Scotts Head Marine Reserve dive and snorkel

At Dominica's southwest tip, a headland on a thin neck of land closes off Soufrière Bay, and the bay is the drowned crater of an old volcano. The rim is lined with coral and drops away to around 160 metres. Snorkellers walk in from the beach by the isthmus. Divers go out by boat. Turtles are seen often, and on luckier dives seahorses, eagle rays and nurse sharks. Bubble Beach on the Soufrière side has hot springs bubbling up in the shallows to warm up in.

The whole bay is a marine reserve, and every snorkeller and diver pays a small fee for each site. Dive shops in Soufrière and on the coast road south of Roseau run daily boat dives, courses and guided snorkel trips, or rent gear for going it alone. Give it a morning on the water and stay for lunch at the fish shacks in Scotts Head village, then walk up the headland past the ruins of an 18th-century British fort for the view back over the bay to Roseau.