Of beaches, boats and blarney in the Bahamas

As bad as I felt for Tim having to spend the rest of the trip nearly legally blind — the commercial airline that brought them all from Philly had lost their luggage, including his contact kit with spares — it still took me an hour to stop laughing. Frank felt bad, too, but not as bad as he would have if they’d been hard lenses. 

That brings us to Tim trying to feed sharks by feel. Even with me in the water acting as his seeing-eye dog, none of the sharks or stingrays take the bait. Tim finally gives up on the dead grouper, and we climb out to join our dads who’ve brought our rental boat around.

Sampson Cay sits astride Pipe Creek, a watery back road running past prolific patch reefs, fishy flats and deserted beaches that trim the collection of tiny cays, some with homes or a small resort, others populated only by nesting birds. Between the islands, deep cuts intersect the creek like offramps exiting toward the abyss of Exuma Sound and the Atlantic beyond. To be in these parts without going out on a boat would be like listening to a beauty contest on the radio — not worth the trouble because you’d miss the best parts.

I steer our small center console down one of the inlets and motor to the edge of the open ocean where we take turns dropping overboard to drift back with the incoming tide, whizzing past tropical fish hiding in eddies behind large mounds of star coral, and keeping our eyes peeled for pelagics on the prowl.

After several rounds of drift snorkeling and a stop at a site called Aquarium to explore a sheer underwater ledge crawling with lobster and clouded with blue chromis, we head south on a serpentine course that wraps around the islands toward the Exumas’ most famous snorkeling site.

Bob Friel

As we approach Thunderball Grotto, I spot a flock of frenzied seabirds wheeling and dipping into the water, usually a sign of jacks attacking schools of silversides. My dad readies a rod while I idle up to the action. There are no fish, but the surface is coated with thousands of dark blobs the size of gumballs. For a moment my heart sinks as I think there’s been a spill and these are gobs of oil. Closer, though, I can see they’re crimson-colored, and alive — thimble jellyfish, carried in by a strange mix of offshore winds and currents. I’ve never seen so many at one time. We watch the birds pluck at the squishy critters for a few minutes then cruise over to a mooring buoy set just off a small, mushroom-shaped cay.

Thunderball Grotto — named for the coolest of all James Bond flicks, which along with Never Say Never Again and Splash, shot scenes at this unique spot — is an unremarkable gray mound of ironshore on the outside but features a juicy hollow inside. The dun-dadada-dun of the Bond theme goes through my head as I dive underwater and swim through a dark opening in the rock. After about 20 feet, the narrow passage widens into a dimly lit chamber. I roll over and look up, seeing what looks like spotlights. Carefully ascending with a hand stretched above my head, I break the surface into an air-filled cavern the size of a chapel. The spotlights are actually small round holes in the roof that allow tight beams of sunlight to stream through, bouncing off the water and playing over the craggy interior. One after the other, Tim, Frank and my dad pop up beside me. Our eyes adjust to the murky light after a few moments and we can see that the bottom is encrusted with purple and ruby-colored sponges attended by queen angelfish and rock beauties.

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