For anyone already in the Caribbean and looking for a cruise sailing from Nassau in the Bahamas, the Blackbeard Cruises company offers affordable cruises focused only on scuba diving. They leave every Saturday for week-long excursions on one of three sailboats that make up their fleet. These are live-aboard diving cruises, so meals are served onboard and everyone gets their own cabin in the boat. The cruises do not have a set itinerary and are dependent on the weather and the interest of the divers. Some of the spots they cruise to are the Exhumas Land & Sea Park, the largest underwater park in the Caribbean and Thunderball Grotto. Shark dives, night dives, and reef and wreck dives are some of the opportunities Blackbeard Cruises offers.
Another live-aboard cruise option can also be found in the Bahamas aboard the Aquacat, a 102-foot catamaran. Scuba diving, water sports, meals and a full bar are all-inclusive on trips aboard the Aquacat. Each excursion is an eight-day, seven-night diving adventure that offers many interesting dives. This includes being able to feed sharks, take deep-water dives, and to participate in high-speed drift dives. The Aquacat also offers Scuba certification classes for anyone looking to learn. While the cruises are mainly focused on diving, guests can take part in other activities when they don't have a tank strapped to them. These include snorkeling, kayaking, fishing, sunbathing, and exploring the hundreds of (mostly) unexplored islands in the Bahamas.
Royal Caribbean is a major cruise line that operates many of their ships in the Caribbean. The Oasis, Voyager, and Freedom line of cruise boats all have a Sea Trek Program targeted at people who want to learn how to scuba dive. The program includes onboard PADI scuba classes using the ship’s pool as well as two dives at different locations in the Caribbean (these depend on the particular ship’s itinerary). Nearly all of Royal Caribbean’s Caribbean cruises also have scuba diving excursions for those who are already certified. Some of the locations these take place in include a shipwreck off Barbados, Antigua, Aruba, and the Bahamas.
