With our Delta issues behind us, Jules, Katie, Conor, Erin and I landed in Bonaire without a hitch. In fact, we arrived nearly 30 minutes early, and the prospect of getting a few dives in for the day was looking really good. After a quick trip to rent our Toyota Hilux pickup (including 5 speed manual transmission and wooden tank rack) we made our way to meet Andrew and Stacey at the house we had rented previously in 2013.
For those unfamiliar with Bonaire…its an island municipality of the Netherlands, lying off Venezuela’s coast in the southern Caribbean. Long recognized by the diving community as one of the world’s top shore diving destinations, Bonaire has long been a leader in nature conservation and ecological responsibility, and established the entire coastline as a marine sanctuary in 1979. The western coast is lined with over 60 dive sites, each designated with its name painted on bright yellow rocks. And there are another 26 on the small island, Klein Bonaire.
While guests of the dive resorts access many of the sites by boat, our group enjoys setting its own pace on unstructured shore diving from the back of our pickups. You simply pull up to an interesting site, grab your gear from the back of the Hilux, then splash and explore!
After a quick bite, and an even quicker unpacking, we headed to our favorite dive center, Dive Friends Bonaire, to set up unlimited nitrox, pay our Marine park fee, and do our check-out dive. Dive Friends has 5 locations along the coast, allowing easy access for swapping out cylinders throughout the week.
Following two, long awaited, warm water dives (Cliff and Andrea II)…we headed back to the house for our first expertly prepared meal from our new friend Norca. Wow, what a meal…we started with a green bean salad w/peanut sauce, then moved on to pork and chicken satay, rice, vegetables with noodles, and finally fried bananas with ice cream. I nearly exploded!
We finished our first day with a night dive at Oil Slick, named after an originally planned site for an oil storage facility (outside of tourism, one of Bonaire’s main industries). A recommended boat dive (yeah right!), its also known as Oil Slick Leap, for the alternate “10′ drop from the wall” entry. For the less adventurous (in this case those named Tor and Jules), there is a steel ladder to climb down.
Day 2 included a full day of diving. We started at Salt City, a great site for experiencing Bonaire’s double reef system. Lots to see, and tons of garden eels in the sand between the two reefs.
Next dive, Tori’s Reef, ranked #2 in the Caribbean for fish diversity.
Afternoon dive: Something Special, an easy, sandy entrance through a boat moorage that leads to a wall which approaches the harbor entrance to the north.
Following another fabulous meal, we did our night dive at Bari Reef, ranked #1 in the Caribbean for fish diversity. Of course, I was shooting macro and didn’t get any good shots of any fish! These will have to do:
