Swimming With a Wild Dolphin in the Bahamas (With Video)

In short

In the Bahamas, a wild dolphin swam with our family for a full hour and would probably have stayed longer. Rick spotted it first and jumped in, and soon we all took turns. Karen and the dolphin seemed locked in a gaze. Our friend Dave Houston said that in all his years of sailing he had never seen such a long encounter. Rick made a video from Nathalie Houston's footage.

Our family had a unique encounter with a wild dolphin. The dolphin stayed with us as we swam for a full hour, and probably would have stayed longer had we not got out of the water. Our friend Dave Houston said that in all his years of sailing, he had not seen a prolonged interaction like we experienced with our dolphin.

Fin spotted!

My husband, Rick, was the first person to spot the dolphin. He assured us that it was a dolphin, and said that he had seen its bottlenose head. Here is a picture of Rick in the water with the dolphin.

Shark or dolphin?

Here is roughly what was going through my mind as we watched this initial encounter.

Would you have determined that the curve belonged to a dolphin?

I am glad that Rick was brave enough to jump in.

Soon, we all took turns swimming with the dolphin.

Here is Karen as she watched the dolphin underwater.

The dolphin seemed just as interested in us as we were in it. At one point, Karen and the dolphin seemed to be locked in a gaze.

We were glad to share this experience with our friends, Dave and Nathalie Houston (SV Cheval). Nathalie filmed the dolphin. Here is a video of the dolphin and 10-year-old Betty.

Rick created the video using Nathalie’s original raw footage. We have been playing with the iMovie application, and while I will continue to be writing, we hope to post more videos in the future.

Next in the story →Ragged Islands, Bahamas: Duncan Town and Buena Vista Cay

← Previous: Hurricane Season in the Caribbean: Why We Chose LuperónPart of Florida and the Bahamas · 43 posts →