Barbados - Snorkeling with turtles in Carlisle Bay (Barbados)

After our two dives in the morning we went back to the diving school of Roger’s Shack, which is located at Brownes Beach in Carlisle Bay.

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How to get from Cruise Terminal to turtles?

Getting to the turtles in Barbados on your own is really quite easy: you either take a taxi from the cruise terminal to the beach (Carlisle Bay) and then snorkel from here as described above to the turtles. Alternatively, you can of course also walk from the Cruise Terminal (2.5 kilometers, about 30 minutes) and make a small sightseeing tour in the capital Bridgetown 🙂

We have drawn the footpath here in Google Maps.

Carlisle Bay in Barbados

Here we had about 1.5 hours to spare before our bus went back towards AIDA. There were actually only two options for bridging the time until then: We lie down lazily on the beach and enjoy the Caribbean sun… or we keep our wetsuit on and snorkel again to the place where the turtles are in Barbados. Anyone who has followed our travel reports diligently should know what we have chosen: because just lying around and doing nothing is somehow nothing for us 😉

Carlisle Bay is a small natural harbour in southwestern Barbados. The capital of the island state, Bridgetown, is located on this bay, which has been converted into a marine park. The Carlisle Bay Marine Park is a popular spot on the island for diving. Many relics, such as anchors and cannonballs from ships, are located on the seabed in Carlisle Bay. The bay is home to one of Barbados’ historic lighthouses, Needham’s Point Lighthouse.

Carlisle Bay, Peppels Beach, Caribbean, AIDA Cruise, Travel Report

Carlisle Bay in Barbados

Where to find the turtles in Barbados?

We had already reported that two years ago we snorkeled here in Carlisle Bay with turtles (see article). So we could still remember relatively well where this was:

From the diving school we walked maybe 300 to 400 meters south along the beach of Carlisle Bay. One actually already siht from the beach the many excursion boats in the water, so that one knows relatively easily where you have to walk into the sea. The sea also drops relatively flat here and is beautiful sandy, so it is really easy to swim something out.

Map, Turtle Swimming, Barbados, Carlisle Bay, Peppels Beach, Caribbean, AIDA Cruise, Travel Report

Map of Carlisle Bay and where to find the turtles

Swimming with turtles in Barbados

It didn’t take long for us to see the first turtle in the water that swam long beneath us. So nothing like afterwards 🙂

The Turtles in Carlisle Bay

She dived up and down a few times and then disappeared in the distance. After a few more meters we arrived at the place where there were already three excursion boats with snorkelers. The guides on the boats feed the turtles with fish and at the same time send the snorkelers into the water. We just mixed among the crowd and it didn’t take long for the first turtle to float here as well. We were definitely in the water for a good 30 minutes. Whenever a turtle disappeared, a new turtle that swam between the snorkelers came out of nowhere.

Snorkeling with turtles in Barbados

The Trustworthy Turtles in Barbados

Swimming with turtles in Barbados

Snorkeling with turtles in Barbados

Swimming with turtles in Barbados

The Turtles in Carlisle Bay

A really great experience! And most importantly, you really don’t have to book an expensive tour to swim with the turtles in Barbados!

We were ready to swim with the turtles in Barbados during our world tour in 2014. You can read this here.

Our video of snorkeling with the turtles

Here are some impressions as a video of snorkeling with the turtles in Barbados:

All travelogues from our AIDA Cruise (Caribbean Sea)

If you read the list of islands that AIDA is heading for on the route Caribbean Islands, you might think it was a dream for a moment: Dominican Republic, Aruba, Curaçao, Bonaire, Grenada, St. Vincent & the Grenadines, Barbados, St. Lucia, Dominica, Guadeloupe, Antigua. To reach eleven islands in 14 days is already a house number. But that was also the reason for us to choose this route. A cruise is predestined to get to know the Caribbean with its thousands of dream islands in a relaxed way. Here you can find all travel reports of our 14-day Caribbean cruise with AIDAdiva.