Here's my take. Westpunt area is the quiet side of the island with the best diving. There are a number of restaurants in the area but some are only open weekends. If you want to go out for dinner every night and want higher end dining experience at every meal and not willing to eat local you may find options limited in Westpunt. We like to mix it up and eat some meals in and some out. Trio Penotti, which is in the area, is excellent and there some other good choices as well. We plan on eating dinner out on the weekend nights (Fri-Sun) with the rest in so this works for us.
As far diving, we started diving CUR using our Bon experience: Truck with divers and tanks that we had from a package and hit shore diving sites. After two trips to CUR we have found shore diving CUR more enjoyable using a modified version of our Bon shore diving experience. We will now stay at a place like Allwest that has tanks and a good house reef right on site. Will dive the house reef at least twice a day. For shore diving else, we dont' bring tanks but prefer to use the dive op on the beach.
The best shore dive reef we have found is at Kura Hulanda at the Gowest dive shop. You can shore dive this site every day of your stay and still not see everything or get bored with it. Because we have stayed at Allwest with our diving through Gowest, diving the Gowest house reef multiple times a trip is a no brainer. We drive over with our gear and get tanks there. Even if we didn't get our tanks as part of Gowest package we still wouldn't bring our tanks. There are a number of reasons but for this site, they have all the amenities right there: Lockers, shaded set up area, showers, rinse tanks, bathrooms, drying racks, dock, rope out to the reef and not to mentioned friendly informative staff. $10-12 a tank for all this is worth it for us. There is also a set of stairs down from the parking area to the dock. If you bring your own tanks there still may be a fee to dive from Gowest's facility.
Our preference not to lug tanks also goes for places like Playa Lagun and Cas Abou. Both have dive shops right on the beach, facilities, and staff. By using the on beach dive op, you get to do something you don't generally do on Bon. You can hang on the beach between dives, grab a bite to eat right there and relax. You can rinse and dry your gear right on site. At Cas Abou at Bdiving, for the price of your tanks, you get their friendly help and advice, shaded set up area, rinse tanks, drying racks, gear storage area. You can also park right in front of their shop where your car is visible and can be seen all day long. Again for the price of tank you get all this which we found quite enjoyable. You feel safe. You feel your car and personal belongings are safe. Easy set up. After the dive, rinse, shower, hang your gear, maybe set up a second tank and go to a snack shack for some food, grab a couple beach chairs and hang out, go for a swim and then maybe another dive.
You can do all this on your own but without the amenities and without a dive op who is there to give advice, help and providing a place for your stuff. Again, it seems the best of both worlds and that is how we plan on shore diving CUR going forward.
Having said this you can certainly dive CUR like BON with your truck, gear and lugging your own tanks, but I don't find it as enjoyable or as necessary. Unlike BON, CUR has an abundance of beautiful beaches and by shore diving this way we get to enjoy the beaches. On BON, while the ironshore parking areas and entries have their own charm, I have never felt the pull to simply hang out there after the dive.
Happy planning and diving.