Ok, so I trip doesn't start for a few more days, but I couldn't resist starting a report! We will arrive on Bonaire on the late AA flight from SJU to BON, after flying from MIA to SJU. We first have to drive about 2 hours to get to MIA.... It's all worth it! Doreen just asked "so, after the check out dive, where do you want to go first?" My reply " lets grab 2 tanks each and...wait, let's grab 3 tanks each and hit Alice in Wonderland, Margate bay, and Angel City." She then reminded me we need to get our rental truck after the checkout and get some supplies at the grocery store. So I'm guessing it will probably be 2 tanks each LOL !
I'm bringing a lap top and digital cameras and a housing, so if I have time, I'll update this during the trip during the surface intervals.

yup - camera, housing, and laptop - essential;)

do your "errands" before your checkout dive...you'll be in the water by 11:00am;)

enjoy;)

My advice...Get the food & essentials first..THEN do the diving. If you're there for a week, you'll have plenty of time for diving.

Since we will be arriving late at night on Sunday, we won't be able to shop until Monday. This will be our 5th trip to Captain Don's. They do orientation first thing in the AM. We usually go to orientation and do the checkout dive off the dock at the resort. Then we pick up the rental truck and do some shopping on the way back. After that we'll have some lunch and head out for shore dives in the afternoon.

it's friday and I'm sitting pool side typing this. All things considered, so far it's been an "OK" trip...mostly due to the fact that Doreen's luggage is still AWOL from AE and no one from AE seems to know where it is. We arrived sunday night and my luggage arrived Tuesday night. Wilco at Captain Don's lent us gear so we didn't miss any diving.... laptop is almost dead now... I will continue later !

Greg - sorry to hear that about the luggage. I would be SUPER frustrated!!! But as long as you all are diving still it's a better.

Greg, hang in there, you are on Bonaire and that is good! Good luck with the luggage. May the luggage gods find Doreen's luggage soon!

We got word that Doreen's luggage will arrive tonight, friday. At this point, it's useless, but at least we will have it. Oh, did I mention I ruptured my ear drum on wednesday after noon ? The diving was great until then. Thankfully it does not hurt. We went snorkeling this afternoon out in front of captainsDon's . We went almost all the way to the water plant and back. We are now sitting near the Deco Stop bar waiting for the sun to set. It looks like it will be nice tonight, as usual. WHen i get back to the states, I'll post some pictures.

guess what wasn't on last nights flight? I guess we will have to file a claim when we get home...

Greg, what a PITA!!! How did you rupture your eardrum????

Greg, bummer on the ear drum issue. And double drats on the luggage issue. Hope you are making the best of it, still in a beautiful warm place and beautiful views. Not to mention the Brights....

We really did have a great time , a big thanks to Jack Chalk, Wilco, Max and the rest of the Captain Don's staff. They hooked us up with rental gear for free so we could dive. When we arrived back at Miami we went to the baggage counter. They said we should get the bag back, delivered to our house. The man at the counter said that no one updated the information in the computer system at the Bonaire end. In other words, Doreen's bag was probably at SJU, but they did nothing because no one at BON told them to send it... Oh well. I did manage to take some nice pictures and we drove around the island and saw things we had not seen on past trips.

My ear drum- this time it was the left ear- I popped the right on in Roatan. On the decent into Roatan on the plane, I had a reverse block in my right ear- mildly painful, but it went away. The next day I was not having trouble equalizing until the 3rd dive, then i tasted the salt in my mouth and knew what happened.

this time in Bonaire it was my left ear. No pain, about the 8th dive then suddenly I could taste salt... upon accending I feel the bubbles coming out of my ear. Bummer... I got a set of Doc's vented Pro Plugs. They worked well for snorkeling, but when I tried to dive, i could feel the water mildy burning my eustacian (sp?) tube.. Hey, at least I tried ! I'll be doing some research and talking with my ENT about this.

We just got back to Naples after traveling all day. I'll do a proper update with a real report in a few days.



Hey Freddie: Guess who we ran into at Don's ?

Gabe and Linda from Hampton Dive ! We had not seen them in about 5 years. They were on our first trip to Bonaire. It was nice to see them again.

Greg..The best thing you can do is see an ENT specialist. Don't know if you had any congestion but you could have a deviated septum which would hinder your ability to equalize. I use Doc's vented pro plugs myself & like them a lot.
Additionally I use the non vented ones in the pool & they're great for preventing otis externa.
Good luck with the ears & ALWAYS go slow underwater.
I think it'll take about 6-8 weeks for a perforated ear drum to heal over.

Doreen's baggage finally showed up 5 days after we got home. It was a relief to get it back as I was not looking forward to the battle we would have had about the value of the contents.

wow...