Snorkeling Blog

If you’re looking for an eco-tour destination, consider the U.S. Virgin Islands. We are big fans of St. John, where we feel like we are immersed in the natural, untamed beauty of the island. Instead of the high-rise hotels and heavy tourist trade you’ll find on the other islands, the vibe here is highly eco-friendly and there are countless places to find great snorkeling.

Eco-tours abound. You’ll have your choice of providers, but this article about a tour that goes to the Maho Bay Camp caught our eye. If you want to strike out on your own (as we generally do), you can certainly do it on St. John. But if you want someone else to organize your trip and take care of everything, this sounds like a good way to go.

Key Largo’s John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park has long been one of our favorite state parks, so we’re happy to write about this amazing park on the 50th anniversary of its opening. The coral reef is the main reason we love snorkeling here.

Every year up to about a million people visit the park to enjoy canoeing, kayaking and – of course – snorkeling. If you’re anywhere near Key Largo, John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park should definitely be on your list of places to spend a day or two. You’ll keep coming back for more.

One of the great things about snorkeling is that you never know what you’ll see – or what you’ll find – when you’re exploring the undersea world.

Case in point:  snorkelers off the coast of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques happened across a set of U.S. military dog tags in the roots of a fallen palm tree.

The tags, belonging to a U.S. Marine, were lost during training exercises in the Spring of 1961. Almost 50 years later, the lost dog tags have now been returned to the original owner.

When you’re snorkeling, you never know what you’ll find.

As one of the stars of the new Pirannah 3D action movie, Ving Rhames fights off a bunch of prehistoric monster pirannah come back to life.

But in a real-life drama, Rhames says he’s been put off snorkeling for good after coming across a bizarre “prehistoric” looking creature while snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef off Queensland, Australia.

Is this just hype to promote the movie? You have to wonder, but Rhames sounds serious about this strange snorkeling encounter.

Take advantage of a fee-free weekend at every U.S. National Park this weekend, August 14 and 15, 2010.

Read about what’s on offer here. You’ll find snorkeling in National Parks from Cape Cod to the Dry Tortugas.

Get out and enjoy the last few weeks of summer vacation!

Not only can you save a few bucks in park admission fees this weekend, lots of park concessionaires are offering special discounts this weekend too.

Here is a great story from the Isle of Man about a new training program aimed at eventually training 3,000 people as snorkeling instructors in the UK.
Seven enthusiastic volunteers have completed the Isle of Man’s first ever Snorkel Instructor Training course.
The British Sub Aqua club, the national governing body for snorkeling, recently launched an initiative to train 3,000 new snorkel instructors across the UK.

read the whole thing
This is a GREAT idea – while diving takes a much larger investment in time and money, snorkeling is simple, accessible and cheap – but many people just don’t know how to do it. We get emails all the time from people who want to go but just don’t know how / what to do.

Next time you are in Hawaii and want to hit the water, but think it may be a bit rough or that you won’t be able to see many fish – here is an option that guarantees you will see the fish up close.  The 280,000 gallon oceanarium  at the Pacific Beach hotel now offers SNUBA – $45 for 20 minutes for hotel guests, maximum 2 at a time.

Jim Cody discovered this shell while snorkeling in an isolated cove in the Bahamas.

Read the full story here.