A Surprise for Pinky - Pinky Frink’s Adventures

I have been visiting the Bahamas since and have made 14 separate dive excursions to explore her waters. For this Alert Diver assignment, I spent time in both New Providence staying in Nassau and Eleuthera, a long wisp of an island to the east. Five James Bond movies have included underwater scenes shot in New Providence, where the capital and largest city, Nassau, is located.

In addition to the obvious beauty of its beaches and resorts, the water in the Bahamas is clear and impossibly blue, so vibrant it almost defies reproduction on film. In the film Into the Blue , starring Jessica Alba and Paul Walker, the color and clarity of the water would have won an Oscar if there had been a "water quality" category. There are easily accessible shipwrecks, shallow reefs and the vertical wall of the Tongue of the Ocean. The most enticing of all for adrenaline junkies are the sharks.

The Bahamas are one of the best places on the planet to view and interact with multiple species of large sharks. Shipwrecks dominate the diving off the southwest end of New Providence. The wrecks were purposely sunk as dive attractions, and most are upright. They are perfect for wide-angle shots that feature the entire wreck; if you are lucky, you might get a shark or two in the frame. The Willaurie stands out for its fully coral-encrusted scaffolding, which is full of reef life and friendly fish.

If you are into macro photography and fish portraits, a visit to the Willaurie is not to be missed. New Providence is best known for the sheer masses of Caribbean reef sharks and interactive encounters. Dozens of Caribbean reef sharks investigating the bait crate on the sandy bottom at times completely obscured views of my dive guide and shark wrangler, Charlotte Faulkner. She was able to demonstrate a strange shark reflex called "tonic immobility," during which sharks become temporarily paralyzed when the area around their snouts is stimulated.

During this state, some so-called shark whisperers can even balance a shark, tail up, on the palm of their hand. There are only a handful of places in the world where divers can get close to sharks without the use of an attractant, and shark diving brings many tourists to the Bahamas. Shark fishing is banned in Bahamian waters, a nationwide shark sanctuary. One day Stuart Cove picked me up in a fast, foot rigid inflatable boat RIB , and we cruised quickly out of Nassau harbor past three giant cruise ships that had docked for the day.

Beginning at about 40 feet below the surface, it is feet in diameter and drops down to more than feet deep. I'm told sharks and rays frequently swim inside the hole, but the star of my dive this day was an unperturbed turtle that was eating sponges on the hole's walls. It beams back live video to a smartphone, which you use to control the camera during flight.

Eleuthera My second stop was North Eleuthera , a long, thin barrier island exposed to the open Atlantic Ocean on its eastern shore. Eleuthera is about miles long, and at its thinnest point is barely wider than the span of the road. Home to about 10, residents, Eleuthera is one of the Bahamas' main agricultural centers and is known for pineapple farming. I boarded a water taxi for my final destination, Harbour Island , home to the famous Pink Sands Beach, among the most beautiful beaches in the world. The diving off North Eleuthera was wild.

Tarpon Hole is home to about a dozen large, shiny tarpon, cruising the area like a gang in their 'hood.

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Strong surge at the Blow Hole crashed against rocks, creating turbulent clouds of air down into the water column. I have seen surge action create similar phenomena at Malpelo and Roca Partida in the Revillagigedo Islands. They are reminders of the unstoppable power of the ocean and are beautiful to witness and photograph. That late afternoon, Boyd, a co-owner of Valentines Dive Center, drove me to the southern point of Harbour Island with Nora, his 6-year-old daughter.

Nora screamed in delight as our golf cart raced up and down the small bumps that constitute the most extreme altitude changes on the island. I wondered what Nora would think of the steep hills we have in San Francisco, my hometown.

Alert Diver | A Week Underwater in the Bahamas

The south end of the island is virtually untouched and features some old cannons buried in the brush and sand. The raw tropical beauty and vast beaches make this a popular wedding and honeymoon destination. The next morning I made a couple of dives at Current Cut , a narrow channel with raging currents estimated to be knots. The dive plan was straightforward: Jump in, descend, ride the current through the passage, and surface.

The estimated dive time was 10 minutes the shortest dive plan I've ever encountered , and the distance traversed was 2 miles. We saw numerous eagle rays none would let me get close , and all the narrow cuts at the bottom of the channel were full of jacks, angelfish and other fish hiding from the current.

Current Cut is a thrilling dive, best done on an incoming tide for optimal water clarity. Dive operators will drop divers in the water a few times since the dive is so short. I did three more dives that day, including dives at Hammerhead Point no hammerheads for me that day, though , Split Head Reef and the Arimora wreck.

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At its narrowest point, Eleuthera is scarcely yards wide. At that point is a bridge called the Glass Window Bridge, striking a dramatic contrast between the dark blue water of the Atlantic Ocean and the bright turquoise shallows to the west. My trips to the Bahamas in the past have been liveaboard-based shark expeditions, so having the chance to explore two distinct regions was a real treat, both topside and underwater.

The Riding Rock dive boat reverberates with joyful shouts, squeals and laughter — and I can't say I am surprised. I've just surfaced from an hour underwater, and my cheeks ache from smiling. Few things are as special as a wild animal choosing to hang out with you, and we've just had two friendly Nassau groupers, known as Tom and Jerry, taking the reef tour right in the middle of our group. I fall for the big brown eyes and rubbery lips that give the groupers a cartoonish charisma. Their favorite trick is to sneak up on your blindside and suddenly appear inches from your mask.

Captain Bruce tells us they like a little tickle under the chin. As a photographer, having groupers posing inches from my lens is about as good as it gets. The captain tells us friendly groupers have been on San Salvador as long as he's been diving. San Salvador is famous for being Christopher Columbus' first landing in the new world — or as the locals put it, "Columbus was our first tourist! It has one of the best runways in the country and is easy to reach either by island-hopper or direct international arrivals from the U.

San Sal was one of the world's first diving destinations. Riding Rock Inn put San Sal on the diving map in The red sun melts into the flat ocean, and it's time for a night dive. I enjoyed the fun of group diving in the day, but at night I prefer my solitude, hunting macro subjects away from the distraction of flashing beams.

Pinky Goes Camping - Pinky Frink's Adventures

I am thrilled to find bountiful subjects: San Sal is known for wide-angle subject matter, with superb visibility and a dramatic dropoff just off the beach that rims the island. But I am mightily impressed with the abundance of tiny charms. The next day I dedicate my dive at Pinnacle Reef to macro photography and turn up tiny treasures including an arrow blenny, roughhead blennies, whitefoot shrimp and a decorator crab with orange legs poking out of the gray sponge covering its body.

The big stuff is exciting the rest of the divers on the boat. During my stay I see plentiful grouper on all the sites, schooling jacks, snappers and grunts. Most of the schools are clustered around cleaning stations, and the grunts seem to almost unhinge their mouths when yawning to attract cleaning gobies. San Sal's larger attractions include rays, turtles and sharks. Others see hammerheads on our dives, but I guess my head was too stuck in the reef looking for sea slugs. Jay says that you can see groups of scalloped hammerheads in February and March, but you will encounter individuals year round.

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San Sal is a family-friendly destination. The dives are mostly easy, although there is the option of depth for those who want it. I saw reef sharks on almost every dive, but unlike the Bahamas' biggest islands, they don't run shark feeds on San Sal because they have found their guests prefer it this way. The big animals are certainly a draw, with a healthy population of reef sharks and frequent sightings of hammerheads.

But my indelible memories were of the groupers — not just underwater, but how mutual curiosity with a wild creature energized a group of teenagers in a way that a computer game or chat room never can. Nassau may be the capital of the Bahamas, but when it comes to Nassau groupers, the Out Island San Sal must be the grouper capital.

Long Island has a super laidback, away-from-it-all atmosphere. The island gets its name because it is just 4 miles across but 80 miles long, with a population of 4, We're staying in the north at Stella Maris Resort Club and diving with their water sports crew, both of which are very hospitable and relaxed. From here you are able to dive Long Island's local reefs, visit a wreck, make a shark dive or take a day trip to Conception Wall , one of the most famous in the Bahamas.

A drive south on Long Island reveals Dean's Blue Hole , much loved by freedivers as it is the world's deepest known blue hole at feet. Our first dive is at the foot Comberbach wreck, which sits upright in close to feet of water; it is impressive, with good growth on it. The propeller is almost unrecognizable for all the encrustation. What really blows me away is the amazing water, which is exceptionally clear and an almost luminescent blue. Omar Daley, our instructor and skipper, has been diving Long Island for more than 20 years.

He says that he has seen huge spawning schools of Nassau grouper at the wreck — "50 feet wide and 80 feet tall around the winter full moons. We even get whale sharks hanging around to feed on the eggs. It is quite a contrast to the high-voltage shark dives I have done elsewhere in the Bahamas, but it would certainly make a good introduction to shark diving because it is only 30 feet deep and the few sharks generally keep a healthy distance. As historical perspective, Stella Maris was the first dive operation in the Bahamas to offer a shark-interaction dive at Shark Reef.

My favorite dive is at Split Rock , which is a pretty, shallow reef, with a high diversity of life. I spent time with an attractive school of horse-eye jacks and then watched a queen angelfish chomping through a sponge. Omar also loves this spot: It feels like an aquarium with so many varieties of fish.

It is bright and shallow, a perfect starter for people's trips. The calmer summer months are best for visiting the 2-mile-long Conception Wall, which reaches up to 55 feet from the ocean depths. We make two drift dives on the wall, which is rich with sponges — barrels, elephant ear and dark volcano sponges and lots of deepwater gorgonia. Groupers and lobsters are common, and the whole place has a healthy, untouched feeling. Omar says summer is the best time for mantas, and divers sometimes see hammerheads or tiger sharks in the deep distance.

The top of the wall is quite deep; we're diving on air rather than nitrox, so we are soon cruising above it, in the blue with the scenery clearly visible below us. Suddenly we hear clicks and whistles, then moments later a bottlenose dolphin blasts into view, makes a few circuits of the group to check out everyone individually, and then he's off.

He was only in view for a minute or two, but the memory of an encounter with this wild dolphin will live much longer. All our dives are from the large and comfortable Solmar 2 dive boat. In addition to ample space, there is plentiful time. The dives sites are between an hour and two and a half hours away, which means full day trips. On both days, we pull in close to shore between the dives and find ourselves alongside deserted beaches of powder-white sand and inviting, glass-calm turquoise waters.

They are places so beautiful that when I'm back home in England under leaden-gray skies I can't quite believe such places really exist. This seems ideally suited to the guests here, who love the feeling of being on "island time" and aren't necessarily trying to fill their logbook as fast as possible. They appreciate having the beautiful ocean to themselves, with no other divers or boats in sight. The reefs feel untouched, and we see sharks on every dive.

It really is like diving back in time. Andros Island is only miles from Florida and is lined by one of the largest barrier reefs in the world, but it's an island that time passed by. Big jets pass overhead, and cruise ships skirt its shores, delivering honeymooners and highrollers to the large hotels, mega-yachts and casinos of Nassau. My minute flight from Nassau was a time machine to another world. As I crawled out of the tiny plane, the large smiles and firm handshakes confirmed this was my kind of place. Andros Small Hope Bay on Andros Island is home to beautiful cracks and caverns begging to be explored.

In my short three-day visit I got only a small taste of the 2,square-mile island that is sliced and diced by waterways and pocked with hundreds of blue holes. The most accessible blue hole is a giant one near Small Hope Bay. This form does not constitute legal advice and nothing that you read or are provided on this web site should be used as a substitute for the advice of competent legal counsel. If someone believes in good faith that a Lulu Account Holder has infringed their copyright, they can request that we take down the infringing material by filing a DMCA Notice. When a clear and valid Notice is received pursuant to the guidelines, we will respond by either taking down the allegedly infringing content or blocking access to it, and we may also contact you for more information.

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The page you are attempting to access contains content that is not intended for underage readers. What a surprise for Pinky when she learns that her parents are adopting a new baby brother! Pinky falls in love with him the moment he is placed in her arms, even though at times she feels like the new baby is getting all of her parent's attention.

This darling, rhyming book depicts some of the changes in family life and a sibling's apprehension when a new baby comes into the household. The illustrations are colorful and adorable, while the storyline gently provides hints about respecting parental authority, family values and responsibility for younger siblings. Log in to rate this item. You must be logged in to post a review. This is a really cute story. I particularly like the way the author depicts how the main character, Pinky Frink, feels "left out of things" when a new baby brother is adopted, and how her mom involves her in the baby's care to alleviate her anxiety.

My grandkids and young nephews just adore the colorful graphics. I am impressed with the rhyming storyline and with how family values are subtlety interspersed throughout the book. It is nice to see a main character who is a well-mannered child that respects parental authority and cherishes both family and her friends. This book definitely deserves a "thumbs up" and would make a great addition to any young juvenile library!

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