Bonaire March 5th to 12th

Flight: Took AJ from Chicago to MoBay to Bonaire, on time all the way, no problems.
Flight back different story, 21\2 hours late leaving MoBay, that made a 5 hour layover, plane full and my seat would not recline. Not a fun trip home, plus they broke one of our suitcases, waiting to find out if they will be doing anything about it. Bet not.

Accommodations:
We stayed at The Golden Reef Inn, Loved it! Quiet, relaxing, peaceful, everything we wanted.
Liz you have a great place and we will be back. Thank you!

Dining:
We had breakfast and lunches in our room, thanks to all the tips from people on here we brought our own cereal and lunchmeat and sandwich things from home.
The first night we had sushi at the Imperial Japanese Restaurant .
Everything was great loved it all, if you like sushi then don’t miss this place. Excellent service, Excellent food.
Sunday we went to Casablanca, We both had the Baby back ribs. Ribs were wonderful, Service was great, enough food that we took some home for another dinner.
Went Morgan's Tavern on Monday, Was ok, food was good service was ok. I ordered steak with grilled potatoes with mushroom sauce. Somehow I didn’t get potatoes instead they brought out steamed cauliflower in butter sauce. No clue how that happened, they did replace it with the grilled potatoes.
Jena had the grilled galic chicken and it was good.
Tue we were going to go to Gibbi’s for BT dinner but ended up doing night dive to Town Pier with Bas from Photo Tours. Ended up having leftovers from Casablanca. Great as leftovers.
Wed we went to Lions Den, Had the shrimp on asparagus with hollandaise sauce appetizer, wonderful. We both had the Lions Den Cheeseburger..I know exotic but it hit the spot. Best we ever had. Service was great.
Thursday we went to a Bonfire and BBQ with night dive that Photo Tours put on. Food was great, company from all over the world was great, night dive great. Glad we went.
Friday we went back for more sushi at Imperial, Once again everything was wonderful.
One thing that did seem a bit odd, We were eating sushi, while listening to Mexican Mariachi music from Karls across the street while in the Caribbean.
Saturday we went for lunch at Zeezicht, Once again everything was wonderful.
Cant wait to go back the PBS is setting in.

Rental truck, We rented a truck from AB rentals. It was a truck, no problems till we left, dispute on how much gas was in truck when we picked it up. I lost. They charged me 25 dollars US for 1\8 tank of gas, a bit much as that will but in over 1\2 tank from Lisa’s.
Felt a bit cheated by them and attendants were indifferent. Also I would have liked a tail gate on the back of the truck instead of the net that was on it.

Bug and Mosquitoes:
Mosquitoes must have been away for the week didn’t see a one.
Ants on the other hand were plentiful and if you stood in the gravel to long they would attack. Sprayed Gravel with Off and didn’t stand around too long in gravel.
Diving:

We went to Bonaire to get in as much diving as possible, and we did.
We had unlimited air from Buddy Dive. They were great, always had tanks available and had no bad o-rings and all tanks were full. We started out taking two tanks each in the morning then coming back for one more set but by the end of the week we were taking 3 tanks each and it was fine with them at least no one said anything to us about it.
I made 22 dives and Jena 21 dives.
Total bottom time a little over 26 hours for me and a little over 25 hour for Jena.
Most of are dives were shallow as we could see more creatures and make dives last a little longer. Only made one deep dive and that was to the Hooker. 93 feet. Most other dives were to 45 to60 feet max, with most of the dive above 35 feet. We use Sunnto Cobra computers and kept a watch on are no deco time. Didn’t even come close.
List of dive sites:
Karpata, Oil Slick Leap (both day and night dive), Ol’ Blue, Andrea II, Buddys Reef (night dive and orientation dive),Yellow Submarine(night dive), Eden Beech to visit the Reefcam(took sign),Town Pier(night dive), Public Beech, North Belnam, Windsock, Hilma Hooker, Angel City, Alice in Wonderland, Larry’s Lair, Salt City, The Invisables, Pink Beech, Atlantis (night dive with Photo Tours), Cai.

Favorite Dive sites;
We went with Bas from Photo Tours to Cai, this was a great dive site we saw tons of creatures, 4 Eagle Rays, 3 Green Moray eels, school of Tarpon, Spotted lobsters, all 3 of the big parrot fish, Midnight, Rainbow, and Blue. Plus big Nassau Groupers and Tiger Groupers on feeding stations. Bas was great and we would recommend him and this dive to everyone.
Angel City was awesome as were all the other sites. I don’t think there is a bad dive site on the whole island. Didn’t see Seahorse or Frogfish but everything else. Saw a Hawksbill Turtle at Alice in Wonderland and one at Town Pier.

Oil Slick Leap was another favorite site, Jena really liked this one. She saw a Spanish lobster here along with a spotted lobster. Along with an octopus we watched change colors this was cool.

Hilma Hooker Have to see the Hooker or trip not complete.

Town Pier, Cant go to Bonaire without night dive here.

Night Dive at Buddy’s was awesome swam with the Tarpons for 30 min this was great fun for us.
I took 6 rolls of 36 of film and 5 of slides. Once again I proofed that I abuse film, but still ended up with a few good pics,

All in all we had fabulous trip and will be planning next trip soon. This was my second trip to Bonaire and Jena’s first. Hope AA has more flights into Bonaire and that AJ cleans up their act.

Jena and I

Visiting Reefcam

Reefcam

Sarge at reefcam

Eel under Reefcam

Matthew,

Great trip report and pictures! No picture of Bonaire (above or below water) is a bad picture!

Thanks for sharing.

Belinda
(11 days woo hooooooooo)

Belinda,
THanks and I know the woohoo of getting to Bonaire... how are you getting there, we drove to Chicago to catch AJ. AA out of St Louis was such a pain with all the stop overs and and late time getting into Bonaire

Thanks Matthew for your excellent trip report!

Mare

Matthew,

We fly AA - SGF to DFW, DFW to SJU, SJU to BON.

Coming home this time we are flying BON to SJU, SJU to ORD, ORD to SGF - thought that was interesting routing (since ORD is 400-450 miles north of SGF).

A LONG day - 14 hours - but we just can't bring ourselves to make a long drive home after we get back from vacation. SGF is an hour away from home and that is long enough!

With all the problems AJ is having right now I think I'm glad we are not booked through AJ.

Belinda
have I mentioned that in 11 days! I'll be on Bonaire :-)

Belinda, I am seething with jealousy... lol...

Belinda,

I LOVE when you mention "11 more days"....it reminds me that we only have 6 more days until we start our way south....arrive in 7 days...

Woo Hooooo from me , too

Loved your photo's and report!Matthew.MASHA DANKI!
Glad you had a great stay at The Golden Reef.
Liz and Ed were just taking it over last year.
They have such a great touch and know Bonaire very well.
Cann't wait to see the place and them.
Hope we have better luck with AJ in May!

Linda,

Where and how long are you staying? Maybe we'll see you at Gibi's!

Have a GREAT trip!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Belinda
10 more days now (yahooooooooooo)

Great report Matthew. My buddy and I plan on staying at The Golden Reef Inn, but not until September. Which type of room did you guys have. We are looking in a Villas in case our significant others decide to join us.

Charles,
We had the studio apt. IT was great, The Villa looked nice, and if we had gone with another couple then we would have taken the villa.
Matthew

Hello Linda, and all BT'ers
June and I have 11 WORKING days O-WELL
See you'all soon.
Buster

HI Buster - I hope to see you there - I will be on the island in 20 days and a wake up!! Are you going to Gibi's Tuesday nights while you are on the island?

Matthew - great pics and report!!! I am glad to hear that you enjoyed your stay at the Golden Reef Inn. Liz and Ed are great people and have done wonders with the Inn since they bought it!!

Charles have you talked to Liz about the rooms yet and what you need - she may have some more options for September - give her a call on the 800 number.

Mary,
Yes, Gibi's will be in our plans, Not sure about the 5th,need to pick up folks at the airport that evening. We went to Gibi"s last year and had a great time.
Buster

I will be at Gibi's on the 12th and hope to see you there.

If you make the 5th - my buddy for this trip (LaDonna Pride) will be there. She is lucky - she will get to 2 Tuesday nights at Gibi's. Though I think we will get there for dinner or lunch some other days too. He is a great cook - his food is always good!!!

Mary - I called Liz about a month ago and at that point it was just my buddy and I. I guess we seemed to excited about the trip because now it looks like we have convinced (don't ask me how) the wives to join us. I will give Liz a call back. How is the diving in September? I think I read somewhere that spawning(sponge coral) takes place around mid September. Only witnessed this once before in the Caymans last year.

Belinda, Buster, LaDonna -
I'm looking forward to Gibi's. I figured we'd drag Buster and June along with us on the 5th even through they have to go to the airport...it's close by . Beside the plane arrives late evening plus the time to get the bags......I think you can squeeze in some Goat Stew.

We also plan on March 29th.....See you all there.

5 days to lift off....Inn-sitters arrive tomorrow.

HAY ALL
Good report Matthew, Linda I will be watching the cams for you and AL, Gibi's could work the 5th
we will have to make it work after all that will be your last night. Would like you two meet Tim & Kathy anyway. GOAT STEW

Buster

Matthew - great report & pic's!
We met Liz & Ed at Gibi's in Feb & they're wonderful people only wish we could have spent more time with them. Gibi is great & his food is outstanding and his home-made desserts were to-die-for.
I wish everyone going to Bonaire a wonderful time, great weather & good diving/snorkeling.
LOL,
Judy

Buster,
Don't know if we'll make cam appearances like in the past. The cam is a little too high up the pole to get good sign viewing......and the Harley may not work in the sand! Keep looking, though, we just might have to go over to Bongo's for those great cheeseburgers. Remember those? Ummmmmmmm

Great report Matthew
You guys are killing me...PBD rising ...I think I'll go outside and stand in the snow to cool me off.....wait a minute...that will just make things worse...remember your flags! I miss Gibi's chicken stew with his homemade hot sauce over rice...drooling....drooling