Espiritu Santo & Malekula

Espiritu Santo is the largest island in Vanuatu by area, and Luganville is its main town — Vanuatu's second city. The island's primary international draw is the SS President Coolidge, a 200 m American President Lines troopship converted to a troop carrier that struck two American mines in 1942 and sank in 20 to 73 m of water just offshore from Luganville. The wreck is accessible from the beach on the flood tide with a surface swim, making it the world's largest diveable shipwreck reachable without a boat. Million Dollar Point, 3 km from Luganville, is where the American military bulldozed millions of dollars of surplus equipment — vehicles, ammunition, machinery — into the sea at the war's end rather than sell it to the French and British colonial administration at their asking price. The rusting equipment now forms a reef and a snorkel/dive site. Malekula, the second-largest island, is a 45-minute flight south and remains one of the most culturally diverse islands in Vanuatu, with dozens of distinct languages. The Santo coast faces the Pacific and the Coral Sea; tidal regime is semidiurnal, spring range 1.0 to 1.5 m. Predictions come from Open-Meteo Marine (gridded model, ±45 min / ±0.2–0.3 m).