideal diving conditions for new and experienced divers a like. With warm water, incredible visibility, low currents, and outstanding marine and reef like this group of small islands truly is a divers paradise. There are three main islands in the Cayman Island group. Grand Cayman, Little Cayman, and Cayman Brac. Grand Cayman is the biggest of the three, is home to an international airport, and receives the bulk of the tourism in the area.
Grand Cayman is also home to some of the best wreck diving you will ever encounter. There are multiple dive sites around Grand Cayman that have been purposely created by the sinking of decommissioned ships. The USS Kittiwake is a huge navy ship which was decommissioned and sunk in January of 2011. It has quickly become one of the must-do dives of Cayman Islands as it has 5 open decks which make it great for wreck divers. It also has already begun to support a coral structure and has been inhabited by a variety of different marine life.
Another dive site that is an absolute must is one that has been featured on travel shows and nature documentaries for years. Stingray City began as a location where local fishermen would clean their days catch and discard of the waste. This fish waste attracted massive amounts of stingrays which became very accustomed to humans being in close proximity. The Caymans quickly figured out that this would be a profitable tourism practice and quickly started offering snorkeling and diving trips to the area. The site has been named the best 12 foot dive on earth and is a perfectly safe place for you to interact with these graceful stingrays. There is also a sandbar not far from the site where families often go on weekends and wade around with the host stingrays.
It wouldn’t be a complete trip to the Caymans without diving on the Cayman wall. The Caymans has one of the deepest trenches in the world around its exterior plunging vertically to around 6000 feet. It is a truly awe inspiring site to look down into the abyss of water below as blue turns to black. Silhouettes of fish swimming below you are a tease as you reach your depth limit far before the marine life that lines these walls. You will find all kinds of colorful coral and sponges on the wall with plenty of fish to go along with them. Eagle rays, sharks, and the occasional manta can sometimes be spotted swimming along the wall.
For more information on diving in the Cayman Islands, check out the newest dive shop to the area, White Sand Divers.
