Things To Do In Exuma

Exuma splits into two very different trip shapes. Most visitors arrive through Nassau and take a full-day speedboat or flight north into the Exuma Cays, where the famous pigs, nurse sharks and grotto sit. Others fly into Exuma International Airport on Great Exuma and explore south from there, closer to George Town, the sandbars and some of the quietest beaches in the Bahamas. The best plan depends on which of those two doors you walk through. Either way, most trips end up chasing the same icons, and our guide to what Exuma is famous for explains how to actually see each one.

This guide puts the tours first, because in Exuma the headline attractions are only reachable by boat, and then covers the beaches, parks and land activities that fill the rest of a week. Every price below comes from the current tour options or from verified planning sources, and where a detail moves around, such as private charter pricing by group size, the honest answer is to check the booking page.

What Are The Best Things To Do In Exuma?

The best things to do in Exuma are the boat-based wildlife stops: swimming with the pigs at Big Major Cay, snorkeling Thunderball Grotto, meeting the nurse sharks at Compass Cay and feeding the iguanas at Allen's Cay, nearly all of them packed into full-day island hopping tours that run from $378 to $499 per person. On land, Tropic of Cancer Beach on Little Exuma is free to access, and buggy rentals run from $300 per day.

The shortlist almost writes itself because geography forces it. Big Major Cay, the original Pig Beach, is uninhabited and reachable only by boat, roughly 10 to 15 minutes from Staniel Cay. Thunderball Grotto sits beside it, an underwater cave system made famous by a James Bond film. Compass Cay, with its resident nurse sharks at the marina dock, and the iguana cays are all within the same northern cluster, which is why a single well-designed day trip can hit four or five of them. If you're wondering how that northern loop stacks up against the rest of the country, our guide to the best excursion in the Bahamas makes the case.

The Bahamas Ministry of Tourism describes the pigs in similar terms on its official page: about 20 pigs and piglets on an uninhabited cay, origin unknown, visited by boat tour from Nassau or the Exumas. There is no entrance fee at Pig Beach itself; the cost of the experience is entirely the boat that gets you there.

For a full rundown of the resident pigs themselves, see the swimming pigs Exuma tour guide, and for the wider question of which port suits your trip, Exuma vs Nassau breaks the tradeoffs down.

Which Boat Tours Cover The Top Exuma Attractions?

Most Exuma boat tours cover the same core loop, pigs, iguanas, sharks and a snorkel stop, over roughly 8 hours, with prices from $378 to $499 per person depending on the boat, the group size and whether lunch and landing fees are included. The Exuma Island Hopping Swimming Pigs Tour with Lunch from Nassau, rated 4.8 across 689 reviews and from $438.90 per person, is the most reviewed of the bunch.

The important split is departure point. Nassau tours run two to three hours each way across open water to reach the northern cays, which makes for a big, full day. Tours departing Great Exuma start much closer to the southern half of the chain. Mixing the two up is the single most common booking mistake, so the table below keeps them separate.

The price band tells a real story. The $328.90 to $378 options are the classic high-speed powerboat runs: long crossings, multiple stops, lunch usually included. The $499 tier tends to mean smaller groups or more stops packed in. The Exuma Island and Cays Tour at from $330 per person, rated 4.9 across 111 reviews, is the standout if you are already based on Great Exuma rather than Nassau, since it skips the long crossing entirely.

If you want the complete decision framework rather than one table, Exuma boat tours compared walks through every option side by side.

For travelers weighing the flight option, the Exclusive Fly-In Trip for a Premium Beach Day, rated 4.7 across 138 reviews, replaces the boat crossing with a flight of roughly 30 minutes, which buys you calmer mornings and more time at the cays. It runs from $838.35 per person, a real step up in price, but it changes the shape of the day completely. Exuma day trip by plane from Nassau covers that route in detail.

How Do You Swim With The Pigs In Exuma?

You swim with the pigs by joining a boat tour that lands at Big Major Cay, feeding them only the food the crew provides, in the water rather than on the sand, with prices from $378 per person for the Day Away excursion up to $850 per person for the shorter, smaller-group Elite Escape. The beach itself has no entrance fee; you are paying for the boat, the crew and the day around it.

The feeding rules are worth knowing before you go, because they come from real history. Operators ask guests to use only the food the captain provides, never personal snacks or alcohol, to feed in the water or by hand and never on the sand, and to leave piglets alone rather than chasing or picking them up. These guidelines trace back to 2017, when several pigs died in circumstances linked to sand ingestion, and the operators who run the beach every day now set and police the rules themselves. No official government regulation of feeding or landings was found on Bahamian government sources, so treat the crew's instructions as the operative law of the beach.

The stop itself is usually shorter than people imagine, often 20 to 60 minutes depending on the operator and how many boats are sharing the cay. That is one reason the tour around the pigs matters as much as the pigs: the big Major Cay Pig Beach guide goes deep on what the visit actually looks like, and the swimming with pigs from Nassau guide covers the logistics of the crossing.

The Exuma Island Hopping Swimming Pigs Tour with Lunch from Nassau pairs the pigs with iguanas, sharks, snorkeling and lunch over about 8 hours, from $438.90 per person, rated 4.8 across 689 reviews, which makes it the strongest single-day answer for a first-time visitor who wants the whole loop. See the full tour page Check availability.

Where Can You Snorkel Thunderball Grotto And See Nurse Sharks?

Thunderball Grotto sits just north of Pig Beach near Staniel Cay and has no admission fee, while the nurse sharks at Compass Cay Marina carry a published $15 per person day-use fee that most tours include in the package price. Both stops appear on nearly every full-day island hopping itinerary, timed around low tide for the grotto.

The grotto is a flooded cave with holes in its roof that pour light into the interior, full of tropical fish and calm enough for confident swimmers when the tide cooperates. The timing detail that matters: snorkelers should enter within an hour or two of low tide, when the entrances are most exposed and the currents weakest. At high tide the entry becomes difficult or impossible without diving gear. Captains plan the day around this, which is one more reason the sequence of stops on a good tour is not random.

No permit is currently required to snorkel or dive at the grotto. Operators report that it lies outside the southern boundary of the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, though the park itself has not confirmed that on an official page. The Thunderball Grotto snorkeling guide covers tides, entry points and the film history in full.

The Compass Cay nurse sharks are a different kind of encounter. The sharks gather around the marina dock, visitors get a short safety briefing covering the basics, no stepping on sharks, no grabbing or chasing, no sudden movements, and the interaction happens in shallow water rather than on a reef. The day-use fee is $15 per person, and tours that include Compass Cay normally absorb it. The Compass Cay nurse shark tour guide explains what the stop is actually like.

Further north in the same chain, Allen's Cay and Leaf Cay host protected Bahamian rock iguanas. Feeding there follows its own etiquette: grapes offered on wooden sticks, no chasing or holding, per the operators who run those landings. The iguanas are a named protected species on the official Bahamas ecotourism page, and the Allen's Cay iguana tour guide covers the stop.

What Can You Do On Land In Exuma?

On land, Exuma offers free public beaches led by Tropic of Cancer Beach on Little Exuma, buggy rentals from $300 per day for six-seater vehicles, short local boat tours from $175 per person around George Town, and bonefishing with local guides, listed by Exuma operators at $450 to $750 per half or full day for one or two anglers. For travelers balancing those guide and rental fees against a tighter budget, our breakdown of free beaches and budget-friendly spots in Exuma shows which experiences cost nothing at all.

Tropic of Cancer Beach is the signature free stop: no entry fee, no facilities, just a long crescent of sand on Little Exuma that many visitors rank among the best in the islands. The Exuma beaches guide maps the rest, and free things to do in Exuma collects the no-cost options in one place.

The buggy rental deserves a note of honesty: it carries only 3 reviews at the time of writing, too few to say anything reliable about quality, so read the booking page carefully. The local water tours around George Town carry the same modest review count. Neither is a red flag, just a thin evidence base.

Bonefishing is the quiet star of Exuma's land-adjacent scene. Local operators list half-day fly or spin trips at $450 and full days at $600 to $750 for one or two guests, and the flats here are among the most regarded in the world for the species. The Exuma fishing charters guide covers guides, seasons and licensing.

For families deciding what fits, Exuma with kids family tours flags which full-day boat runs suit younger children and which do not; one Great Exuma operator explicitly does not recommend its group boat for children under 5.

How Much Do Exuma Activities Cost In Total?

A full-day Exuma boat tour costs $328.90 to $499 per person depending on the operator, while a fly-in premium day starts at $838.35 per person and private charters run $6,000 to $8,500 per group for up to a full day. Land activities from buggy rentals to beach days add $0 to $300 per day, and most visitors spend $328.90 to $499 per person on the core tour day.

Two rules keep the budget honest. First, per-group prices are not per person: the private charters at from $6,000 and from $8,500 divide across the whole boat, and one fishing and boat charter lists from $1,006.49 printed "per person" on its page, with private pricing varying by group size, so confirm on the booking page before assuming anything. Second, the tour price usually absorbs the landing fees: the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park charges charter vessels BSD 6.36 per person at most park locations, or BSD 12.73 with a guided Warderick Wells tour, plus 10% VAT, and operators normally fold these into the headline price. Compass Cay's $15 day-use fee works the same way.

Entry and exit costs sit outside the tour budget. The Bahamas requires passports valid for at least six months for non-citizens, no visa for US, Canadian and UK visitors staying under three months, and a departure tax of $29 per person aged six and over, typically collected inside the airfare. The Bahamas entry requirements guide covers the arrival card and the new digital arrival card pilot.

The Crystal Bay private boat and fishing charter, from $1,006.49 with pricing that varies by group size, splits the difference between a group tour and a full private day. Explore the charter option Check availability.

When Is The Best Time To Plan Exuma Activities?

The best window for Exuma activities is December to May, when seas are calmer, water clarity is at its peak and the hurricane season, which runs 1 June to 30 November with its busiest stretch in August to October, is over. Boat tours can be rescheduled or cancelled in rough weather at any time of year, so keep a flexible day in your plan.

That is the standard answer, and it holds, but late October deserves a fairer hearing than it usually gets. Sea temperatures in Exuma were reading around 29 degrees Celsius in the final week of October, warm by any standard, and no active tropical systems were listed near the Bahamas at that point. The tradeoff is risk, not comfort: a shoulder-season visit can mean quieter cays and lower crowds, balanced against a real chance a tour day gets bumped. Any booking with free cancellation is worth preferring in this window for exactly that reason.

Getting there is also getting easier. American Airlines will operate three daily nonstop flights from Miami to Exuma International Airport from 17 December 2026 through 5 April 2027, on top of the existing year-round Miami service, and the airport already fields seasonal routes from Atlanta and Charlotte.

What to pack barely changes between seasons: reef-safe sunscreen, a hat, sunglasses, a towel, a waterproof phone pouch and water shoes, per the packing lists local operators publish. The what to bring on an Exuma boat tour guide has the full checklist, and best time to visit Exuma weighs crowd levels against weather month by month.

On the water, one protected-area rule outranks everything else on this page. The Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, established in 1958 as the first marine reserve in the wider Caribbean, is a strict no-take zone: no fishing, no conching, no shelling, nothing living or dead leaves the park. Wardens and Royal Bahamas Defence Force officers enforce it with fines and potential vessel confiscation. Tours passing through comply as a matter of course; the Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park tour guide explains where the boundaries actually fall, and the Bahamas National Trust sets out the rules on its official park page.

Before any of it, if you are still deciding whether the whole destination justifies the effort, Exuma Tours exists to answer exactly that question with honest, current figures rather than brochure copy, and the Ministry of Tourism's own swimming pigs page is worth a read for the official framing of the islands' most famous residents. Entry rules for your citizenship are on the official entry requirements page.

Common Questions About Things To Do In Exuma