In a recent newsletter, anthropologist Tricia Allen described her trip to the 2004 Pacific Islands Festival of the Arts in Palau. For ten days in July, over 4,000 delegates from 27 island nations gathered to celebrate Pacific art and culture. Just three months later, Mark Burnett’s SURVIVOR crew invaded Koror, the capital city of Palau. Within days, they’d turned tents into workshops and taken temporary possession of Palau’s islands and waterways. Six weeks later, SURVIVOR departed, leaving few traces of their presence. After a landmark year, Palau returned to tropical slumber.

There is no better time than now to visit Palau, and there is no better place than Palau to visit. For Americans, Palau is an uncomplicated travel destination. Once a UN Trust Territory under US administration, Palau officially became a sovereign nation during President Bill Clinton’s term in 1994. The currency is the US dollar, credit cards are widely accepted, visas are not required and most residents speak English. In addition, the water is safe to drink and the country is virtually crime-free.

This may be why so many visitors never leave! While traversing the seas on a 4-year around-the-world sailing trip in the ‘80s, Tova and Navot Bornovski fell in love with Palau. They hired on as cook and divemaster at Fish n’ Fins. Then owner Francis Toribiong had spent his childhood fishing and snorkeling the reefs around Palau, so when Jacques Yves Cousteau visited Palau in the 1960’s, he hired young Francis to help navigate the waters. In 1965, Francis became one of the first Palauans to experience the undersea world beneath his home. In 1972, Francis, now a newly graduated anthropologist from the University of California, brought the first dive compressors and SCUBA tanks to Palau. He then opened Fish 'n Fins, Palau’s first dive shop. Tova and Navot bought the business from their friend Francis in 1998, and now run the dive shop, head an experienced staff of tour guides and operate the liveaboards, Ocean Hunter I & II.

Sam Scott, originally from Olympia, Washington, moved to Palau in 1982 at the age of 20 to join his step-father who had become the Paramount High Chief or "Ibedul" of Koror, a powerful position in Palau's ancient traditional clan system. In 1990, he founded Sam’s Tours, offering dive, sportsfishing, and other land and water tours in the area. In the past few years, Sam’s Tours has noticed increased interest in snorkeling and kayak tours, jungle hikes, history and cultural explorations, birding expeditions and city tours to the local aquarium and museums.

The majority of tourists come to Palau for the diving Jacques Cousteau once called, "the best in the world." One dive operation, NECO Marine, started life in a cargo container parked on the shoreline in 1984. Spearheaded by Shallum Etpison, the son of a former President of Palau, and his wife Mandy, the dive shop is now working out of a new $3 million dollar facility.

Eco-tourism is evident at Jellyfish Lake, a saltwater marine lake connected to the ocean by underwater tunnels. This isolated ecosystem has evolved a unique species of jellyfish that, free from ocean-going predators, has lost the ability to sting. Snorkelers are able to swim among literally thousands of drifting transparent jellyfish. Closely monitored by the Koror State Rangers, tour guides supervise all groups entering the fragile environment. Swimmers are encouraged to move slowly and carefully to avoid harming the jellyfish and to leave their fins on the shore.