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BAck to Bonaire, Again

On our trip to Bonaire last December, I really enjoyed the diving. I was ready to do more and I didn't want to wait a whole year to go back. I called up both my sons to see if there was any way they could get away in the short term. Mickey said yes, and we quickly zeroed in on dates in February. Only two months and we would be diving in Bonaire again.

Unlike the December trip, this wouldn't be a large, diverse group. I didn't have to plan for divers and non-divers, husbands and wives, serious and casual divers. It was just the two of us, and all we wanted was to dive our brains out. The last few trips we had gone to Sand Dollar, but we decided to give Buddy Dive a try. The setup of the dive operation at Sand Dollar never was very convenient. Plus Buddy Dive had the best restaurant, for our tastes, of any of the dive resorts north of town. I made the reservations. Mickey got his vacation approved at work. Most importantly, we both got clearance from our wives for the trip. We were good to go.

I did my usual overnight in Houston. Next morning I met Mickey when he flew into IAH and we took the flight to Bonaire together. For this trip I rented a truck as soon as we landed. Surprisingly, I found that vehicle rental isn't that expensive in Bonaire. This would give us maximum flexibility, whether we wanted to do a variety of shore dive sites, tour around the island, or just go into town for dinner or shopping after we finished our dives for the day.

It was late by the time we checked in at the resort, so we hurried to Blennie's, the restaurant at Buddy Dive, to get dinner. Unfortunately for us, they had a food truck there that didn't look too appetizing. The regular menu wasn't available because they give the cook staff the weekend off. That isn't a bad thing. It just meant that we had to race over to Breezes and Bites at Sand Dollar to get dinner before they closed. Fortunately, we made it.

Next morning we were up early and at the dive shop the minute it opened. We had to get our rental equipment, get gear lockers assigned, and sign our lives away on numerous waiver forms. Then we had to attend two lectures. Obviously it was a big guest changeover day because there were a lot of people there. First they had a half hour orientation talk in the restaurant. Then we had to attend a second orientation at the pickup station where you got tanks to take offsite for shore diving.

By the time all this was done, it was 11:00 am. Since everyone who just listened to the orientations rushed down to the dive dock the minute it was over, we decided to wait. We took a walk over to the local market, where we could get badly needed supplies, like Diet Coke and beer. That would give the crowd some time to clear out. Then we were finally able to do some scuba diving.

Both Mickey and I thgouth that the dive setup at Buddy Dive was really nice. The equipment lockers were just off the dock so you didn't have to haul your gear a long way to set it up. That's a problem at both Plaza Resort and Sand Dollar, places we have stayed on our previous trips. Hurray! There's no need for a wheel barrow to haul all your gear from storage to the dock. From the benches where you gear up to the ladder leading into the water can be as short as two steps. Close enough that I just did it with my fins on, although it was easy enough to put your fins on while you were on the steps or in the water.

The tanks are close by as well. Getting your gear, getting it setup, and getting into the water is easy. The one drawback is that it's not setup well to do a giant stride. The end of the pier doesn't have anything to use for balance while you put on your fins. No bench. No pole. Nothing. Giant strides are more fun than going down stairs into the water, but it isn't that big a deal.

Things were excellent once you were in the water as well. There was a line just above the bottom that ran from the dock out to the reef, and then down the slope to about sixty feet. This made navigation brain dead simple. When returning, you just swam along the reef until you saw the line, then followed it back to the dock. This was especially nice on night dives. No wondering if you had come back far enough to turn back to shore. No popping up to see where you were.

There was a small wreck, the La Machaca, that we used as an additional navigation aid. It lies on the reef from about 40 to 60 feet deep. It was the perfect distance from the dock for our turn around point. And last but not least, there was plenty of space to sit on the dive dock, with plenty of shade, for when we just hung out during our surface intervals. No need to go anywhere or get out of our gear and put it away. We both agreed that it was a great setup for diving. From now on, Buddy Dive is going to be my default for future trips to Bonaire.

In six days of diving we did nineteen dives. All but one of them were on the house reef. Even though most of our dives were on the same site, no two were the same. We could vary our depth, or time of day (or night). Every dive was different. The setup at Buddy Dive just made diving the house reef so easy that we could do it as much or as little as we wanted, any time that we wanted. We did at least two dives every day, and one day we even did five dives. Yeah, boat dives let you dive sites on Klein Bonaire, or hard to reach sites on Bonaire, but we've both done that enough on previous trips that we didn't feel like we were missing anything.

Although we just dove the house reef, we saw different marine life on every dive: tarpon, eels, grouper, barracuda, angel fish, all the standard reef fish. On our trip in December, the water was very warm and some of the coral was bleached. The water was cooler on this trip and most of the coral looked to have recovered - a good thing. Usually we went to the north because of the current, but a few times it reversed and we went south, providing some variety in the underwater topography.

We did two bounce dives to the bottom of the reef slope. On one I set my dive computer on the bottom and read 129 feet. Almost the recreational dive limit! I was at that depth for all of fifteen seconds before we were heading up. Basically the whole dive was ascending gradually from our max depth to the shallows. But I always enjoy seeing garden eels, and they cover the sandy area at the bottom of the reef slope. I like how they disappear into the sand when you approach them.

As usual on Bonaire, current wasn't much of a problem. Usually we had to pause for a moment at the start of our dive to even figure out which way it was going. Except for one dive. It was from the north and we turned and swam into it. After about five minutes it seemed like we had only gone about twenty feet. We decided that was too close to being on the limit of what we could swim against so we aborted at that point. We could dive anytime we wanted so no sense doing it when conditions were suboptimal. We hit the bar early that afternoon.

We did two night dives. Both times we had several big tarpon following us, hunting in our dive lights. Once we saw the biggest lobster that I have ever seen. He had to be three feet long. He was definitely not happy when we shined our lights on him. He probably knew about the tarpon too. He was still fine when we left him in peace.

We did take the truck to do one shore dive - Salt Pier. It's such a cool dive site that we had to do it. The entry is supposed to be easy but I think it's a little tricky. I had problems when we did it on our trip back in 2022. I slipped on the rock slabs going in and my son Tim had to lift me up and haul me into deeper water. Fortunately I only hurt my pride. This time I made it in ok, although I was shaky getting out. Luckily there was a guy playing in the surf who gave me a hand to steady me. My balance just isn't what it used to be. That's why I mostly stick to the Buddy Dive hourse reef with it's easy in, easy out.

Entry and exit aside, the dive was fantastic. The pier pilings were totally encrusted in coral. There were all kinds of fish. At one point we paused and could count seven barracuda that were visible, all at the same time. Pretty amazing. The dive is shallow so we had a lot of bottom time, even though I'm a notorious air gulper.

We didn't spend all of our time diving. We had to eat and drink too. Usually we just went to Blennie's, the restaurant at Buddy Dive. We did wander over to Captain Don's Habitat once for lunch. We wanted to check it out since it is the most famous dive resort on Bonaire. The dive setup didn't look as good as Buddy Dive's, and the restaurant had a more limited menu. I don't think we are going to switch to them for our next trip.

We also went into town some evenings, since we had a vehicle. We had to get pizza at least one night at Pasa Bon Pizza, a regular stop for us on our trips to Bonaire. One night we splurged and went to Pier Dos. It's right next to Karel's Beach Bar, the most famous place on the waterfront. It's a bit fancier too. It is nice because it's right on the water, literally. The tables are on a rectangular pier that gives you a great view of the ocean as well as the lights of the town when night falls. And of course, we went shopping for tshirts in town too.

Sadly, our time for diving eventually came to an end. We had our one free "no diving day" before we could fly. We drove up the west coast, stopping at a few of the famous dive sites, like Jeff Davis Memorial and Thousand Steps. At Karpata, we saw a lady coming out of the water with a sign on the back of her tank that said "This is my 1000th dive". We were impressed.

We cut across the island to visit Rincon. It's a small town in the middle of the island rather than on the coast. It's there because it's the only spot where there is reliable fresh water, something that is very scarce on Bonaire. It's not a tourist spot. It's where a lot of the locals who work in the resorts live. With all my trips to Bonaire I had never been there so I wanted to check it out. There was a religious shrine in a grotto above the village that was interesting. Mickey and I walked around town a bit. Some of the houses are painted with cool art work. There is a nice church in town. We went by a distillery that makes a liqueur from the cactus that are all over the island. Apparently it's famous but that's not my thing. We did score a tasty treat though at John's Homemade Ice Cream.

John the Ice Cream Man commented that we were early for the festival. Huh? Turns out that it was the biggest day of the year in Rincon. That afternoon there was a big parade, with floats and everything. He said most of the island turns up for it. That is not what we wanted. Time to get out of Dodge. We drove home along the east coast road and sure enough, there was a solid line of traffic heading to Rincon. We passed about a dozen big floats with people in fancy costumes. It looked like the Macy's Parade. We felt like we got to see it because it all passed us going the other direction towards Rincon.

We got to Kralendijk mid-afternoon and hung out at The Bucket. It's right on the busiest corner on the island - a great place to people watch. Then we ate at the Diver's Diner, we'd earned the right, before heading back to the resort. We had an early flight out the next day. It seemed like we had to get up in the middle of the night. We dropped off the rental truck as soon as they opened at 5 am. It was bad enough getting up that early once in a blue moon to catch a flight. I would hate doing that every day. The guy who worked there was tough.

And that was it. Our dive trip was over. We had a blast, doing a lot of dives and just hanging out together.

The flight back was uneventful. I spent most of it pretending to read, but really trying to figure out when I could do my next trip back to Bonaire.