One group we met had 17 people, all friends from Poland, all here for diving. They had already dove at many of the popular locations around the island, including Million Dollar Point and the SS President Coolidge. Million Dollar Point is where US forces dumped a massive amount of machinery and vehicles at the end of WWII, by building a pier and simply driving the vehicles off the end (the French Government didn't want to pay for the equipment and the Americans didn't want to give it to them). The SS President Coolidge hit a land mine in 1942 and sank right off the shore. Luckily it was close enough to shore that all but a very few people were able to escape safely. Many artifacts, from Coke bottles to eyeglasses to medicine bottles, are still on the ship and make it an extremely interesting dive.
The Polish group we met was very nice, and invited us to dive with them at the Blue Hole right outside Luganville. This is a very clear, startling blue freshwater lagoon, fed by a river, which is fed by a spring. We went to the dive shop (Aquamarine; run by a very friendly Bermudian named Rehan) to get our gear rentals straightened out and met up with the group, early the morning of the dive.
After a short bus ride we arrived at the Blue Hole, donned our wetsuits, BCs, tanks, masks, and fins, and walked down the concrete stairs to enter the water. There weren't many fish, but the bottom, 15 meters down, was covered in very cool rock formations, and the water was so clear we could look up and see the trees that lined the shore. Vanuatu is a great place to SCUBA dive!
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