Bonaire: 3/11/2001 through 3/18/2001

I just returned from my 10th trip to Bonaire and once again had a fun and enjoyable time!!

Getting there/back.

We were booked on AA out of DCA to MIA and on ALM from MIA to CUR to BON. ALM with their poor reputation exceeded all our expectations. Every segment was on-time, the food was good and ride smooth. My only dissappointment is that they don't have the free alchohol like they used to (good ol'days) At least my next trip via TACO airlines still has an open bar . Our return trip was just as smooth and the ALM flight from CUR to MIA was lightly loaded with many empty seats. Customs was the usual morass of humanity trying to locate their misplaced baggage and comply with all the signs and regulations. All-in-all the travel arrangements went off without a hitch. PERFECTO!

Lodging

In past I have stayed at the Carib Inn, Capt Don's and the Sand Dollar and continue to use the Carib Inn as my first choice for my group trips. This year was a bit different in that my friend's uncle is a long-time Bonaire resident and we were staying at his home right on the beach at the Something Special dive site! Great location and I'll talk about the night dives there under the DIVING section.

Dining

We ate in most evenings but we did have several excellent meals of note. One at It Rains Fishes ... someone else mentioned there fish in mustard sauce. It was excellent even if it was just wahoo. I had an excellent tenderloin at De Tuin and the ribs also were good. We stopped by the Maikey Snack for cabrito stoba which was good and they also had wahoo done caribbean style. We had a jar of conch (although I don't think it was conch ... more like small snails??). We enjoyed plenty of cold amstel's at Karel's and Mona Lisa most evenings. The one thing we did miss on this trip was that Prisca's was closed all week so no goat's milk ice cream ... although we did enjoy Lover's in-town on several occasions. There seemed to be very little fish to be had during our stay, I guess most of the catch goes to the restaurants first.

Diving.

The water was COLD!!! At 75degrees I found I really needed my 5mm wetsuit. Although once your over the intitail shock it wasn't too bad .... thank god for Sink the Stink! We arranged our diving via Bruce at the Carib Inn. This way we could do a few boat dives in addition to primarily doing shore dives. We did 15 dives over 5 days Typically an AM/PM + a night dive every evening. The Carib Inn's package is the best deal on the island ... although many divers don't like the practice of not getting 2 or more tanks for doing multiple dives up in Washington Park. I've never found this to be a problem because I typically could do 2 dives on a single 80 except in the most extreme cases. I often use the AL 60's at the Carib Inn which are more than adequate for 60 minute dives. Most of our night dives were after 10pm and done right from the house but one evening we did the night boat dive off Klein with the Carib Inn group. We started with an easy warm-up dive right off the dock at the Carib Inn on Monday morning. Nice corals, lot's of moray eels, lots of little critters and just an easy dive for my firend who had NEVER been to Bonaire even though his uncle's been there since 1965!! We did via shore: Ol'Blue (twice, once at night), Calabas Reef (ie the Carib Inn), Invisibles, Margate, Hilma Hooker, Eden Rubble, Karpata, Tori's Reef and Something Special (3 night dives).... from boat we did two Klein dives: Rock Pile and Divi Tree (night); Oil Slick and Rappel were our other boat dives. My favorite dives continue to be Invisibles and Ol'Blue. This was my first trip to Bonaire since Lenny and I was blown away by the devastation in the shallows south of town. The huge gardens of staghorn at Invisbles was gone, all the soft corals, gorgonians and sea fans at Tori's reef were deposited on the shelf at 30-50' the debris washed ashore at Red Slaves indicates that the lush soft corals, gorganians and sea fans there are also gone (we didn't do Red Slaves on this visit as the wind/seas created a less than ideal entry/exit) while there are signs of recovery it will take many years for the shallow sites to be the lush gardens that they once were. The two sites we did on the south side of Klein were nice and in great condition. I would have liked to seen what the condition of the western sites were just to see compare from past experiences. The northern sites like Ol'Blue and Karpata were in good condition. We saw turtles and large, LARGE, grouper at Invisibles as well as a large southern stingray.
Larry the divemaster at the Carib Inn found us the sea horse at Oil SLick (a request from a departing diver) and we found a nice frog fish at Eden Rubble. While the topside conditions were very windy (20+knots most days) the underwater conditions were fine, very little if any current and visibility ranged from excellent to just OK. Our last dives at Tori's reef the visibility was only 40' or so. Visibility was reduced primarily due to the heavy phytoplankton. Our night dive off Klein on Wed evening had a bit of current in the shallows on the return to the mooring but nothing in comparison to say Cozumel or open ocean dives we do off North Carolina and the eastern seaboard. Night diving from the house's dock at Something Special was exceptional with Tarpon's following us every evening... nothing prepares you for catching a flash of a LARGE fish entering your peripheral vision and looking right into a BIG eyeball as a 4footer swims by, there were ton's of coral crab's (they were everywhere), lots of free swimming morays, scorpion fish (stonefish?) and a wayward lobster or two. Additionally, the bristle worms were prolific. Plenty of arrowcrabs that would walk out onto an open hand. We missed the full moon by a week or so, I've always enjoyed night dives out at places like Ol'Blue when the sky is clear and the moon is full.

General stuff

I was surprised at how so few people seemed to be around. What's the current occupancy rate overall for the island....lot's of places had closed and there seems to be MANY homes for sale. I might have to make a quick trip down for the auction in mid-April for those repopped Sabedeco lots . The people are still some of the friendliest in the Caribbean and as long as the keep the Pod people from taking over (ie cruise ships etal) Bonaire will continue to be one of my favorite destinations. Can't wait for the golf course.

Another great trip......

Loved your trip report, but just gotta ask: why would you want to golf in stiff trade winds? More important, as a diver, why would you tolerate the spoiling of the water clarity with chemical run-off from grass maintenance? Don't golfers have thousands of desinations, while divers and marine biologists can count the protected reefs on one hand?

destinations, I mean.

Thanks for the great trip report! I just can't wait for my first experience in Bonaire! I'm taking notes as I type!

I think it's going to be really strange travelling to a Carribbean island and not having to fight all the crowds of people. Cruise ships have pretty much taken over the Carribbean, so it's nice to find a place with little in the way of cruise ship activity. (although doesn't one cruise ship line stop in Bonaire?)

Thanks for sharing!

As a person who loves to golf and loves to dive, I do not want to see a golf course on Bonaire just in case the maintenance of the grass hurts the reef. I would gladly give up golf for Bonaire any day.

Nikki,

"More important, as a diver, why would you tolerate the spoiling of the water clarity with chemical run-off from grass maintenance?"

Golf is part of my retirement triangle:

- - Flying - -

Golf ----- Diving

In fact I mentioned the golf course in a "tongue-in-cheek" manner. Just wanted to see who was paying attention -BG-

I think it would a major mistake to try and develop such a complex in the Karpata area. You're correct, there would be serious problems associated with run-off of fertilizers etc. Water consumption would be huge with traditional course construction and maintenance. Although I would be hesitant to place all the blame on golf-course runoff for general reef destruction and poor water clarity. Ever been to Hawaii? Florida? California? Plenty of healthy reefs. People and general development have a far greater impact than a golf course. Bonaire is particularly vulnerable without an adequate sewer and waste treatment plan. In any case, I don't think that this kind of diversification would be in Bonaire's best interest.

Now a golf course on Klein Bonaire would be ideal ... -VBG-

Bob

along with a cruise ship dock...that would solve the parking problem down town

jason

Great report, like Robb I'm taking notes also - mostly on restaurant ratings but also where to find those hard to find seahorses and frog fish (whoops my photographer side just popped out there).

Re cruise ships: there were 3-4 per week each of our 2 weeks there. A couple of the days had 2 ships on a single day. The largest that stops at Bonaire is about 1500 passengers, about half the size of the big ones that are in so many other Caribbean ports. We found it was fun watching them come & go, but the cruisers didn't impact our activities one way or another. We did notice that the main "shopping" area of Kralendijk has been spruced up quite a bit since our last visit (pre-cruise ships).

I dove with the sea horses at the site you mentioned about 10 times (nearly every early morning) at Xmas. Glad to hear they are still there, assuming they are the same (almost solid black, quite large). If you only saw one, it was probably the male as the females travel around much larger areas than do the males. But, they do mate for life I guess, so the other was probably near by.

I took my wife to see them and only found one. When we were hovering nearby (not too close), the other came floating in and hooked up about 12 inches from it's mate.

I'd avoid giving out locations for sea horses, though, as too many people harass these things already.

Bob, I am glad I scrolled down and read the rest of the posts,because I have worked on a golf course and I had to have blood tests to monitier the amounts of chems. in my system.
If they were worried about the chems, in my system can you image what is flowing into the aquafer and waters around any golf course.
Haven't heard of any free ranging courses yet.
Niki + Bob introdued us to Carib Inn and when we return in Aug we will sign up there.
Much more layed back.