Spanish Steps...Snorkeling Heaven

Josh’s and my first big outing in Guam was to a secluded beach on the Navy Base known as Spanish Steps. The beach gets its name from the historical trail leading down to it. The trail was supposedly created for water to be hauled up to the Spanish forts from the well down at the base of the cliff. It must have been a long, difficult haul, for the trail is quite steep. True to its name, there are some steps at the top of the trail, but further down the trail gets rather dicey. In fact, there are some spots where a rope is anchored on trees for you to use as support against slipping. They say it’s a mile hike down, though it really didn’t feel quite that far. Once you get to the bottom of the cliff, you still have a fair way to walk through a true jungle, complete with lizards, hermit crabs, butterflies, and lots and lots of mosquitoes. When you reach the remains of the old Spanish well, you have a choice to make: left, to the snorkeling coves, or right, to the actual beach with breaking waves and a terrific view. You really can’t go wrong, though Josh and I are now partial to the snorkeling coves. They are simply serene! And, due to the effort required to get there, they are almost completely deserted.

Josh and I brought a picnic lunch down the cliff with us, and our first order of business was a quick snack. Then, we wrapped our things up and ran out into the water. We could have snorkeled for hours! There were so many interesting fish swimming around. We saw fish that closely resembled Dori from Finding Nemo, giant sea slugs that looked just like octopus tentacles, beautiful black and white striped fish, itty bitty electric blue colored fish, and feisty gray fish that jumped for joy at the hot and spicy Vienna sausages we fed them. At one point, as we snorkeled over a school of miniscule baby fish accompanied by a few adult fish, one of the adult fish came up and nipped me on the finger. Either he was trying to protect his babies, he was grouchy, or he wanted more Vienna sausages…I’m not sure which! Anyway, we were totally enamored with all the fish. It was amazing to have this huge tropical aquarium all to ourselves.

When we could snorkel no more, we went back to the beach to have our lunch, only to find…giant hermit crab thieves! Except, oddly enough, the only things they appeared to be interested in were our napkins. They had stolen all of our napkins and dragged them over to a nearby rock. I suppose they intended to shred them, but we didn’t give them the pleasure. After we recovered our napkins we heard rustling all around, and many more hermit crabs began coming out of various parts of the jungle. We must have offended them! In the future, perhaps we’ll bring a spare napkin or two as a peace offering…

Despite heavy rainfall that began on our hike up the cliff at the end of the day, Josh and I completely fell in love with all aspects of Spanish Steps. Unfortunately, this particular beach is rarely open due to its proximity to the ship port. In fact, many of the people we have spoken with who have lived here at least a year or more say that they have never been to this beach because of its frequent closures. So, I suppose we were lucky to catch it right away. We’ll have to pay close attention to its schedule in the future, because it’s definitely one we want to return to!