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Blue Hole Diving at Small Hope Bay Lodge - Andros Island Bahamas Seven Different Blue Hole Dives Offered At Small Hope Bay Lodge Small Hope Bay Lodge added a new Inland Blue Hole to its dive options bringing it's total number to seven Blue Holes now offered in its custom-tailored Specialty Dive Programs. The island has fifty-nine (59) known blue holes. "When people ask, "what's new", they expect you to say you've renovated your rooms or something. Well, we've put our efforts elsewhere. We've gone diving!," says Jeff Birch, Manager of Small Hope Bay Lodge. "We are offering to scuba divers what helio-skiing offers to skiers," says Jeff. "We are going to the places no one else goes -- or in some cases even knows about. We can boast that more men have walked on the moon than have been on some of our dive sites." "Of course, on an uninhabited island like Andros, it's not very hard to do," he adds. "And we've put together a great new dive." This new option is the Stargate Blue Hole located in South Andros. Stargate is known as the primary site for the 1987 International Blue Holes project, directed by British cave diver Rob Palmer. Stargate is a spectacular Blue Hole both above and below the surface. The entrance is hidden inside a grotto; surrounded by tropical scrub trees. The entrance to the water is a 12-foot drop, once inside, stalactites are found hanging from the ceiling. Once in the Blue Hole, divers descend down to 80 feet, through sulfur layers where the line splits to run north and south. This tour swims north, passing large stalactite and flow stone formations. Maximum depth is 120 feet. Here is a partial list of Blue Holes and other custom-tailored speciality dives:
Blue Hole-Level II:
Blue Hole-Level III:
Back Side of the Blue Hole:
Bob's Blue Hole: Guardian Blue Hole:
The Little Frenchman:
The Hole In The Wall:
Over The Wall At Night:
Alec's Caverns: And Many More... Cost for these dives are: $175 for one diver, $100 each for two or more divers. Click Here For More About Our Custom Tailored Speciality Dives Blue Hole Level II: Blue Hole-Level II starts at 45 feet. We swim over the edge of a collapsed cave, drop down between the collapse and the ocean floor to 100-feet, then through a hole in the breakdown where we come into a huge tunnel, where the bottom is 320-feet down. We traverse along the ceiling at 140-feet. After a short swim the ceiling breaks away and incredible shafts of light pour through. A little further on we come to the largest cavern in the Bahamas. It resembles a lunar landscape.
Looking up and out you can see the silhouettes of a large variety of fish. We swim up through the cavern to the uppermost lip and then circumnavigate the entire Blue Hole, seeing ancient river beds and water falls that were created during the last ice age. The depth around the rim ranges from 60-70 feet. We circle back around to the anchor line, where we pull anchor and drift. Click here to see an illustration of Blue Hole-Level II
These dives are offered strictly on a one-on-one basis. Small Hope Bay Lodge's Specialty Dive Program also includes wall dives, open ocean dives and cavern dives. Small Hope Bay Lodge, now in its 49th year, offers just 20 cottages on the beach, all-inclusive rates and the 140-mile long Andros Barrier Reef one mile offshore. |
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