scuba diving destinations

The hottest dive spots — from the Caribbean to the Pacific — to beat the cold-weather blues!

North Carolina is well-known for its wreck diving — more than 650 ships sank off the Outer Banks, the state's barrier islands, between 1526 and 1945. This has given the area the nickname The Graveyard of the Atlantic. On land, western North Carolina consists of rolling hills that ascend to the Blue Ridge and Great Smokey Mountains. North Carolina was one of the 13 original colonies, and it was the last state to join the Confederacy in the Civil War.

Where three bodies of water converge, expect off-the-charts biodiversity — in this 7,000- island archipelago that forms the northern end of the Coral Triangle, the Pacific Ocean, South China Sea and Celebes Sea meet to support 2,000 marine species.

There are a few places in the world that require studying a tidal chart when planning the day’s diving, but perhaps nowhere else with as much South Pacific romantic beauty as the islands of French Polynesia. High tide brings you elbow-to-fin with sharks, dolphins, tunas and other hunters when you try “pass diving,” a signature Tahitian experience. Fly like Superman through the small inlets funneling into lagoon pools. This is shark diving at its finest: Encounter gray reef, silvertip, silky, whitetip reef, blacktip reef, milk, lemon, great hammerhead and tiger sharks.