Curaçao's Cas Abao Beach

When our plans to see the Blue Room fell through on our last full day of our week in Curaçao, we decided to go see one of the most well-known beaches in Curaçao (Cas Abao Beach) and to snorkel off that beach.

Cas Abao Beach is listed as one of the world's best beaches in National Geographic's "21 Best Beaches in the World."

Although Cas Abao Beach is a beautiful beach with beautiful water, I think one of the reasons it gets more attention than some equally pretty (or arguably even prettier) beaches in Curaçao is the full range of services available (many of Curaçao's gorgeous beaches have few or no services). The Cas Abao Beach Facilities page lists parking, Wifi around the beach bar, beach chairs and palapas available to rent, restrooms with changing rooms, showers (requires token but a token is provided with a beach chair rental), and Beach Bar and Terrace.

Admission to the beach ($6 USD per vehicle with four people or fewer) is paid at a stand and then there is a passable dirt road to the beach's dirt parking lot.

Snorkeling really close to the beach is not great because of low water visibility, but the snorkeling gets really interesting and with better visibility as one swims out along the rocks on the left side (when facing the water from the beach and as shown in the next photograph).

The ocean floor becomes more interesting and the water visibility improves quickly as one moves away from the beach.

Not surprisingly, the coral and more interesting ocean floor mean more fish too.

I really enjoyed (and took a lot of GoPro photographs) of this area near the rock wall where the fish were staying in one apparently favorite place and gracefully floated back to the place whenever a current pulled them back.

This is another spot near the rocks that I enjoyed simply floating above and watching the fish.

As you swim toward the end of the rocks towards the open ocean, the seafloor drops quickly, opening up the depths for a different view.

We had arrived at Cas Abao Beach just a couple hours before closing time and the beach was really quiet when we were ready to leave.

Watching the sun beginning to set made Cas Abao Beach even more beautiful.