New York’s Beloved Waterfront Restaurant Makes a Splash in The Bahamas with New Atlantis Paradise Island Location

PARADISE ISLAND BAHAMAS – (JUNE 18, 2025) – One of the most anticipated new openings at Atlantis Paradise Island, Claudio’s Bahamas brings the legendary energy of its sister restaurant in Greenport, New York, to the heart of the Caribbean. Overlooking the Water’s Edge Lagoon at The Coral, the new eatery blends East Coast heritage with Bahamian vibrancy—serving fresh seafood, seasonal favorites, and timeless island cocktails in a soulful, nautical setting.

Guests can enjoy signature dishes from the original location, a cherished East Coast staple for over a century. Famous menu items include Calamari with preserved lemon aioli; Baked Clams topped with peppers, onions, double-smoked bacon, panko, and parmesan; and Claudio’s Lobster Roll, a fan favorite served on brioche challah with brown butter, celery, lemon aioli, and chives.

Selection of Signature Dishes – Claudio’s Bahamas

To complement the familiar favorites, Claudio’s Bahamas offers a selection of dishes unique to the location, showcasing the vibrant flavors of the islands. Signature dishes include decadent Lobster Mac n’ Cheese, featuring a creamy four-cheese blend and crispy bacon panko topping; Fish Goujons & Fries, made with Nassau grouper in a Kalik batter and served with mint tartar sauce; Crispy Wings tossed in guava goat pepper sauce; Shrimp Loaded Fries with garlic shrimp, avocado mousse, sour cream, and pico de gallo; Sticky Ribs with crispy onions and homemade sticky BBQ sauce; Veal Milanese with lemon-caper butter, parmesan, cherry tomatoes, arugula, and panko; Conch Fritters with sweet peppers, onion, and a spicy sauce; and Conch Chowder, served in a rye bread bowl with potatoes, onions, carrots, applewood smoked bacon, topped with double cream and parsley.

Claudio’s Bahamas also offers a stylish, new late-night scene, enhancing the resort’s offering of evening experiences. The beverage program features a global wine list, refreshing beers, and classic Caribbean cocktails. Highlights include a Mudslide with vodka, coffee-flavored liqueurs, sugar reduction, and milk; Sky Juice with dry gin, coconut water, heavy cream, condensed milk, and nutmeg; Captain Claudio’s Bloody Mary-one of the most famous drinks from Claudio’s Greenport, is an eye catching cocktail stacked high with stone crab, shrimp, bacon, olives, jalapenos, vodka, Worcestershire sauce, lime juice, hot sauce, and tomato juice; Frozen Miami Vice, this must-try cocktail, has vodka, strawberry and coconut slush; and Junkanoo Punch, inspired by the festive Bahamian tradition, includes rum, blackberry liquor, lemon juice, grenadine, orange juice, and pineapple juice.

Capturing the spirit of the ocean, the sophisticated nautical design features soothing blue hues, natural wood tones, and expansive, floor-to-ceiling windows. The dining room is centered around an interactive display of colorful fiberglass sailboats suspended from the ceiling. Inspired by an award-winning Bahamian Class E sailboat that competed in regattas throughout the Bahamas, each sailboat is named after classic Caribbean cocktails, like the Painkiller, Yellow Bird, and the Bahama Mama. Claudio’s Bahamas dining room leads to a large patio and shaded gazebo bar, offering stunning lagoon views and the perfect backdrop for sunset vistas. The restaurant is equipped with multiple large-screen TVs, ensuring guests never miss a live sporting or entertainment event. The outdoor terrace, featuring twinkle lights and a lively DJ on weekends, creates an energetic atmosphere for diners and visitors. With two semi-private dining rooms, Claudio’s Bahamas is ideal for groups of all sizes – from social events to birthday parties, family reunions, and bachelor/bachelorette celebrations.

Bar Area – Claudio’s Bahamas

“As the only resort in the region to offer unmatched culinary experiences, Atlantis Paradise Island continues to lead the way in innovation thanks to our incredible food and beverage team,” said Audrey Oswell, President and Managing Director of Atlantis Paradise Island. “We’re thrilled that Claudio’s, an iconic brand with over 150 years of history, chose Atlantis for its first international location, further solidifying our reputation as a world-class destination for dining and hospitality. This partnership brings together two storied brands that share a deep commitment to excellence in service, entertainment, and guest experience—uniting the best of the best under one roof.”

“We’re excited to introduce Claudio’s renowned East Coast legacy to the Bahamas for the very first time,” said Celeste Fierro, Managing Partner of Claudio’s. “Claudio’s Bahamas is a celebration of heritage and hospitality, where timeless nautical charm meets the vibrant soul of the islands. We can’t wait to welcome guests and invite them to experience the next chapter of Claudio’s right here in paradise.”

Claudio’s Bahamas is open all day for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and late-night dining. Dining is available until 2 a.m., and the bar remains open until 3 a.m.

For more information about Atlantis Paradise Island and Claudio’s Bahamas, please visit atlantisparadise.com, @atlantisbahamas and @claudiosbahamas.

CONTACT:

Erika Garcia-Lavyne                                          Lauren Clark

Atlantis Paradise Island                                    Chapman Communications Group

954-224-1972

erika.lavyne@atlantisparadise.com               lauren@chapmancommunicationsgroup.com

Open-source workflow from Perry Institute for Marine Science researchers enables automated data processing, arming reef managers worldwide with rapid, easy-to-use solutions for large area imaging.

Media Contact:

Written by Lily Haines | PIMS | WhatsApp +1 (613) 791-6045 | lhaines@perryinstitute.org

June 17, 2025—NASSAU | Coral reefs cover less than one percent of the ocean floor yet anchor a quarter of all marine life. Protecting them has been the Perry Institute for Marine Science’s (PIMS) mission for more than 50 years—work that spans cutting-edge coral restoration, fisheries research and the Caribbean-wide Reef Rescue Network of coral nurseries.

Now PIMS scientists, working with Arizona State University, have unveiled ReefShape, an automated photogrammetry pipeline that converts thousands of underwater photographs into millimeter-accurate, 3-D and 2-D reef maps in hours instead of days. Their method, published this week in the Journal of Visualized Experiments (JoVE), gives managers from Abaco to Zanzibar a practical and streamlined way to track bleaching, storm damage and restoration success at the millimeter scale.

“We needed a method that’s easy to teach, automatic, and lets us focus on actually saving coral reefs rather than just making maps of them,” said lead author Will Greene, photogrammetry specialist and research scientist at PIMS.

The reef-mapping bottleneck

Photogrammetry—the digital alchemy that converts overlapping photos into lifelike 3D models—has transformed archaeology, forestry and even Hollywood. Yet under water it has remained a specialist’s sport: equipment can top US $20,000, and the software pipeline still relies on hours of manual clicks. In the meantime reefs around the world bleach, crumble or succumb to disease weeks before new data reach managers’ desks.

Headquartered in the United States, PIMS is a non-profit research organisation dedicated to ocean conservation and community engagement around the world. Through its flagship Reef Rescue Network—the region’s largest coalition of coral nurseries—PIMS has already planted tens of thousands of elkhorn, staghorn and fused staghorn corals throughout the Caribbean, restored critical reef habitat, and trained hundreds of local divers, students and tourism operators in reef-monitoring techniques. PIMS also leads research on sustainable fisheries, mangrove and seagrass restoration, and partners with governments to translate science into policy that safeguards coastal livelihoods.

Three simple upgrades

Turning big-picture conservation goals into on-the-ground action—and doing it fast enough to matter—meant re-engineering reef mapping for the realities of a dive boat. Instead of inventing another costly gadget, Greene’s team asked what the absolute essentials were and how to make each one fool-proof. The answer distilled into three simple upgrades that, together, turn a labour-intensive workflow into a backpack-friendly kit:

1. Permanent corner markers. Four dinner-plate-sized markers drilled into the reef plot corners act as digital anchor points. Software recognises them automatically, snapping every future survey into perfect alignment.
2. Phone-based GPS logging. A free Survey123 form guides divers to collect surface positions and depth readings of the markers, then formats the data for the processing script—no spreadsheets, transcribing coordinates, or typos.

A fully scripted pipeline. Custom Python code drives Agisoft Metashape processing through a graphic interface, whizzing through image alignment, mesh generation, orthomosaic building, data export and even structural-complexity metrics with no keyboard input beyond run.

From dive to desktop in 1 hour 58 minutes

Using the fully automated ReefShape script, a 200 square meter, 1,300-image reef plot can be processed in under 2 hours on a modern laptop—roughly 400 percent faster than the same dataset handled with earlier, semi-manual workflows. Even on 2018-era hardware, the scripted pipeline still shaved hours off turnaround because most of the speed-up comes from automation and careful workflow optimization, not brute processor power.

Stress-tested during a record heatwave                                                                                                                                                        ReefShape’s coming-of-age moment arrived during the record marine heatwave that washed over The Bahamas in August 2023. Having surveyed Simms Point Reef seven months earlier, the team returned with a camera and retraced their path above the permanent markers. Hours later, side-by-side mosaics revealed that over 90 percent of corals in several species had bleached completely, while a handful of colonies clung to colour.

“That immediate feedback lets us prioritise restoration sites and share data with partners before the next storm hits,” says Dr. Craig Dahlgren, PIMS executive director and co-author on the new paper. “It’s like switching from film to livestream.”

Democratizing a critical tool

Everything needed to utilize the workflow—recommended camera system, field equipment, a suitable computer and software—comes in around US $5,000 ($8,000 without educational software discounts). The scripts and step-by-step manual live for free on GitHub, and the authors encourage anyone mapping coral, seagrass, mangroves or shipwrecks to fork and improve the code.

The design is deliberately tolerant: while the protocol gives specific instructions for researchers wanting a cookbook-style approach, it works for plots from 25 m² to > 1,000 m², depths down to 30 m, any camera system and swim pattern with sufficient overlap, and on any recent computer. The ReefShape software includes adjustable controls to suit different data collection strategies and researcher needs while remaining streamlined and easy to use, automatically exporting data pre-formatted for analysis in free software packages like QGIS or TagLab.

Why it matters

Coral reefs occupy less than one per cent of the ocean floor yet shelter a quarter of marine speciesand buffer tropical coastlines from storms.

With mass-bleaching events now recurring every few years, conservationists need diagnostics that are fast, cheap and repeatable—tools that turn snapshots into time-lapse. ReefShape, its creators argue, is a step toward that future.                                                                                                                  “Our goal wasn’t another complex method,” says Greene, now completing a PhD at Arizona State University on GIS-driven 3-D reef mapping. “It was to hand every reef manager a simple, comprehensive monitoring tool, then get out of the way so they can use it.”

ReefShape was developed by Will Greene, Sam Marshall, Dr. Jiwei Li and Dr. Craig Dahlgren, with funding from the Disney Conservation Fund and the U.S. National Science Foundation. Fieldwork was conducted under permits from the Bahamas Department of Environmental Planning & Protection. Full documentation and code: https://github.com/Perry-Institute/ReefShape.

PHOTO CAPTION:

1st insert: Time-series aligned imagery of Simm’s Point Reef in New Providence before (left) and during (right) the 2023 mass bleaching event. The data were processed automatically in ReefShape, allowing researchers to rapidly analyze the extent and severity of the bleaching event (bottom panel), uncovering different patterns among the various coral species present.

3rd insert: The ReefShape field kit—ready for a single-tank survey. (A) Mirrorless camera with wide-angle rectilinear lens; (B) matching underwater housing and dome port; (C) Bluetooth-enabled “kickboard” GPS for surface positioning; (D) reusable coded corner markers that lock each plot to precise coordinates; and (E) coded scale bars that set the model’s exact dimensions.

Video caption:

Fly-through of a ReefShape 3D model of a coral reef: a centimetre-scale, colour-true reconstruction that lets scientists measure coral growth, bleaching and erosion without getting wet.

— The nation’s first coral gene bank will preserve, propagate and replant coral to reverse devastation from rising ocean temperatures and a rapidly spreading disease –

PARADISE ISLAND, The Bahamas (June 13, 2025) — The Bahamas has launched an aggressive national conservation initiative to address and reverse the devastating effects of warming ocean temperatures and a disease ravaging its coral reefs. The country’s first coral gene bank is operated and managed by coral experts from the Perry Institute of Marine Science. The biosecure facility opened today at Atlantis Paradise Island to house, propagate, and replant healthy coral on damaged reefs.

“Coral has become increasingly endangered over the years, but the introduction of Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease completely changed the game and created extreme urgency to act,” said Perry Institute for Marine Science (PIMS) Executive Director Dr. Craig Dahlgren. “Transmitted among corals through direct contact and water circulation, the disease has spread to all major Bahamian islands and causes a high death rate in corals. Treatments are emerging slowly, but corals need to be rescued and isolated from the disease while these methods are perfected.”

Part of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums’ global Saving Animals from Extinction (SAFE) program, onsite management of the new bank is led by PIMS experts, including a former Bahamas Agriculture and Marine Science Institute (BAMSI) graduate and student interns from BAMSI and the University of The Bahamas, with support from marine-life experts at Atlantis.

“Our collective vision is not only to preserve coral currently under threat, but also to foster new generations of corals that, when planted, are more resilient to disease and other dangers. Longstanding support and funding from our contributors and supporters, including Disney Conservation Fund, Atlantis Paradise Island, and Atlantis Blue Project Foundation, have been essential in making this national effort possible.”

“Our investment in the Coral Gene Bank builds on Disney’s decades-long commitment to protecting coral in The Bahamas,” said Andy Stamper, Conservation Science Manager for Disney Conservation. “This facility is a vital step toward preserving biodiversity and restoring reef health for generations to come.”

The Bahamas Coral Gene Bank can accommodate up to 200 large, mature coral colonies, in addition to smaller fragments and juvenile corals. PIMS has already rescued and relocated fifteen coral species to the biosecure Gene Bank research facility. Coral fragments collected from the ocean are placed in pristine, on-site aquaria, and once stable, they grow and reproduce quickly with the aid of innovative reproduction techniques such as lunar-cycle simulations.

PHOTO CAPTIONS:

Header:  A proud moment for coral conservation: Scientists from Perry Institute for Marine Science, Atlantis, and partner organizations stand over the newly established coral gene bank at Atlantis Paradise Island, having just populated its tanks with rescued coral colonies.

 1st insert: One coral at a time—This fragment of a highly susceptible coral species is now safe inside the Bahamas Coral Gene Bank. Here, it can grow and reproduce under expert care, protected from the deadly Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease.

2nd insert: Hope in their hands: Two coral researchers at the Bahamas Coral Gene Bank share a moment of joy after placing healthy coral colonies into their new biosecure home—an act that could help restore entire reef systems.

About the Perry Institute for Marine Science (PIMS):

For more than 50 years, Perry Institute for Marine Science (PIMS) has advanced ocean stewardship around the world. Guided by our vision “Thriving Seas, Empowered Communities,” our scientists pair cutting‑edge research with hands-on conservation to protect coral reefs, mangroves, fisheries, and coastal habitats while supporting sustainable livelihoods. We collaborate with governments, NGOs, schools, and forward‑thinking businesses to turn data into action—whether restoring reefs through our Reef Rescue Network, mapping coastal ecosystems with drone and photogrammetry technology, or training the next generation of marine leaders. By discovering solutions, creating opportunities, and inspiring action, PIMS works to ensure a healthy ocean for people and the planet alike. Learn more at www.perryinstitute.org.