Bonaire 2003 Trip and Dive Report

[domino22]

Ok here it goe's I will start with the good and then address the other side of good. I have talked to Natasha thru two emails and this will effect my review. I wish we had one of those email talks before I had left. I would like to thank Bob for dealing with the group and trying to deal with Ramon the dive shop mgr. We had a good group and a lot of fun. Stephanie was the high lite of the trip for me! I would dive with this girl any time and any place. We had a system she would wash ashore on the rocks or the dead coral and I would go over and pick her up. Thank God that she is a little thing. Steph thanks for letting Paul sleep with you, that one I will let y'all think about.. As for the Plaza Resort they call themselves a five star resort but to me it was run with a two star attitude and a two star attention to detail. Our room had three burnt out lights a broken refridgerator and missing a lamp shade. First call got us a working fridge sometime that night this was a good thing. As for the lights we got one fixed never saw a lamp shade.Maid service was a joke never cleaned the patio no clean glasses asked for soap it was never left. I was forced on a recon mission and found a unattended maid cart and I was able to solve the soap problem, but no clean glasses were on board.After the fourth phone call for light bulbs they decided to up grade us to the "GRAND SUITE" oh boy this is cool. So we pack all are stuff up and a bell hop shows up and we are moving. Well we went from the second floor with a view of the lagoon down to the first floor with a view of a bush no vaulted ceiling and no ceiling fan, and they call this a "GRAND SUITE". The toilet and the camera was basin next to the toilet was seperate from the shower that made it a "GRAND SUITE". Well Paul called and told them this sucks we want are broken room back. Well at this point I decided it was time for me to take the phone and deal with the person on the other end with my Texas charm which at this point I am beyond MAD.Well I explained to the front desk their inability to remove their head from their +;# and do not use the word "GRAND" when you talk to me about this room. I believe at around this point in time the girl was afraid that I might be heading towards the front desk and did the right thing she stalled for time and asked to speak to the bellhop and I gave him the phone. He said that he needed to go to the front desk and get another key. I said cool but I am not moving this luggage any more.Well he returned and we went to look at another room this time BINGO second floor vaulted ceiling and a awesome view,we will take it thank you. The new problems with the room were ok no biggie but the same maids did the same poor job here as they did with the first room. They need a maid supervisor to go behind these maids and check their work it was really bad. And I normally tip housekeeping but not this time.As for "Toucan Diving"we all thought that our group had a boat to ourselves but after getting back and talking to Natasha I found out we were to small a group for a private boat. Would have liked to known that before hand. So with that said I will comment only on Tueday's boat dive. They put sixteen people on a thirty foot boat you could not move we had to gear up in stages. People this is what they call "A CATTLE BOAT" it sucked! Bob said something to Ramon and got a 3rd world responce from him. All boat dives will be to Klien well one dive there and then a shore dive by boat, this was not what was told to me about the boat dives before I left. I had to ask if they ever changed the water in the rinse tank at the beach to someone delivering tanks and he said is it dirty I told him you can not even see the bottom of the tank- he changed the water.Dive shop tanks were the same at times. Got a bill delivered to the room Friday night from the dive shop they were billing me for a extra boat dive $54 guilders, I knew I owed some money for the night dive so I thought we will fix it in the morning.So we go down for the pizza party at 5:30 I asked Ramoan at 6:05 where are the pizzas and he told me we are not having pizza F&B at the resort are putting something together for the group. We skipped lunch planning on the pizza party and now no pizza. Well here comes this guy with two small platters of triangle toast with cheese or something on them and five or so ribs. I looked at this stuff and said this ranks up there with the cattle boat dive and said this is a joke I am going to go get something for dinner , five of us left and went to dinner. Sorry Bob and Dave you guys should have walked away with us. Well we went to the shop Saturday morning and I tried to explain to the girl at the counter that the only dive I owed for was for the night dive and she was convinced I had made a extra boat dive and started to rumage thru a stack of papers. At this point Ramoan showed up and I tried to explain their mistake and he seemed annoyed with the problem they created and I basically told him after you put sixteen people on the boat on Tuesday what makes you think I would ever get on another one of your cattle boats again. He just turned around and walked away! After twenty minutes of the girl at the counter shuffle thru through paperwork I told her I am done with you and here is the money for my night dive and left. Well a little later Paul came out with my money I had left and said I would have to pay at the front desk.So any ways we checked out and I did not pay for a boat dive I did not make. I would never stay there again nor would I ever dive with Toucan again. On a lighter note "Casa Blanca" restaurant must do ate there 4 nights great food good price. Yellow Submarine for diving used them before and after the group trip $84 18 tanks and friendly nice people who gave good customer service. Toucan Apartments two bedroom $79 nice new but bring your own soap boy there goe's the soap thing again.Would like to see Natasha try the Divi Flamingo or Buddies. Like I said in the first part it was a good trip and had a good time .But some things need to be said so others can make their own choices. Thanks Natasha.

 

[socaldiver]

Jim you had your problems with the resort. We never encountered any problems.

Housekeeping cleaned our room everyday and left soap. They cleaned the floor inside but not the patio, which was alright because we had our gear hanging out there anyway.

Only time I had "problems" was tracking them down for extra coffee.

Although I was not pleased with 16 people on the boat, remember 2 were crew so you had 14 divers. This happened one time. The other times we went out on the boat there were no more than 10, and that was not a problem.

As far Klein Bonaire the only boat dives, I never read anything to that affect before the trip. I also believe Klein Bonaire' reefs were a little better but the other sites were still good.

Ahh, the pizza party that didn't happen. I also probably would have complained if I was paying for it. But being that the resort gave us a beach BBQ on Tuesday and had platters of finger sandwiches and ribs on Friday night in lieu of the pizza, and it didn't cost us a dime, I don't feel we were short changed, cheated or anything else but treated nicely. Also, Ramon stayed there with us Friday night and was very apologetic and seemed sincere about the happenings for the week and for that I was satisfied.

I guess the moral of the story is you can't please everyone and people look at things in a different perspective. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you have yours as I have mine.

I will personally recommend the resort and dive shop to fellow divers and intend on going back there in the future.

Peace

 

[domino22]

socaldiver once bubbled...
Jim you had your problems with the resort. We never encountered any problems.

Housekeeping cleaned our room everyday and left soap. They cleaned the floor inside but not the patio, which was alright because we had our gear hanging out there anyway.

Only time I had "problems" was tracking them down for extra coffee.

Although I was not pleased with 16 people on the boat, remember 2 were crew so you had 14 divers. This happened one time. The other times we went out on the boat there were no more than 10, and that was not a problem.

As far Klein Bonaire the only boat dives, I never read anything to that affect before the trip. I also believe Klein Bonaire' reefs were a little better but the other sites were still good.

Ahh, the pizza party that didn't happen. I also probably would have complained if I was paying for it. But being that the resort gave us a beach BBQ on Tuesday and had platters of finger sandwiches and ribs on Friday night in lieu of the pizza, and it didn't cost us a dime, I don't feel we were short changed, cheated or anything else but treated nicely. Also, Ramon stayed there with us Friday night and was very apologetic and seemed sincere about the happenings for the week and for that I was satisfied.

I guess the moral of the story is you can't please everyone and people look at things in a different perspective. Everyone is entitled to their opinion and you have yours as I have mine.

I will personally recommend the resort and dive shop to fellow divers and intend on going back there in the future.

Peace

As for sixteen people on the boat remember Luis and erica also dove one tank each so lets settle on 15 divers and still call it a cattle boat.As for the pizza free or not if I had known it would not happen I would have been better prepared if I knew it was forgotten by "Toucan". As for the boat dives to klien that came from Natasha directly.

 

[Natasha]

Jimmy:
You started out saying you had a good time. Unfortunatly, for all of us, you only wrote about the bad time you had.
You never gave us a dive report on what you saw, or how you liked the diving in Bonaire. This was a dive trip, right?

You dwelled on the room and the pizza. Kinda strange. ( And you were then upgraded to an Ocean view suite)
As for me saying ALL? boat dives would be on Klien?
Come on Jim, you know I didn't say that. Bob said he did 6 boat dives out of 20 on Klein.
And without being there I could not tell the boat where we wanted it to go.
What usually has happened in the past, is the captain will ask everyone where they want to go. If eveyone or most agree on a spot, then so be it.
I'm so sorry you will not go back to the Plaza or Toucan. I will go back for the rest of my life.

 

[herman]

Oh yea, those are the places I went back after dark and dead tired! I forgot about them..

 

[nikyyo]

Oh boy, here it goes. Actually I was thinking for a while how I was going to organize this but domino22 (who I will refer to as JD) covered many of the bases. I want to thank youNatasha for organizing this trip first of all. It was a pleasure meeting dave and Cathy, Bob and beth, and of course Steph. Bob, I want to thank you for your kindness, support, and patience with me. If it wasn't for you, I never would have done a nite dive let alone two. I hope I have the good fortune of diving with you again sometime in the future. Steph, I enjoyed our conversations on politics, classical music, and aesthetics in general. I look forward to seeing you perform in New York.Thanks to you I was able to get some sleep that week. JD.....what can I say, we didn't even know each other before the trip and we had a blast. I don't think they could have roomed two more compatible people.....with the exception of the wood sawing at nite! Jd and I arrived a bit early and left a couple of days late. We got a lot of dives in, and my diving (i'm pretty new at this, got substantially better). It was my first experince with beach diving and there are advantages and disadvantages of which i'm sure everyone is aware of. I probably donated approximately 2 pints of blood to the waters of Bonaire before I got the hang of entries and exits. The diving was generally very nice and the best I have done in my limited experience. I did feel, however, that the profiles became somewhat monotonous after a while. My favorite dive was Karpata which I thought was absolutely magical. That's the only way I can describe it. Runners up were angel city, aquarius, and atlantus. As far as the issues that JD has raised....well they're all 100% accurate. The Plaza really could not get their act together all week, which I think is remarkable for a resort that paints itself as "luxurious." It should be noted that half the lights were out in bob's room (check with him for verification) as well. It doesn't pay for me to cover the same ground as JD except for a few points. It is true Natasha that they upgraded us to a "grand suite with an ocean view." This, however, is not where they wanted to send us. The first "grand suite" had a dirt view. It was only when JD got on them that they gave us the real upgrade. I also don't think that the pizza thing was that big a deal, but i don't believe for a second that there was a miscommunication with staff. Did Ramon tell them to bring pizza and they brought whatever it was they brought? come on. It's not about being short changed, it's about apathy on the part of toucan in my opinion.

Now JD covered Toucan in depth as well so I won't rehash except to say that I agree with him. I wasn't terribly impressed with them and essentially thought that they were going through the motions all week. As far as there not being enough for a boat to ourselves...all it takes is Ramon to say it's enough. Furthermore, why was it that when he was confronted about it he claimed ignorance? Why didn't he just say there wasn't enough people (again please refer to Bob). All in all I would say they were just adequate. There was also a bizarre last day experience with billing JD for this dive he didn't take. Folks, this was really bizarre. Everyone signed paperwork indicating their profiles for the day they dove. Simply produce JD's signature as proof that he took the dive! They couldn't and didn't. Also this was something that I don't think Ramon should have walked away from, but he did and gave some instructions to the girl behind the counter, and I stress: this was before JD blew his fuse.
At the end of the trip I spoke to three people in our group who felt they over tipped. Of course that's all our individual responsibility.

I have to be honest Natasha but I really have to recommend taking your business elsewhere. I just can't see going back to the plaza. Dave, you even concede that they never cleaned your terrace area but you didn't care because youlet your scuba stuff dry out there. That's all well and good but many people do use the terrace on vacation. If you do recommend the place to friends just tell them to bring some cleaning solution and dish detergent I suppose. What's more troubling is that when you call them they still can't get it right.......this is a luxury resort people!!!!

In conclusion, does all this mean I didn't have a good time? Absolutely not. I had a great time. These are simply things that transpired and I'm not going to sugar coat it. I hope, Natasha, that you don't excommunicate me from future coast to coast trips for speaking my mind. I would like to travel with you again and I know this stuff is beyond your control. If anyone wants to ask me anything feel free to im me. Peace and love.......Paul.

 

[domino22]

Natasha once bubbled...
Jimmy:
You started out saying you had a good time. Unfortunatly, for all of us, you only wrote about the bad time you had.
You never gave us a dive report on what you saw, or how you liked the diving in Bonaire. This was a dive trip, right?

You dwelled on the room and the pizza. Kinda strange. ( And you were then upgraded to an Ocean view suite)
As for me saying ALL? boat dives would be on Klien?
Come on Jim, you know I didn't say that. Bob said he did 6 boat dives out of 20 on Klein.
And without being there I could not tell the boat where we wanted it to go.
What usually has happened in the past, is the captain will ask everyone where they want to go. If eveyone or most agree on a spot, then so be it.
I'm so sorry you will not go back to the Plaza or Toucan. I will go back for the rest of my life.

Natasha let me respond.As for"Dwelled" on the room and the pizza. The room problem was a on going thing for the first part of the trip covering 4 phone calls and a few days. I was trying to point out their poor service and lack of responce. As for the pizza we had skipped lunch and I had pizza on my mind for dinner and I was not alone. It just was another thing that was disappointing and came back to poor service and attitude by staff. You even told me they screwed that one up. So it was a combination of allot of things. As for the boat dives to Klein it was a email or phone call we had and you told me that the boat dives where to Klein because when every one gets there they normally get together and rent a truck together. So why do shore dives from a boat when you have a truck. This is what I got from that conversation. If I misunderstood you I am sorry.Ok for the diving it was good. Got attacked by a eel saw some turtles,crab,big lobster,tarpon,grouper etc. I did have a good time and I enjoyed the diving. 13 days was to long and the diving got a little boring for that long of time. It did not seem to me to have a very diverse reef system,it was very similar at most of the sites. I also think the dive shops there should work together and start sinking ships for artifical reefs like a lot of dive locations are doing. Yes I will go back someday but I would like to try Buddys or Divi Flamingo. I think in Bonaire you have allot of choices and I think you can find better service and a more competent staff at a different location other than the "Plaza" and "Toucan Diving". Hey this is only my opinon and allot of folks here including you think these folks are the best so we differ and that is OK. I am not trying to attack you or the trip only pointing out my personal experiance with the Plaza and Toucan.Enough said!!!!!!

 

[Natasha]

Jimmy and Paul:
Well, I'm glad I did a good job pairing you two up! That does always seem to be my specialty from what I am told.
Anyway, I'm glad you both cleared a lot up.
I understand it more now.
All I can tell you is the last time I was there, last September, we didn't have these room problems or Dive Op problems. If the Plaza and Toucan (who are rated number 6 in the Caribbean for dive ops) have gone down, then I need to hear it and know it.
I have to tell you Buddy is owned by Marteen too. So he owns both properies, and the dive shops are also owned by him and a man named Steve.
Both men are my friends, who I have met and dove with on several occasions.
So, I will have to report back to them with this news.
As far as future trips, I can only say at this time, if you did not like the Plaza and Toucan, I don't know if any of my other trips will make you happy either. Cozumel and the place we are staying there, have beds, only Mexico can love.
Anyway, thanks for the reports.

 

[domino22]

Natasha once bubbled...
Jimmy and Paul:
Well, I'm glad I did a good job pairing you two up! That does always seem to be my specialty from what I am told.
Anyway, I'm glad you both cleared a lot up.
I understand it more now.
All I can tell you is the last time I was there, last September, we didn't have these room problems or Dive Op problems. If the Plaza and Toucan (who are rated number 6 in the Caribbean for dive ops) have gone down, then I need to hear it and know it.
I have to tell you Buddy is owned by Marteen too. So he owns both properies, and the dive shops are also owned by him and a man named Steve.
Both men are my friends, who I have met and dove with on several occasions.
So, I will have to report back to them with this news.
As far as future trips, I can only say at this time, if you did not like the Plaza and Toucan, I don't know if any of my other trips will make you happy either. Cozumel and the place we are staying there, have beds, only Mexico can love.
Anyway, thanks for the reports.

OUCH! Hey NYNY I think we just got black listed!!!!!!!! I think we struck a nerve here! Damm must have been a big personal nerve! Well then I guess we need to grab our own house and Steph for Coz and run for ourselves.Seems to me a little to much "My Friends Do No Wrong" here or the Club Med syndrom which I could understand.You know I was never upset with Natasha but it appears she is with me and you. I guess we should have gone with the flow and kept our mouths closed. Ya right wrong is wrong and poor service is poor service and yes I will stand up and say so. You do not like it change the channel! As for your future trip responce I am devastated truly devastated. I am giving up diving! Welcome to TEXAS.

 

[nikyyo]

I just want to throw out a question here. Maybe it's me or maybe it's JD. Are the issues that were brought up not valid? (i.e. broken lights, broken fridge, incomplete room cleaning, various requests for incidentals left unresponded to). Especially when they take place at a place like the Plaza? These things happened and we are reporting it. It does seem, Natasha, that you are taking exception to it and I don't know why. Shouldn't we have brought these issues to the fore? For whatever reason our feelings and experiences are being marginalized and I won't speculate as to why. At any rate, I've never been one to conceal the truth and maybe that's worked to my detriment. Well it's almost 9:30 and I have to be at work at 6 am tomorrow so nity nite.