Pig Beach Excursion from Nassau Overview
This pig beach excursion from nassau takes you by speedboat to the Exumas, where you'll swim alongside the famous swimming pigs at Big Major Cay in crystal-clear Bahamian waters. Most pig beach excursion from nassau tours include snorkeling at Thunderball Grotto, visits to Allen's Cay to feed iguanas, and a stop at a pristine sandbar, offering a full day exploring the Exuma Cays.
Big Major Cay earned its nickname in the 1990s when sailors released a small herd of domestic pigs onto the uninhabited island, likely intending to return for a future meal that never materialized. The animals adapted, learning to swim out to passing boats in search of food.
By 2010, the colony had grown to two dozen individuals, and tour operators from Nassau began offering pig beach day trip from nassau charters to the remote Exuma Cays.
Today the swimming pigs phenomenon draws fifty thousand visitors annually to a coastline accessible only by boat. Big Major Cay sits eighty nautical miles southeast of Nassau, requiring a two-hour speedboat crossing or a thirty-minute seaplane flight over the Exuma Sound. The island itself spans three acres of coral sand and Australian pine, with no infrastructure beyond a shallow beach where the pigs congregate each morning. Tour groups from Nassau typically arrive between nine and eleven, when the animals are most active and the anchorage holds fewer than six boats. The pigs—descendants of that original herd—approach waist-deep water to accept carrots and lettuce from visitors, though feeding protocols now limit human contact to preserve the colony's health.
The excursion to pig beach from nassau became a signature Bahamian experience after a 2014 viral photo campaign, but the site's popularity has raised conservation questions. In 2017, seven pigs died after tourists fed them alcohol and processed snacks, prompting the Bahamas Humane Society to implement visitor guidelines. Current regulations prohibit feeding anything beyond approved vegetables, and tour operators brief passengers on approach distances and photography conduct. The Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, which manages the surrounding marine reserve, patrols the island weekly.
Beyond the pigs, Big Major Cay sits at the northern edge of the Exuma chain, a 365-island archipelago defined by tidal flats and visibility exceeding one hundred feet. Charter operators bundle pig beach bahamas tour from nassau itineraries with snorkeling stops at Thunderball Grotto—a limestone cave system featured in two James Bond films—and lunch anchorages at Staniel Cay, where nurse sharks circle the yacht club docks. The full-day circuit covers forty nautical miles and returns to Nassau by late afternoon.
4 hr
