Town Pier is the best-known night dive in the Caribbean and at the same time the site with the most conditions: you may only enter with the harbourmaster's permission and under the guidance of a local dive school. Without those two it does not go ahead — that is not advice but a rule.
Town Pier is a guided night dive in Kralendijk under the harbour pier: densely overgrown pilings to twelve metres, accessible only with the harbourmaster's permission and a local guide.
The pilings are densely covered from top to bottom with orange and purple sponges, soft corals and oysters, with a density of colour you see nowhere else on the island. Between the pilings sit seahorses, frogfish and brittle stars. The deepest point lies around twelve metres.
Only at night, only when no ship is berthed or expected, and only with a guide who has arranged the permission. Book this through a dive school, not on your own.
You depend on permission that can lapse on the day itself. The pilings stand close together: with a camera and poor trim you touch all sorts of things. It is shallow and looks simple, but it is a dive within a structure. No room for large groups.
Decisions on diveability, technique and health belong with STINAPA, a dive school or a doctor. This page only describes the conditions.
The pier belongs to the harbour of Kralendijk and is still in use for cargo; that is why diving is only possible when there is no shipping. The growth on the pilings is exceptional because the light from the quay draws plankton at night and the structure offers shelter.
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