Harbour Village Visit

[mjsylver]

Just spent a week at Harbour Village diving with the fine folks at Great Adventures Bonaire. Our dive was led by Instructor Alev Ozten. Great Adventures Bonaire is a top notch op on the Island. I'll be diving with them again

Here's the video from our dive on the Hilma Hooker

 

[phelana]

thanks for sharing..it means a lot..I saw a Buddy Dive Boat at HV this past week. They filled up and left. Does HV have their own boats?

 

[diversteve]

From: Bonaire Diving | Harbour Village Beach Club | Caribbean

Diving adventures are just steps away with Great Adventures Bonaire, the on-site PADI five-star Instructor Development Center offering instruction courses for all levels, retail shop, a full range of services and daily boat dives from the Harbour Village dock for hotel guests and club members only.

 

[drrich2]

Please share more specifics about the experience of staying at Harbor Village, particularly if you've stayed elsewhere on Bonaire to compare it to.

I ask because when Harbor Village is mentioned on the forum, it's often not from 1st hand experience, may be viewed as a more upscale, more expensive place to stay (by Bonaire standards), so it it seems to get passed over pretty often as people instead focus on Buddy Dive Resort (& affiliated Caribbean Club Resort), Sand Dollar (Dive Friends vs. Bonaire Dive & Adventure), Divi Flamingo, Hamlet Oasis and Beachcomber Villas, the Plaza and Captain Dons.

Of course we can look at their website, but I'm curious as to what you found compelling about staying at Harbor Village.

Richard.

 

[mjsylver]

I've only stayed at Harbour Village. It reminds me of staying out at South Seas Plantation on Captiva Island back in the 80's and 90's. The rooms are top notch, the staff was incredible and they have their own onsite coral restoration nursery and site. The dive operation is Great Adventures Bonaire which is run by Chris Ball and her crew. Chris is a PADI course director and they are a 5 star IDC resort. They do have 2 boats that belong to the resort, a 42 foot Newton Dive special and the smaller boat size and make escape me right now as I've spent most of my dives on the Newton.The place is on the smaller side as far as resorts go, which I actually appreciated. They are considered high end and will set you back a bit.. I am a faculty member and dive safety officer for a local private high school in the Miami area and help supervise a group of kids in our Teens4oceans.org and marine field studies program which specializes in Coral Restoration and we will be making our second trip down to the resort to work with CRF Bonaire and the local T4O chapter of the Junior rangers.
As far as the resort, the accommodations are modern, extremely clean and well cared for. The food at La Balandra, the onsite restaurant was quite good, they offer breakfast, lunch and dinner. They have a beautiful private beach with service from the wait staff, hammocks, chairs, beach towels etc not to mention access to paddleboards and kayaks at no extra charge.

I am very much looking to my trip down in February. I hope this helps a little.

 

[KeithG]

I've only stayed at Harbour Village. It reminds me of staying out at South Seas Plantation on Captiva Island back in the 80's and 90's. The rooms are top notch, the staff was incredible and they have their own onsite coral restoration nursery and site. The dive operation is Great Adventures Bonaire which is run by Chris Ball and her crew. Chris is a PADI course director and they are a 5 star IDC resort. They do have 2 boats that belong to the resort, a 42 foot Newton Dive special and the smaller boat size and make escape me right now as I've spent most of my dives on the Newton.The place is on the smaller side as far as resorts go, which I actually appreciated. They are considered high end and will set you back a bit.. I am a faculty member and dive safety officer for a local private high school in the Miami area and help supervise a group of kids in our Teens4oceans.org and marine field studies program which specializes in Coral Restoration and we will be making our second trip down to the resort to work with CRF Bonaire and the local T4O chapter of the Junior rangers.
As far as the resort, the accommodations are modern, extremely clean and well cared for. The food at La Balandra, the onsite restaurant was quite good, they offer breakfast, lunch and dinner. They have a beautiful private beach with service from the wait staff, hammocks, chairs, beach towels etc not to mention access to paddleboards and kayaks at no extra charge.

I am very much looking to my trip down in February. I hope this helps a little.

this is a great start. can you provide more info about the dive operation?
things like
- how many on the boat
- details of gear storage
- shore diving?
- how long are the boat dives?
- 1 tank or 2 tank dives?
- time limits and surface intervals
- hours of access to tanks
- mandatory follow the DM or can you dive your own profile
- ....
- etc...

 

[MadMaxEsq]

this is a great start. can you provide more info about the dive operation?
things like
- how many on the boat
- details of gear storage
- shore diving?
- how long are the boat dives?
- 1 tank or 2 tank dives?
- time limits and surface intervals
- hours of access to tanks
- mandatory follow the DM or can you dive your own profile
- ....
- etc...

If he does not come back to answer these, I can at least help out a little, having stayed at HV recently. I only did shore diving, so I know nothing of their boat of DM situation.

Gear storage is in room full of good sized cubby holes, which is open during the day and locked up when the dive shop closes (5 or 6pm). The resort is gated, and I did not have any concerns about somebody walking off with our gear. If you want to dive outside of the hours the shop is operating, you just have to plan ahead and grab your gear, and keep it with you until you can return it to the locker. Tanks are readily available at the dive shop and at the bellman's desk by the front gate (when the dive staff remembers to replenish this supply, but we only had to wait for tanks up front once during the week).

For shore diving at the resort, the shop is at the Eden beach/north side of the resort, and has a beach entry or dock entry to go up and access the north side reefs (Front porch, i think?). There are also carts available to transport your gear to the other end of the resort (town/south side) so that you can do a beach entry and dive those reefs (something special?). There is a nice wreck at the resort and some established as well as newly planted coral, but overall it is not as nice as other sites on the island. You can also use the carts to move your gear/tanks from the shop to your truck outside of the gate.

The only aspect of the review above that I disagree with is the quality of the on-site restaurant. The food was just OK at best, and very overpriced, and the options in town (15 to 20 minute walk) or next door at Eden Beach or Between2Buns were much, much better.

I loved everything else about the resort, rooms, beach, dive staff, location, etc. and will stay there again when we return.

 

[Scuba Chris B]

Harbour Village Beach Club (The dive shop is Great Adventures Bonaire and is exclusive to the resort) runs two boat trips a day for one tank dives a day at 9am and 2pm athough if the resort is busy it changes to 8;30, 10:30 and 14;00.

On average there are about 10 people on the boat although this can be more or sometimes less , there is a 42ft Newton and a 36ft dive special in service.

Boat dives are up to 1 hour with travel time being 15 to 20 mins. Surface intervals between dives are a minimum of 1 hour.

The dive shop is located on the beach, where there is a dock where the boat trips leave from, and storage area for gear. Lockers are open from 8am until 5pm although there are a few private lockers for those wanting to dive outside business hours.

Air tanks are available 24/7. Nitrox are locked away but can be analyzed before business closer at 5pm and stored outside for access. Air tanks are available at the beach or near the car park.

When shore diving you can follow your own plans, on the boats the DM"s give an overall plan and divers dive within it. As the majority of dives are sloping shoulder you all go the same way against the current first regardless. Boat plan is usually 30mins or half air supply against the current, turn around head back to the boat shallower and be on board with a minimum 500psi within the hour. Divers are asked to dive within their certified limits and no deeper than 100ft if certification allows.

The diveshop is a PADI 5Star IDC and offers courses from beginner to Instructor as well as specialities such self reliant diver and coral restoration diver as well as the usual ones.

You can get more information by mailing gab@harbourvillage.com

 

[Scuba Chris B]

If he does not come back to answer these, I can at least help out a little, having stayed at HV recently. I only did shore diving, so I know nothing of their boat of DM situation.

Gear storage is in room full of good sized cubby holes, which is open during the day and locked up when the dive shop closes (5 or 6pm). The resort is gated, and I did not have any concerns about somebody walking off with our gear. If you want to dive outside of the hours the shop is operating, you just have to plan ahead and grab your gear, and keep it with you until you can return it to the locker. Tanks are readily available at the dive shop and at the bellman's desk by the front gate (when the dive staff remembers to replenish this supply, but we only had to wait for tanks up front once during the week).

For shore diving at the resort, the shop is at the Eden beach/north side of the resort, and has a beach entry or dock entry to go up and access the north side reefs (Front porch, i think?). There are also carts available to transport your gear to the other end of the resort (town/south side) so that you can do a beach entry and dive those reefs (something special?). There is a sailboat wreck at the resort and some established as well as newly planted coral, but overall it is not as nice as other sites on the island. You can also use the carts to move your gear/tanks from the shop to your truck outside of the gate.

The only aspect of the review above that I disagree with is the quality of the on-site restaurant. The food was just OK at best, and very overpriced, and the options in town (15 to 20 minute walk) or next door at Eden Beach or Between2Buns were much, much better. I loved everything else about the resort, rooms, beach, location, etc. and will stay there again when we return.

The wreck is 50ft cargo vessel called "our Confidence" that ran around the islands until it started to sink in the marina. Great fish life around it!