First Things First

Do you want to avoid the crowds? Are you arriving by cruise ship and looking for independent Grand Turk excursions to avoid the large crowds often associated with cruise ship excursions? In business since 1983, Blue Water Divers provides Grand Turk excursions for cruise ship passengers who wish to go diving or snorkeling on Grand Turk and prefer to be in smaller groups. As a cruise ship visitor, we know you will only be on Grand Turk for a limited period of time. We also know you don’t want to be in danger of missing your ship’s departure and therefore our trip offerings for cruise ship passengers are specifically designed with this in mind. We want you to have a relaxed, enjoyable experience, so we tailor our cruise ship trip schedules to work with the ship schedules. As such, we will often have only one trip departure time per ship docking and we limit the number of passengers on any single trip. In order to check trip availability, we need to know both the date on which you will be arriving as well as the name of the ship on which you are traveling.

Grand Turk is a very small island (7 miles by 1.5 miles at its widest point), with only two dive shops who are licensed to take cruise ship passengers scuba diving (apart from the cruise ship excursions). We take bookings for our independent Grand Turk excursions on a first deposit, first reserved basis. All of our tours and courses help you avoid the crowds with our small groups policy, as we purposefully limit the maximum number of people on any trip to fewer passengers than what our boats are actually rated to hold. Because Blue Water Divers specializes in taking out small groups of people to provide a more personal experience for our guests, some days can fill up quite quickly. If you want to be sure that you are able to get out on (or under!) the water during your visit to Grand Turk, please contact us in advance to make a trip reservation. More often than not, on cruise ship days we are unable to accommodate walk-in business.

We offer two different trip types for Certified Divers. For those of you who are Certified Divers but haven’t been diving in a while (2 years or more), there is our Skills Review dive trip, which can be reserved as either a single tank dive or a two tank dive. This is also an option for people who have been diving more recently, but would like to review some skills with one of our PADI instructors before going on the wall dive(s). The other trip option, only available for Certified Divers who have been diving within the last 2 years, is either a single tank dive or a two tank dive without a skills review session prior to the dive(s).

For those who are not certified to dive, we offer Discover Scuba Diving trips as well as snorkeling trips.

Keep in mind that whether you are trying out scuba diving for the first time, are an experienced diver with hundreds of dives, or even just snorkeling in a few feet of water, ALL of our boat captains/dive masters are trained PADI instructors. Our dive team are also all Emergency First Responder Instructors.

We ask everyone interested in diving or snorkeling to please take the time to consider the following questions:

Certified divers should think about your most recent dive and ask yourself: Was I comfortable and relaxed in the water? Was my buoyancy well under control? Was my air consumption reasonable? Am I able to perform the basic underwater skills of clearing my mask and my regulator? Would I be comfortable in the water with my dive buddy if a dive instructor was not present? If the answer to one or more of these questions is “no” you should consider our “Skills Review” trip or our Snorkel only trip.

ANYONE considering a snorkeling OR diving excursion should ask yourself: Am I in reasonable physical shape? Can I climb up a boat ladder (that has a weight limit of 250 lbs) to re-board a 24-28′ skiff from the water without assistance? Are my health and physical condition both well suited to participation in an outdoor sport which is subject to weather and sea conditions? If the answer to one or more of these questions is “no” perhaps a different type of excursion would help you get the most enjoyment from your time on Grand Turk.

It is not our intention to dissuade people from either diving or snorkeling activities, but simply to encourage careful thought about the type of excursion best suited to your needs and personal situation so you will have fun during your time here on our island.