Curaçao is known for its beautiful pristine beaches, this Dutch Caribbean paradise island offers plenty for family scuba divers. Not only does it have easy and beautiful scuba diving, but it also has great topside activities (art tours, forts, cliff jumping, horse riding, snorkelling). Exploring Willemstad, Curaçao’s capital city is a must. Its charming pastel buildings and equally colourful history earned its recognition as a UNESCO World Heritage City.
Curaçao has a mixture of all sorts of scuba diving, so whatever your preference you'll find it here! Diving the famous The Blue Room was without doubt a highlight for us. It a blue-lit cavern with schools of glassy sweepers everywhere you look. You can dive or snorkel in the cavern in an almost surrealistic blue environment. The surrounding Mushroom Forest dive blows your mind, with huge coral heads representing mushrooms and large barrel sponges with an abundance of marine life. We also enjoyed as a family snorkelling with green juvenile turtles at Piskado. Here the turtles are so tame that you can happily stay above them for hours without a care in the world.
Curaçao is part of the the three western most islands in the Leeward Antilles in the Caribbean sea and together with Aruba and Bonaire they are named as the ABC islands. It has a fringe reef surrounding the island. With calm waters and great visibility, you can see the healthy corals, macro life, and abundance of marine life. One of the most popular events occurs in September and October with coral spawning. We will have to go back for this event. We visited in August 2021, water temperature was 27c and calm conditions, perfect for diving with children.
Find below our video of the Curaçao Dives we did and some pictures we took.
Our Top 6 Family Curaçao Dive sites are:
Watamula - Probably one of the top dive sites on the island. Often a drift dive, an hour on this site is like going to space it will blow your mind. Large coral heads extend from 10-30m (30 ft. to 90 ft) and large bait balls are often encountered. Turtles are common and schools of tangs and chromis .
Blue Room/ Mushroom Forest - Gets its name from a maze of large coral heads that have taken on the shapes of giant mushrooms. Most dive magazines call this the signature dive of Curaçao. Being able to combine the blue room and the Mushroom Forest was magical. A blue-lit cavern with schools of glassy sweepers everywhere you look. You can dive or snorkel in the cavern in an almost surrealistic blue environment.
Kathy's Paradise - A stunning drift dive, with healthy coral and an abundance of life. Turtles are often seen here. Schools of blue chromis regularly are seen parade themselves in lines.
Booby Trap - This is one of our favorite sites for beginner divers with just a mild current, easy access, and great visibility. It provides a variety of soft and hard corals and sponges. The dive site is also great for macro. Its a wall dive dropping to 36m.
Tugboat - The tugboat lies at shallow depths of 5m which is also good for beginners and great for long dives. Not only is the boat a highlight of the dive, but the nearby pier has lots of marine life hiding there. You can spot seahorses, octopus, tarpons, scorpion fish and many others.
Directors' Bay - Named after some Directors from the Shell corporation this dive is a gentle wall dive, where you will come across squid, parrotfish, octopus and much more.
Here is our official Scuba4Families review score:
Scuba 4 Families - Curaçao & Epsilon dive centre Review:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Beginner Dive Site (Safety, Entry/Exit etc)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Diving and Equipment Conditions
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Accessibility of Location (Ease of Travel)
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Value for Money
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ - Customer Service of Dive club
Thanks also to DaveCharter
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