Saba, the Island for Divers

My adventure began on Wednesday night, two days before spring break, when my roommate asked me to join her and her family on their spur-of-the-moment trip to St. Barthelemy ("St. Barts"). Realizing my passport was expired and my family was out of the country, I started my search for a miracle that would allow me to board the plane to St. Bart's on Saturday.

Fortunately, after two trips to Houston, two passport applications and a generous man who took pity on an absent-minded college student I was on a plane headed to the paradise known as St. Bart's. 

Sadly, my roommate is not scuba certified, so I anticipated that our group would only snorkel. Although I was upset that I would not be able to tell all of you about my personal experience diving in St. Barts, I did not want to miss out on the opportunity to research the island and report back to all my followers about the diving in the territories of the Leeward Islands.

While on a sunset cruise I questioned the crew about the best dive sites, the visibility and the sea-life a diver could expect while diving around the islands. When I asked about the best location for diving, the man thought about it for about two seconds and pointed into the distance at a nearby island and in a thick, French accent muttered, "Saba."

Glorious Saba Island
(picture from J2venture.com)

Saba is a Dutch island located in the Lesser Antilles, southwest of St. Barts. The volcanic island is only five miles long and has an estimated population of about 2,000 people as of 2010. The island is known for its Saba National Marine Park; scuba divers come from all over the world to explore the park's mysterious depths. Saba is interesting because it does not have beaches on the island, so if your looking for white sands to relax and drink piña coladas on you might want to try one of the other Caribbean Islands.

Notorious Saba Runway at Juancho E. Yrausquin Airport
(Picture from Oddee.com)

Besides the magnificent diving, Saba is known for its treacherous runway at the Juancho E. Yrausquin Airport. This runway has established itself as one of the most dangerous runways in the world. The runway is 1,300 feet in total length and there are no overrun areas on either end of the runway, where cliffs immediately drop 200 feet into the sea.

Now that I've sufficiently terrified you, I thought I would describe the Saba diving experience in more detail. While there are exciting shallow reefs and walls for less experienced divers, Saba is known for it's awe-inspiring pinnacles (summits of underwater mountains) that begin at about 85 feet deep. While diving among the pinnacles you can expect to see numerous large fish and pelagics such as sharks and sea turtles. Saba's marine park is different from most marine reserves in that it was founded before diving tourism was popular in the area. This is why the reserve remains undamaged.

 When researching Saba's dive shops I found two that seemed promising. The first one is the Saba Deep Dive Center. The shop was opened in 1981 and was Saba's first "dive shop." Saba Deep offers multiple dives each day including night dives. They will also help you plan the rest of your trip by booking hotels, providing transportation and of course planning your dives.

The second promising dive shop is Saba Divers and Scout's Place Hotel, which is a convenient and unique combination of dive shop and hotel all-in-one. The Saba Divers dive center offers multiple inexpensive packages for every diver's needs, with a discount for each package if booked in advance. Your package will also include transportation to and from Fort Bay each day you dive.

Saba Divers Dive Center

While I missed out on the opportunity to dive in the crystal-clear water surrounding Saba Island, I do not want the same to be true for you. Don't let Saba's runway scare you out of booking your flights today; you will get to experience the dive of a lifetime.