Sculpture parks become so much more interesting when they are under water, especially when that water is the crystal blue Caribbean ocean.

In 2006 a British artist decided to create an underwater sculpture park right off the shore of Grenada. The park contains a series of sculptures of people, but also a bench, a person sitting at a table with a typewriter and other interesting objects.

In addition to being a tourist attraction the park also acts as an artificial reef for marine wildlife.

Despite this amazing idea it does not appear to be a very well known attraction. While all the tourism companies wanted to take us on trips for spice tasting, sail trips, sightseeing and other activities close to none advertised with trips to the sculpture park. That was OK with us, because we had our own plan: After spending days with thousands of tourists on board a cruise ship we were ready to travel more like backpackers and locals. As we disembarked the ship in Grenada’s capital St. George’s we headed towards the bus terminal and caught a ride with the locals. While the taxi drivers wanted up to $20 to take us to the sculpture park the bus ticket was only $1 per person.

Greatly satisfied with our own research and backpacker skills we zoomed out of the capital in a tiny minibus with a bunch of locals. We were by far the only tourists on the bus, something the music on the radio confirmed. They were singing about “gringos” and although our Spanish proficiency is close to non-existent it was safe to assume that the lyrics were not politically correct…

After 20 minutes we arrived at Dragon Bay, the most accessible area close to the sculpture park. It is possible to swim to the park from here, but the distance is about 500 meters and a bit to far to be practical in open waters. Therefore we found a local with a boat and asked if he could take us to the park in his boat. That he would, for $20 per person, a price way lower than the few offers we had seen by the tourism agencies. With the local we also got tips on where to swim to find the different exhibitions.

Getting under water and viewing the sculptures was an almost surreal experience. Although we knew that these sculptures were put here just a few years ago it felt a bit like we just rediscovered a lost city reclaimed by the sea thousands of years ago.

As we came accross a sculpture of a man sitting by a desk with a typewriter we were reminded that this was far from an ancient lost city…

Towards the end of the snorkelling a catamaran showed up with a bunch of tourists. They got to jump into the sea and swim around for a while, but nowhere near the majority of the sculptures, despite having paid a lot more than us. Therefore we got the entire area more or less to ourselves for a full hour.

We have taken a step outside our comfort zone and tried to make a video featuring ourselves on YouTube, a scary and somewhat awkward thing. So please don’t laugh at us, here’s our first vlog:

Have you been to an underwater sculpture park or would like to go? Let us know in the comments 🙂