-hh
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(Query regarding shore diving on Cayman Brac)
The area right in front of the Divi Tiara is known as "Dick Sessenger's Bay". For the most part, there's not much here in the way of corals, as the area gets sand-swept by nature, plus they dredge it around once per decade or thereabouts. But if you're a "muck diver", you will find octopus and other "sand denizens" in the area.
For a quick dip with the mask, Hurricane Ivan messed up the old spots in the beach area, such as the old Divi dock. Over the years (2006 will be our 18th year going to the Brac), we've seen all sorts of amazing life right from the dock area even without getting in the water...tarpon, eagle ray, stingray, butter ray, barracuda, reef shark, nurse shark, bonefish, etc. Its a nice "quiet retreat" after dinner. While I'd expect that in time the new dock will once again have a large resident puffer fish, etc, I just can't say if enough recovery time has passed yet or not.
One area that has recovered fairly well is in front of the timeshares (to the right (West) of the main dock and the resort): there's the old concrete pier that remains from Charles Briggs's "Siesta" house, and its a little nursery of sea life and has some encrusting corals. It is safe enough to go in here, although watch for boat traffic.
Further down to the right (West), locals occasionally go in "swimming" near the spit where it cuts back. But if you wade in here, you'll immediately notice that there's a pretty significant current running to the west. It varies by tide level, but what this is is that all of the water that comes in over the reef from here all the way east to the Coral Isle bar (aka "Aunt Sha's") cannot go back out over the reef, so it forms this longitudinal current - - the further west you go, the stronger it gets, and it then turns south and goes out along the bottom through the inlet...this outflow is what causes the incoming waves to stack up a little bit higher in the inlet.
It actually pretty straightforward to get out to this reef...just ride the current out. The trick is in getting back in, against this current. Long story short, you won't: this is generally considered a dangerous shore dive that should only be attempted when its "mirror calm", so that way one can walk nearly anywhere across the reef for egress/ingress.
For shore diving on Cayman Brac, the general answer is that you need to have a car to get around to various spots, although some intrepid snorklers have made due with pedalling around on one of the resorts' free bicycles.
For where to go, I made up this webpage a couple of years ago. It goes over the basics, and assumes that you have good sense in reading conditions to decide if to go in or not.
There's also now a nice book that's since been published (2002). The title is "Adventuring on Cayman Brac" and its by Skip Harper. Skip has a couple of sites that I don't have and I think I have a couple he doesn't have, and we both know the local who probably most frequently uses these sites and told each of us about them. Amazon's only got one copy left in stock, so hurry
-hh
smb1014:
The area right in front of the Divi Tiara is known as "Dick Sessenger's Bay". For the most part, there's not much here in the way of corals, as the area gets sand-swept by nature, plus they dredge it around once per decade or thereabouts. But if you're a "muck diver", you will find octopus and other "sand denizens" in the area.
For a quick dip with the mask, Hurricane Ivan messed up the old spots in the beach area, such as the old Divi dock. Over the years (2006 will be our 18th year going to the Brac), we've seen all sorts of amazing life right from the dock area even without getting in the water...tarpon, eagle ray, stingray, butter ray, barracuda, reef shark, nurse shark, bonefish, etc. Its a nice "quiet retreat" after dinner. While I'd expect that in time the new dock will once again have a large resident puffer fish, etc, I just can't say if enough recovery time has passed yet or not.
One area that has recovered fairly well is in front of the timeshares (to the right (West) of the main dock and the resort): there's the old concrete pier that remains from Charles Briggs's "Siesta" house, and its a little nursery of sea life and has some encrusting corals. It is safe enough to go in here, although watch for boat traffic.
Further down to the right (West), locals occasionally go in "swimming" near the spit where it cuts back. But if you wade in here, you'll immediately notice that there's a pretty significant current running to the west. It varies by tide level, but what this is is that all of the water that comes in over the reef from here all the way east to the Coral Isle bar (aka "Aunt Sha's") cannot go back out over the reef, so it forms this longitudinal current - - the further west you go, the stronger it gets, and it then turns south and goes out along the bottom through the inlet...this outflow is what causes the incoming waves to stack up a little bit higher in the inlet.
It actually pretty straightforward to get out to this reef...just ride the current out. The trick is in getting back in, against this current. Long story short, you won't: this is generally considered a dangerous shore dive that should only be attempted when its "mirror calm", so that way one can walk nearly anywhere across the reef for egress/ingress.
For shore diving on Cayman Brac, the general answer is that you need to have a car to get around to various spots, although some intrepid snorklers have made due with pedalling around on one of the resorts' free bicycles.
For where to go, I made up this webpage a couple of years ago. It goes over the basics, and assumes that you have good sense in reading conditions to decide if to go in or not.
There's also now a nice book that's since been published (2002). The title is "Adventuring on Cayman Brac" and its by Skip Harper. Skip has a couple of sites that I don't have and I think I have a couple he doesn't have, and we both know the local who probably most frequently uses these sites and told each of us about them. Amazon's only got one copy left in stock, so hurry
-hh
