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Tropical nature in the raw
WELCOME BAHAMAS - NASSAU, CABLE BEACH & PARADISE ISLAND - 2004
Tropical nature in the raw
Bahamas wilderness is closer than you think
Although The Bahamas welcomes more than four million tourists every year, most of them visit New Providence (Nassau and Paradise Island) or Grand Bahama (Freeport) and increasingly now, Abaco. But most do not get a chance to experience the ?real? Bahamas, which is really a vast sub-tropical wilderness.
Fewer than 305,000 Bahamians, two-thirds of whom live in Nassau, are scattered over 16 major islands, ranging from about 47,000 in Grand Bahama to less than 75 in the Ragged Island range. Many of the 700 major islands and most of thousands of smaller cays and islets are uninhabited.
One hundred thousand square miles of pristine ocean ? an area larger than Spain ? surrounds the archipelago; the land, and especially the sea, being home to an incredible diversity of wildlife.
On land, these include stately pink flamingos, the national bird. These strangely elegant creatures were once headed for extinction but between 50,000 and 80,000 West Indian flamingos are now protected in a large national park on the most southerly island, Great Inagua ? far off the beaten path.
Another endangered animal is the hutia, once thought to be extinct but rediscovered living on Plana Cay where it is now thriving. It has also been relocated to two cays in The Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park. Still another rare beast is the prehistoric- looking Bahamian rock iguana, now living on a few cays in the Exuma chain. The endangered ground-nesting Bahama parrot, once threatened by raccoons and feral cats, is now protected in a national park on mighty Andros, The Bahamas? largest island.
Another part of the wild kingdom in The Bahamas includes colonies of once domesticated animals ? including pigs, donkeys, goats and cats ? abandoned by early settlers. On Abaco, there?s a herd of wild horses, thought by some to be the descendants of animals brought to the New World by Christopher Columbus on his second voyage in 1493.
The real glory of the Bahamian wilderness, however, lies under the nation?s breathtakingly clear waters; organisms ranging in size from tiny coral polyps to visiting whales.
According to the 2004 Bahamas Handbook, there are ?some 900 sq miles of reef in The Bahamas, including the third-longest barrier reef in the world off the east coast of Andros. The reefs are rich with a diversity of marine life including green moray eels, cinnamon clownfish, queen angelfish, barracudas, the Nassau grouper, the placid nurse shark and inflatable porcupine fish.?
Mailboats & fast ferries
If you truly want to experience the Bahamian wilderness there is air service to many islands and local guides can be hired to show you around. There are also eco-tourism and fishing camps on remote islands in the Bahamian hinterland ? some basic, some luxurious.
One way or another, a boat of some sort will be required to take you to many of the wilderness sites, including, of course, the ones that lie under water. An inexpensive way to get to other islands is by Bahamian mailboat.
Mailboats dock at Potter?s Cay, under the exit bridge from Paradise Island and make scheduled trips to the Out Islands every week. The boats, subsidized by the government as mail carriers, also take on freight and passengers. While travel times vary from a few hours to a couple of days, you are guaranteed an interesting perspective, true cultural immersion and close contact with the ?wild? Bahamas en route to your destination.
One of the shorter trips is to lovely Eleuthera, a narrow, 100-mile-long island about 40 miles to the east of New Providence at its closest point.
First settled in 1649, Eleuthera has many attractions, rolling hillsides, steep cliffs and stunning beaches. Among many places to visit is the Glass Window Bridge, where you can see the open Atlantic on one side of the island and the more tranquil waters of the Bight of Eleuthera to the west. Nearby Harbour Island features a spectacular pink sand beach.
A fine way to get there is aboard the Bahamas Ferries catamaran Bo Hengy ? an air-conditioned high-speed passenger vessel ? which easily navigates the tricky Devil?s Backbone reefs, dropping you off at Harbour Island in about an hour and 40 minutes, including a short stop at Spanish Wells, a prosperous fishing village.
You can see a lot of the natural Bahamas on Bahamas Ferries day-away packages, which include lunch, walking tours, and use of a cabana on Harbour Island?s famous pink beach. Bahamas Ferries also offers a Saturday day-away to Andros, including a tour of the historic settlement of Fresh Creek, with nature tours available upon request.
Nearby tropical paradise
A superb place to witness the Bahamian wilderness is the Exuma Cays, a chain of islands that curves northward from the main island of Exuma, just about dead centre in The Bahamas.
Says the Yachtsman?s Guide to The Bahamas: ?Almost all (the cays) have beautiful beaches? The water is crystal clear and the vivid colours, on a normal bright day with a moderate trade wind ruffling the surface, cannot be adequately described, You will have to see for yourself.?
Now you can, even if you are not sailing a yacht through these islands. Powerboat Adventures was the first company to provide daily excursions to the Exumas from Nassau. Over the past 15 years, Powerboat Adventures has evolved into an award-winning day trip, favoured by many local Bahamians as well as visitors.
At 9am, sleek Miami Vice-style boats, powered by four 250 hp outboards, ease out into Nassau Harbour from the company?s headquarters on East Bay Street, opposite the Harbour Bay Shopping Centre.
Less than an hour later, you?ll be stopping at Allan?s Cay to visit with a colony of about 100 iguanas, lookinglike miniature dinosaurs (some are two feet long), dragging their long tails in the sand as they scurry out of the bushes for snacks of fruit. It?s fun to feed them but be careful! Iguanas have notoriously poor eyesight and might mistake your finger for a grape.
Next stop is Ship Channel Cay where you?ll spend the rest of the day. The cay is a private island two miles long and half a mile wide, with spectacular views in all directions. The sand is powdery white, the water is gin clear in the shallows and every shade of green and blue further out. This is the true, true Bahamas.
There are many activities: feeding stingrays, watching the staff feed hungry sharks, drift snorkelling with the tide over a superb shallow reef, nature hiking or, if that?s your preference, soaking up the rays on the beach. There?s a delicious lunch, an all-day free bar, showers, gazebos and shaded decks and a converted fishing cottage to find relief from the blazing sun.
Late in the afternoon, it?s time to head back to Nassau: another exciting trip across the shallow waters of the Great Bahama Bank.
Nearby wilderness areas
While most visitors will not have a chance to visit the far-flung areas of The Bahamas, they can still catch amazing glimpses of the wildlife while visiting Nassau. Two obvious places to begin are the aquariums at the Atlantis complex on Paradise Island and, for land animals, (flamingos, Bahama parrots, rock iguanas from San Salvador and the Bahamian boa constrictor, among others) visit the charming Ardastra Gardens, Zoo and Conservation Centre, Chippingham Road, not far off West Bay Street near Arawak Cay.
Another place to experience Bahamian flora is The Retreat, an 11-acre preserve that features a large collection of exotic palm trees. You can take a self-guided tour of the property with a map or ask for a guided tour for groups, by appointment. The Retreat is headquarters for the Bahamas National Trust (BNT), which overseas The Bahamas? growing system of national parks.
If birds are your thing, get in touch with the BNT Ornithology Group which meets at 7am the first Saturday of each month, except during mid-summer. Call coordinator Carolyn Wardle at 362-1574.
Entrepreneurial spirit
Thanks to the entrepreneurial spirit, visitors can make an even closer encounter with tropical nature, even if you have only a few hours to spare. Many dive and excursion companies will take you to nearby places that are as wild as you would want.
These places are not far from the hustle and bustle of downtown Nassau and the busy Cable Beach strip ? and just a short boat ride away from the manicured precision of Paradise Island. They?re dazzling and they?ll stay in your memory for a long, long time.
One of them is Sea Gardens Marine Park, which lies under 10 to 20 ft of water just off tiny Athol Island. Athol was once a quarantine station for incoming ships, protecting New Providence from outbreaks of yellow fever, cholera and smallpox. It?s now the site of a proposed links-type golf course to be built by Kerzner International, owners of the Atlantis complex.
Local dive companies say most nearby reefs have suffered damage owing to too much dive traffic and runoff from the island, but the protected Sea Gardens are an exception. ?There?s a lot to see there,? says Tony Lowe of Bahama Divers. ?It?s excellent for snorkellers and first-time divers, but not especially for experienced divers, who want to go deeper.?
You?ll see tons of tropical fish, says Lowe, including yellowtails, pale blue with yellow stripes, vivid blue tangs, silver and red grunts, as well as triggerfish and angelfish that display a rainbow of colours. If you don?t have an underwater camera for this trip, pick up a disposable one, for $20 or $25 in most dive shops.
If you?re not up to snorkelling you can still appreciate the Sea Gardens from a glass-bottomed or semi-submersible boat. To book a trip, check out the listings in What-to-do magazine, available free almost everywhere, or contact the tour service desk at your hotel. Take along your camera but use film rated at 400 to 1000 ASA for shooting through the portals.
Sea Gardens is close but there are plenty of other reefs and coral heads a little farther out, still within easy reach of New Providence and Paradise Island. Stuart Cove?s Dive Bahamas has a boat dedicated exclusively to snorkelling, with all the equipment you will need (a mask, snorkel, fins and flotation vest). You can choose a spectacular reef, a shipwreck or take part in an exciting shark-feeding trip, watching up to 20 Caribbean reef sharks feeding on bait placed on the ocean floor.
Nassau Scuba Centre has more than 30 diving and snorkelling sites on its itinerary, including outlying sites where you can snorkel reefs, wrecks and abandoned movie locations. To contact the dive companies, refer to the See & do section, starting on pg 142.
One thing the dive masters will impress upon you when diving or snorkelling is to ?look but don?t touch.? Although coral looks like sturdy coloured rock, it is actually millions of tiny organisms inside limestone shells. A thin layer of tissue, or mucus, covering the coral protects the organisms from disease and it can be wiped away with the lightest touch.
Rose Island snorkelling
Less than two miles to the northeast of Athol is Rose Island. Almost nine miles long but only a few hundred yards wide, Rose Island has vacation cottages but is partly wild too, particularly on the rugged southern shore. There are several reefs just off the powdery beaches that dot the northern shoreline and they are all in excellent shape. These beaches and coral beds draw hundreds of visitors every day.
A great way to get there is aboard a sailing catamaran, which can reach nine knots in a good breeze. One of these is the 57-ft Flying Cloud, under the sure command of ?Captain Craig,? who has been hosting swim and snorkelling trips to Rose Island for many years, all necessary equipment provided free.
Flying Cloud Catamaran Cruises offers half-day sailing, snorkelling and beach trips to Rose Island Monday to Saturday, and a full-day cruise on Sunday, which includes snorkelling, sunbathing on a private beach, and lunching on barbequed ribs and chicken, along with peas ?n rice, with fresh fruit and rum punch. The Flying Cloud leaves the Paradise Island Ferry Terminal for a 31?2-hr cruise at 9am and 2pm every day except Sunday, when it leaves on a five-hr cruise at 10am.
If you prefer a motor to sail, try the Fiesta II, operated by Sea Island Adventures, which leaves Nassau Yacht Haven at 10am every day except Monday for a ?full-day getaway.?
Once on Rose Island, you can swim, play beach games, explore or just relax on a beautiful private beach. Free snorkelling equipment, paddle boats and kayaks are available. All this builds up a big appetite, which you can assuage with a tropical barbecue buffet, along with salads and white wine or fruit punch. There?s a cash bar on Fiesta II, along with a gift and souvenir shop. If you?re a history buff as well as a wilderness lover, this company also offers a Historical Bahamas Cruise, an accurate, colourful account of Bahamian history as you cruise through Nassau Harbour.
Swimming with dolphins
Salt Cay, more popularly known as Blue Lagoon Island, is due north of of the eastern end of Paradise island and it?s the place where you can swim and play with one of Nassau?s premier wildlife attractions ? Atlantic bottlenose dolphins.
Dolphin Encounters is a family-run enterprise located at the eastern end of the cay. The company conducts two programmes: Swim with Dolphins and the Close Encounter, both preceded by an information-packed briefing. You?ll learn a lot about these sleek, friendly mammals. For example, did you know that a dolphin?s brain is, on average, bigger than a human?s?
In the Close Encounter, visitors stand on a waist deep platform within the spacious habitat, while dolphins glide in to be petted and fed. The Swim with Dolphins programme is more intense; a maximum of 10 swimmers actually get in the water with two dolphins. Two interactions you will have to experience to believe; the ?human hurdle? and the ?foot push,? where ? nose to foot ? a dolphin pushes a swimmer through the water at high speed
Either of these programmes takes about three hours, including 20-minute ferry rides to and from Blue Lagoon Island from the terminal on Paradise Island. It was ?definitely the highlight of my trip,? said Alexis from Vancouver, British Columbia, echoing the sentiments of many who sign the guest book.
Fast boat to paradise
Forty miles from Nassau is a little cay with seven flawless beaches, a stunning sandbar and a nearby reef with myriads of colourful fish. This is Saddleback Cay, so called because of two prominent hills and a ?saddle? formation between them.
Saddleback, also known as Little Norman?s Cay, is virtually uninhabited. No one lives there permanently, although there is a Spartan, seldom-used fishing camp on one of the hills, with a spectacular 360-degree view of the surrounding area.
At one time, only yachties and fishermen landed on this private island. Today, even landlubbers can visit Saddleback, thanks to Island World Adventures, a full-day excursion firm that can whisk you out to the island on one of two 32-passenger, custom-designed, high-speed boats.
Once clear of Nassau Harbour, past the opulent homes of the rich and famous on the left, the captain throttles up for a high-speed run across the Great Bahama Bank; you can clearly see the bottom all the way. Have a camera ready because wild dolphins are frequently spotted in these waters. When they are, the captain will slow down for a closer look.
At the end of the trip, you?ll speed past a postcard-pretty beach and debark on a wooden dock. From that point on, a day in the Bahamian wilderness is yours. A hostess will welcome you with a light snack and an open bar. Later on there?s a delicious Bahamian buffet lunch with seafood and chicken which you can eat al fresco on secluded dining platforms overlooking the incomparable Bahamian sea. Keep all the scraps; there?s a platform from which you can toss them to an interesting accumulation of Bahamian fish: houndfish with their weirdly shaped needle noses and a couple of sleek lemon sharks, sometimes trailing parasitical remoras, attached to the sharks by a sucker apparatus on the top of their heads.
You can even feed a stingray (it feels like the fish is gently vacuuming the food from your hand) on Half Moon Beach, a crescent of white powdery sand lapped by turquoise water.
You can spend the day sunbathing and swimming if you like but there are plenty of other things to do ? including a nature walk around the island, visiting a shallow sandbar where you can search for shells and a built-in snorkelling session for those who like it, all equipment and instruction provided free.
On the way back to Nassau, you?ll stop off at Leaf Cay one of only a few islands that still support Bahamian iguanas, some of them two feet long. They love grapes and other fruit, and will stand up on their hind legs to get it, presenting fine photographic opportunities.
A little over an hour later, at 5pm, you?ll be back to civilization on Paradise Island, with lifetime memories of tropical nature in the raw.
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