Swimming Pigs in the Bahamas
A few weeks ago while I was in the Bahamas I visited the famous Swimming Pigs on one the many (literally hundreds) Exuma Islands, Big Major Cay.
After I posted on instagram story at the Pig Beach and posted a few photos, I received SO many questions, and a lot of them were the same. At the end of this blog post I am answering all of those questions but first I’m going to talk about the logistics of this trip, how you can visit the swimming pigs, my experience and more details about the day trip.
You can skip logistics and go straight to the questions you all asked me or skip right to the end of the post where I share my tips and things to note before visiting the pigs.
The Swimming Pigs in Exuma, Bahamas
A day trip is a super popular option, although you can stay in the Exuma cays. Staniel Cay is the closet island to the pigs that you can stay on. If you aren’t staying in the Exuma cays (I was not, click to learn about the hotel I stayed at), you can take a day trip there to go to the pig beach. The tour company we worked with was Staniel Cay Vacations and I would highly recommend them!
There’s a ton of tour companies with a variety of excursion packages that can get you there. To get to Pig Beach from Nassau, (which is the most common island that people stay on and is where I stayed during my Bahamas trip) you can either take a boat ride or take a flight. We took a flight, our flight to Exuma from the Nassau international airport took 30 minutes. When we were planning our day trip, I noticed that most of the excursions available included a boat ride to Exuma instead of a flight to the pig swimming beach. The boat rides take around 2 hours to arrive to the Exuma islands.
The Pigs Running up to our boat as we were pulling up to the Island (I have a youtube video with this moment in it that is at the bottom of this post if you are interested)
We took a private tour for our day trip to Exuma but I saw several of the group tours and a lot looked very nice. Pig Island was our first stop because our tour guide for the day told us how crowded this location gets as the day goes on.
So if it is in your control in any way, I would highly recommend getting to pig beach as early as possible. We arrived at 9 am, this was supposed to be the least crowded that it was going to be all day. There was probably around 15 other people there while we were.
Because we took a private tour, we were in control of how long we stayed at the pig beach, however, I noticed most of the tours I saw coming in were staying on the island for an average of about 30 minutes.
YOUR QUESTIONS
Are the pigs aggressive?
Yes, they can be, especially the adults. They are used to getting fed and look for food most of the time you are around them, so if you don’t have any food, make sure to hold your hands up to show the pigs that they’re empty to avoid any problems.
Do they bite? I’ve seen a lot of videos of people getting bit.
The pigs can bite but I did not see it happen while I was there, just be cautious and aware and you should be totally fine!
How crowded is the island?
It get’s very crowded, like I said above; go as early as you can!
Can the pigs actually swim?
Yep! It’s really so amazing to watch, I was in awe .
Did you step in poop?
I almost did probably ten times! But I was not paying attention very well to my surroundings because I was so excited!
Is there a special spot for the small/baby pigs on the island?
The island is pretty small so you can’t miss the baby piglets! They were all laying together in one area away from the water, which is where most of the bigger pigs hangout waiting for tourists to feed them.
Are their workers on the island?
Nope! Just all of the adorable pigs, well beside tour guides and other tourists :)
POINTS TO NOTE AND MY TIPS
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If it is in your control in any way, I would highly recommend getting to pig beach as early as possible. I arrived at 9 am, my tour guide told me that this was probably the least crowded that it was going to be all day.
Thunderstorms hit this area pretty often and will cause your tour to be cancelled if one hits the day you are planning to travel there, definitely check the weather forecast (though I always feel it’s never super accurate) and make sure you are conscious about the weather before the morning of your trip.
Please please please do not go to pig beach unless you are 100% going to see the animals with good intentions. I encounter a tour group that seemed a bit frightened of the pigs and it translated into them being a bit aggressive towards the pigs.
DON’t yell at the pigs, treat them poorly, scare, hurt, you know what’s right and wrong, (I hope!) I encountered a tour guide that I felt was very aggressive and was yelling at the pigs, it made me super uncomfortable and mad. I wish I knew the name of this group so I could not recommend them!
Make sure you bring food with you to feed the pigs if you want them to come close to you! Our tour guide provided us with lettuce to feed the pigs, which I highly suggest; who knows how often anyone brings them something healthy to eat?!
Overall, I highly recommend having this experience and I’m pretty sure I will be back one day (more like 100% sure) I hope I covered everything that you were interested in knowing but please let me know if not and I will get back to you!!
Feeding the pigs can be very simple and this sweet!!
