Trip Report: Chet and Jean Wood
February 23 to March 15, 2007
Authored by Jean, comments added by Chet

It is hard to convey in words what it is like to return to Bonaire each year. This is our 10th visit and it always feels like coming home. A big part of it is meeting some of the same people each year. People from Bonaire-talk that come the same time that we do and people that live here part or all of the year. It is a pleasure of come to Bonaire & meet with the interesting and friendly people who have welcomed us into the life of Bonaire.
We stay at Sand Dollar in the condo owned by Alan & Joan Zale. Over the 7 years we have rented from them, they have introduced us to many people at Sand Dollar. They have made improvement each year to their great condo. I love their screened porch. We use the lounge chairs a lot and I use the table on the porch for working on water color. This year they bought new living room furniture, very comfortable and good looking.

Land Activities
We had a nice lunch at City Cafe with Bill and Prawphan. I had a nice smoked salmon salad. The atmosphere and view was very nice, as well as the company.
Twice we went to the Tuesday night dinner at Gibi’s. Nice to see friends: the Richter’s, Dawn & Scott, Darlene & Tom, Mary & Pat, etc.

Also a good selection of great food.


Diver Debbie and Adam also were staying at Sand Dollar and we had a nice visit and heard about their visit to Thailand and an elephant that paints. Alan & Joan introduced us to a couple more of the condo owners at Sand Dollar. It is nice to walk around & run into people you know.
I took two art classes with Jan at JanArt again. She is such a patient teacher; and a neat person to work with.


Thank you to Michael Gaynor for getting the ball rolling on our 10 year Medallion. It is a nicely done bronze medallion with a neat ribbon (suitable for showing off).


b{Dive Activities}
It is so convenient at Bari Reef that we did all but one dive right there. The Bonaire Dive & Adventure pier is so convenient for gear-up and stride- in (also for posing for a picture).

The other dive was a boat dive out to Klein.

My favorite fish or creature encounter this year was with the squid. Several times we ran into pairs of adult squid. There seem to be a lot of pairs around Bari Reef this year. One encounter we saw that one of the pair was feeling the other with its tentacles. I think we interrupted something! They danced around me changing colors. I don’t know if they were curious or trying tell us to go away. They seemed curious and playful. I had the video camera running as they came toward me and retreated several times flashing different body colors and iridescent flecks of color. After about a minute we left them to proceed with their own games!

I guess this is the year for cephalopods. There were 3 octopus on Bari Reef. I only saw them in their lair. I heard and talked to others who had seen them also. One day I was looking at an octopus at the edge of a crevice and realized there was another behind him. Also got a quick glimpse of a tentacle moving between them before she retreated far into the crevice. I left then. I’m not a peeping Tom, really I’m not.


There were also seahorses around. I just saw one black one. That sounds so jaded. A couple years ago I had never seen a seahorse and didn’t know if I ever would!

Well that is one reason we dive Bari Reef, there is always a good variety of fish and creatures. Besides it is so easy to just giant stride in and we are getting lazier each year we get older.


The boat dive to Klein was a wall dive at Carl’s Hill. It was nice to see Klein again.

Also, just before we came this year, I finally retired the Sea &Sea camera and went digital. Got a Nikon P3 with a FantaSea housing. Still learning to use, and will want to get an external strobe before next years trip. Jean dives with the video, I get the still.


Buoyancy Seminar at Carib Inn with Bruce Bowker
Bruce gave a very interesting one hour seminar on buoyancy at Carib Inn.

I get cold so I wear two 3 mil wetsuits, one full and one shortie over it. Plus a full hood with the face cut to a larger opening for comfort and I removed the shoulder yoke so I can move my head easily. And I wear full boots. With all that neoprene I always have trouble with buoyancy and roll on the first part of the trip. Bruce’s tips were very helpful. First I switched to a smaller tank as I always have plenty of air left at the end of the dive. That puts less weight on the top.

Bruce discussed how to balance your body lengthwise. With all the neoprene on my upper body and 14 lbs of weight at my waist, my upper body is very buoyant. I had already (before the seminar) experimented with putting weight at my shoulders. Somehow I need to get some of the weights toward the front center of my body to prevent roll.

Chet wears no neoprene and can stand on his head with his feet straight up. But my feet do sink if I totally relax, so I have some more work to do be balanced. My feet are always dragging which makes it hard to look closely at little Goby’s and Secretary Blennies. It is especially hard to use our video camera and make sure I stay off the coral. We spent time trying ankle weights in my BCD pockets, which helped a little.

Another creature encounter was Chet taking pictures of the iquanas that like to sun on the deck where The Green Parrot used to be .

Overall a great trip, lots of relaxing time, time with people and with the beautiful fish and coral of Bonaire.

Great photos and congrats on the 10 Year Bronze award. Michael was very helpful to Rob and I to get the same thing done for us a few years back. Sounds like you had a fabulous trip with good friends and a great condo to boot!!
Thanks for sharing.....we'll be leaving this coming Friday for a week in paradise.

Kobi in Virginia

I LOVE THOSE IGUANA PICS!!!! What a wonderful report and lovely pictures. We just have to find a way to get to Bon at the same time. Glad to hear you had a good trip. Hope to see you both sometime soon.

Always great to see you guys..and never seems to be enough time..either getting in or out of the water..would'nt you love to be in Bonaire tonight ? cold and white here..brrrrrr Jean keep on painting and Chet..we'll hunt up some beer cans for ya...see you 2008 for another button..Thanks for the vinegar, we really did use it for salad !

Great trip report Chet and Jean!!! Between your beautiful descriptive writing and doing my own report, I want to be back in Bonaire now! I didn't know (or forgot )that you were a fan Of Jan Huckaby and took art lessons from her. I think that is great and you know how much I love her work!
Congratulations on your 10 year medallion and see you next year!

Thanks for the report and pictures.

Well done report guys. Thanks!

Well done - great report - thanks. I'm ready to go back as it's been too long.

Great report. I have some DVD's about the whole underwater ecosystem and part of it dealt with cephalopods, in particular, reef squid in Bonaire. From your descriptions it sounds like you were witnessing the squid mating. The "feeling with tentacles" is the actual sexual act according to these scientists. I am going down there at the end of May and planned on looking for the squid as well. On the video, the scientists were in very shallow water just off of the Bari Reef pier which sounds like thats where you saw them.
Very nice report.

Great report & as always thanks for the wonderful BT buttons Cool medallion & congrats!

Thanks for the kind words about our unit. We really enjoy seeing you when we overlap. Congrats on your ten year award. We'll have to come with something when you rent from us for the tenth time!

I also enjoyed and learned lots from Bruce's bouyancy class, switching some weight around and remembering to point my head where I wanted to go actually helped alot Lydia

Great pics and great report. Thank you.

Very Nice Report!
The iguanas are wonderful