{"id":23501,"date":"2026-06-24T11:22:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T11:22:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/?p=23501"},"modified":"2026-09-20T19:01:51","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T19:01:51","slug":"trying-to-get-to-thunderbolt-grotto-staniel-cay-exuma-islands-the-bahamas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/2026\/06\/24\/trying-to-get-to-thunderbolt-grotto-staniel-cay-exuma-islands-the-bahamas\/","title":{"rendered":"Trying to get to Thunderbolt Grotto, Staniel Cay, Exuma Islands, The Bahamas"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The moon was not full anymore, but still shone vividly at dawn on Thursday, March 5 <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We\u2019d arranged to meet two of the families at Thunderball Grotto<\/a> at 0900, which was slack high tide. We were leery about getting in and out of the cave at high tide, but they assured us that it would not be a problem and said they thought it was better to go when there was no current. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We left Kosmos at 8:40, figuring it would take us 20-minutes to get there. But even though it was supposed to be nearly slack tide, the current was strong and our little 3 hp electric motor struggled. For a portion of the time, we were only going a little over one knot. It took 40-minutes to get there. Eric was frustrated. He’s been contemplating switching to a fast gas motor for the last few months, and he announced that this was the last straw \u2013 he was buying a new motor. When we got to the cave, we could barely see the entrance. We don’t think we would have been able to find it at all had we not been there before. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As our friends had assured us, getting in was not difficult. Here was a selfie with a view of the entrance from the inside.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

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The cave felt a lot smaller at high tide \u2013 it almost looked like a completely different place.\u00a0Our friends told us that before we came in, they’d scared off some bats that had been perched on the ceiling close to the water line. At low tide, the bats would have been too far above head to have been disturbed. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here was a video of what it looked like underwater. The underwater holes that Eric and Keith had liked to swim in and out of <\/a>were notably deeper, and they didn’t attempt to go through them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here were Erik and Andrea from Traveler<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Unfortunately, we couldn\u2019t stay long as the current came back with a vengeance, making swimming both strenuous and potentially dangerous given that there were hazards in the cave. The lines that we’d held onto in our past visits <\/a>were set for low tide and were well under water right now. Here were our friends as they prepared to exit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We found exiting to be more difficult than entering because the current was so strong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the late afternoon, we went over to the Cruiser’s Beach<\/a> to have some time on dry land. Since our friends weren’t there, we didn’t stay long.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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We had another colorful dusk. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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In the evening, we went over to Traveler. The adults played Mexican Train Dominoes and the kids played other games. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The moon was again amazingly bright.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The moon was not full anymore, but still shone vividly at dawn on Thursday, March 5 We\u2019d arranged to meet two of the families at Thunderball Grotto at 0900, which was slack high tide. We were leery about getting in … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[402,52,9,1,428,20,399],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bahamas-caribbean","category-caribbean","category-cruising-life","category-general","category-geological-sites","category-scuba-snorkeling","category-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23501"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25060,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23501\/revisions\/25060"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kosmos.liveflux.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}