Little Cayman vs Bonaire

[Hintermann]

You could also look into Grand Cayman. The diving is not as good but there is a lot or in top side activities.

I am already booked into a liveaboard cruise to the Cayman Islands in January 2014. I should get plenty of Grand Cayman on that...maybe only Grand Cayman diving. The boats often do not go across in winter months due to the high seas. I have also booked 3 further days of diving in Little Cayman after the cruise but even so, as many of you guys have said yourselves, the boats from LCBR may not make it around the corner to the north shore if the sea conditions are bad.

My main trip for may 2015 is liveaboard diving in Socorro. But I wanted to somewhere else to dive in that same trip before the liveaboard that was a complete contrast to the conditions in Socorro and so initially considered Bonaire, a place which I have thought about and decided against several times previously. But after initial enquiries with the local dive operators and these forums, I came to the conclusion that Bonaire simply would not suit my idea of a diving holiday. I normally don't like land based diving for the hassle that goes with it and Bonaire seems to have more than its share. At least in LCBR it is simpler - all boat dives, schedule previous night (allowing as always for the unexpected), no need to rent trucks, considerbaly less worry about getting your things stolen and to cap it all, the Bloody Bay Wall!

 

[DeputyDan]

Planning dive trip /vacation in November. Have not been to either Little Cayman or Bonaire , but seek advice. My wife , son and daughter -in -law want to go along and all are non divers? Which would be best in your opinion? Also if Bonaire, would the resorts or something like a condo FRBO be best in your opinion?

Take a look at Ambergris Caye in Belize as an alternative.
Stuff for everyone to do.

 

[CanadianTravelAgent]

I agree with Diver Steve and diverjen. Assuming they want something to do other than in or on the water, Curacao would be a great option. Another suggestion might be Roatan, but Curacao would give more options to the non-diver. Ambergris Caye in Belize as posted above is a good suggestion also.

 

[Johncbd]

Little Cayman has some of the world's best walls, Bloody Bay and Jackson's. Most, if not all of the diving is by boat. There is one small settlement of a few hundred folks, and a couple of stores. What there is to see landward will take a day. You will never see all that is to be seen underwater.
Cayman Brac is underrated, as it too has great walls, also by boat, and an active shore diving community. In the last two years a few enterprising locals have begun to mark the sites with red rocks by the side of the road with the name and number. The map was in development last winter and may well be available now. Check with Liesel at the Brac Scuba Shack for tanks and weights or Brac Reef for full packages. Rent a car from 4Ds. Stay at the Reef or rent a cottage for a week and cook in. It will take two days to see all of the Brac, but there are many beaches and places to snorkel and swim as well. While LC might be the most expensive place in the Caribbean for food and spirits, the Brac has four large markets and several smaller ones, so some competition. The US dollar is worth .80 Cayman cents and the VAT is 19.8% or so, which translates to everything costing 40% more without the markup for everything on the island coming by barge from Grand once a week. There is a library and hospital which I would use for emergency treatment while waiting for the air ambulance.
Bonaire is beautiful and almost all of the sites are shore dives. We did them all and then concentrated on the reef just off our rental cottage. It will require a car and be aware that there is significant crime. It, like Grand, is a dive destination for thousands and they will be there. Crime on Little is non existent and so rare on the Brac that any instance is major news.
Weather can be a factor. Bonaire is south of the hurricane belt and is unaffected but the Caymans have been hit many times. Large storms in coastal US also reach down to the Caymans to change the wind direction and bring clouds and seas curtaining diving for the most par, at least for this old man who no longer wishes to be jack hammered on the ladder at re-entry or banged around a boat. We do a few weeks on Little, boat diving whenever the weather is good, and then a few on the Brac shore diving every day we can.
While its all good, I would rate Bonaire, Little and the Brac along with Speyside at the north end of Tobago as the best in the Caribbean. If you are interested more in your diving pleasure than their accommodation, pick the best dive site and hope they can entertain themselves.

 

[drrich2]

It's worth elaborating on the 'significant crime' issue with Bonaire.

First off, Bonaire is one of the safer feeling places you can travel to in the Caribbean. My wife, buddy and I walk around there at night on dive trips without much concern. Crime is inherent to the human race, but Bonaire has a good safety record as far as violent crime toward tourists.

The issue is petty theft from rental trucks. Basically, in Bonaire, your dive package will probably include a manual transmission rental truck (unless you make advance arrangements & pay ~ $150 extra for an automatic) and unlimited shore diving (you can take 2 tanks at a time, all you want). You'll drive along a road that hugs the coast, and occasionally see a site you like, pull over, back up so the truck bed (loaded with tanks & dive gear) faces the water, park, gear up & go diving.

So you're down about 45 minutes to an hour+ and that truck, obviously a rental driven by a fairly well-to-do tourist, will be predictably unguarded for close to an hour. On a Caribbean island with a lot of relatively poor people.

Wonder what could happen?

Well, petty theft of items left in trucks is the main issue. Tanks are generally considered 'safe.' Theft of gas or the truck battery is rare (but not completely unknown). A 're-purposed' plastic soda bottle with tap water for an after-dive rinse, worn out simple clothes, perhaps a pair of old flip flops, likely won't be bothered.

So the general advice is to leave your doors unlocked & your windows down (so they don't break a window to get in). That shows you're probably not hiding anything very valuable, and if they search the truck while you dive, there's nothing much to steal.

For most of us, this is no big deal. Some of us 'take a risk' with a pair of cheap sunglasses, etc... But don't leave a digital camera, a wallet, etc...

But some people are outraged at this, and complain why the police don't run sting operations, etc... (all the while I suspect the police wonder when the tourists are going to learn not to leave valuables laying around for theft).

So, is crime significant in Bonaire? That's mostly up to you. Get a little water proof case for your truck keys & driver's license, plus some cash if you want to stop somewhere for lunch.

Richard.

 

[AggieDiver]

In other words...you are doing totally unsupported dives by yourself with only your buddy to help you and you can't rely on any first aid supplies or other dive tools you might bring to be in the truck when you come up from the dive. That idea always bothered me personally. I guess I feel that it isn't too much to ask for police to take an interest when theft of batteries from rental vehicles is common enough that people blow it off as just part of what you have to deal with as part of the diving there. I am a very safety conscious diver, and it would bug me enough to not be able to bring a first aid kit without worrying about it being stolen. But to think that I could come out of the water with a buddy in medical distress and have a disabled vehicle is simply something I just can't accept as a normal hazard of diving somewhere. Yes, petty theft happens just about anywhere to some degree, but it is so predictable on Bonaire, that it seems the only people incapable of predicting where thieves will strike next are the local police.

 

[diverrex]

In other words...you are doing totally unsupported dives by yourself with only your buddy to help you and you can't rely on any first aid supplies or other dive tools you might bring to be in the truck when you come up from the dive. That idea always bothered me personally. I guess I feel that it isn't too much to ask for police to take an interest when theft of batteries from rental vehicles is common enough that people blow it off as just part of what you have to deal with as part of the diving there. I am a very safety conscious diver, and it would bug me enough to not be able to bring a first aid kit without worrying about it being stolen. But to think that I could come out of the water with a buddy in medical distress and have a disabled vehicle is simply something I just can't accept as a normal hazard of diving somewhere. Yes, petty theft happens just about anywhere to some degree, but it is so predictable on Bonaire, that it seems the only people incapable of predicting where thieves will strike next are the local police.

I have taken 3 one week trips to Bonaire. Have not had anything taken from our truck and we have always left old clothes and towels in the truck. It's not at all clear to me how predictable the petty crime is on Bonaire since on my experience I would predict that there is no crime.

 

[AggieDiver]

So there is so little crime, that you were just lucky and only left old clothes and towels in the truck? Or you had read so many stories about crime or had been told by others enough about the crime there that you knew that if you left anything more than old clothes and towels that thieves would steal it? I suspect that the latter situation is more likely.

You prove my point with what you said. Crime there is predictable. You knew based on the experiences of others that if you left more than old clothes or towels that it would likely get stolen. Ergo...if the police wanted to catch the thieves, how about grabbing a rental truck, putting a couple of "divers" in it and leaving some tempting items behind. Seems like it would take them a couple of weeks at tops to round up quite a few thieves and put the others on notice that not all unattended rental vehicles are truly unattended. The fact that they don't do that is a clear message to me that the Police don't see the crime as a problem and probably see some value in a cheap black market for the goods on the island.