Recommendations for great snorkeling destinations

Although I have dived before, I'm not very confident in the water. I'm primarily interested in photography, but I've often found a conflict in that I'm nowhere near confident enough to bring a camera diving.

For these reasons, snorkeling works very well for me. Easily the best place I've ever been was Lady Elliot Island in Queensland, Australia. What I loved was that during high tide I could snorkel for several hours every day. Most corals + fish were in under 6 feet of water - which also meant that I was able to use ambient light to photograph. This also allowed me to get eye level view of many of the critters without needing to dive - and I didn't have to worry about bubbles. Also, my favorite spots were easily accessible from the beach - so no special tours were necessary.

Several of the shots I took are at http://www.calevphoto.com/p27426112#h70fbeab1 For my next snorkeling trip I plan to add a better camera body + strobes.

What I would greatly appreciate is recommendations for more places around the world where I can plop in off the beach and snorkel in relatively shallow water.

Thank you for your time.

Hi kirispupis!

You've got some lovely pics there - and very impressive for snorkelling. Well done!

Couple of thoughts on possible destinations:

Bonaire (Netherlands Antilles off the coast of Venezuela) is good for shore "diving" which makes for easy snorkelling. Although not all the many island sites are good snorkel spots, some should work well - and Klein Bonaire (a very short boat ride) would offer some good corals and critters in about 15'. And Bonaire is pretty easy to get to from the US.

And then some islands in the Maldives are good. I'd suggest Vilhamendhoo, part of South Ari Atoll. Its an "island getaway" style resort, cracking food and very good snorkelling.

Jackson Reef in the Egyptian part off the Red Sea (accessible from Sharm El-Sheikh) is also good snorkelling. You have to get there by boat though and it can be a bit crowded - although with all that is going on in the world maybe not as crowded as it was!