We've been home for a couple of weeks now. I thought I probably ought to share a trip report and video after throwing out a few teasers in Dee's earlier thread. (Hint: You can skip to the end now for the video if you don't want to read the rest of my report.)
We were on the island for 3 weeks, from Dec 19 through Jan 7th, along with another couple that had also accompanied us in 2012. It was our 13th trip to Bonaire in 19 years, and our 26th through 28th overall weeks on the island. It was also our 7th consecutive year of enjoying 3 weeks on Bonaire over the Christmas and New Year holidays. We've previously also enjoyed visits during February, May, June, August, and September. If it's not obvious, we're comfortable on the island. It fits our personalities, pace, and tastes.
We flew the Saturday Delta flight from Atlanta, just as we've done on our previous 8 trips. Coming from Idaho this means staying overnight in Atlanta going each way, but we think it's worth the extra time and expense to avoid potential winter weather issues etc. We also like that Delta continues to fly the 757 to Bonaire vs. United's 737 planes. The 757 is larger, has more roomy bulkhead and exit row seats, and offers economy class lavatories at both front and rear of the plane. It also has more first class seats, which increases the odds that Delta frequent flyers (like me) might be lucky enough to receive complimentary upgrades.
Once again we rented our truck from Poppy at Telerin. As with previous Telerin rentals the price was great, the trucks were well-worn but functional, and Poppy was quick to respond to any questions or issues etc. As we've also done previously we paid for the truck via American Express and declined Telerin's CDW policy in favor of the $24.95 Amex Premium Car Rental Protection policy. It's nice to see that fuel prices have finally dropped on the island. For several years unleaded gasoline prices were fixed at $1.28/liter and now the price is $0.95/liter.
For something new we stayed at one of the Crown Ridge villas in the Sabadeco area. These are the oceanfront villas between Andrea 1 and Andrea 2 dive sites. Our particular villa was directly in front of Andrea 1 entry point and the steps from villa to shore made for an easily accessible house reef. I have to admit though that Andrea 1 is a much less interesting house reef than what we've been enjoying at The Cliff in front of Beachcomber Villas for the past 5 years or so. Despite my best efforts I just couldn't locate anything extra-special or otherwise notable during my dives at Andrea 1.
We picked up take-away pizza from Rumrunner's Pizza Temple one night and ate burgers in town while waiting to depart on our last day. Otherwise we cooked all of our meals in our villa. The kitchen was large and well-equipped, we had a nice gas BBQ, and the seaside ambience was enchanting. Grocery prices are slightly higher than at home, but I think this mostly reflects the incremental cost of shipping food to the island. I kind of have to laugh a little at how some folks go out to eat every night because "we don't cook on vacation" while some others lament the high price of groceries. I guess we fall somewhere into the middle demographically.
IMHO diving conditions were below average (whatever that is) compared to our previous Bonaire trips. The wind had been higher than normal in the week preceding our trip and continued for our first 2 weeks. We also experienced a week or so of rainy weather that was much-welcomed topside. The combination of wind, rain, and ocean currents reduced visibility to 50' to 60' or so, water temps were around 77 degrees, and some interesting waves came in from the south at some of the far southern and northern dive sites. On our last week (the first week of 2016) ocean conditions returned to what we think of as normal for this time of year.
One interesting upside of the weather was that waves were coming in to western shores at an angle from the south. This meant that the area from Tolo north past BOPEC to Candyland was getting significant afternoon waves that were discouraging divers from entering. But we found that the NW tip of the island was protecting Nukove from these waves and entry there was easy. Most amazingly, on the day we visited we were the only other truck on that remote section of road. You can see our entry and exit for that dive in the video below.
Once again we stuck exclusively with shore diving and picked up our tanks through Dive Friends Bonaire's Hamlet shop. Robert, Andrea, and Kaj are great folks, as are the DFB staff we've encountered at all of their locations over the years. I don't know if DFB is currently "the best" on the island, but they're pretty damned good by our account. Tank fills were consistently 3000+ psi and often 3200 psi. Nitrox blends were consistently 31.5 to 32.5 on their analyzer. My only complaint was that I had to change several tank o-rings and return a couple of tanks with leaking valves or threads. I realize that this is inherent with "break/fix" maintenance strategy... but it never seems to happen at an opportune time. Our solution was to always carry a spare full tank in the truck with this in mind. I also carry a keychain o-ring replacement kit that came in handy.
We weren't too militant or hard-core about our diving goals, especially considering the lower than normal water temps. As usual my wife and I both wore 5/4 mm full wetsuits with 2 mm beanies. This year she added a dive skin layer under her suit. The skin helped with warmth and also to don her suit more easily. We saw quite a few divers wearing shorty wetsuits and some just wearing swim trunks and t-shirts. But all that I observed outfitted like that were in the water for considerably less time than us. Several times we encountered divers underwater that entered the site after us and were gone when we exited.
I logged 37 hours of bottom time this trip with average 71 minutes bottom time per dive. That's down a bit from 40 hours and 74 minutes average the past couple of winter trips. I think the difference was the slightly colder water temps this trip. You can see in the video that our dive pace is relaxed, which helps quite a bit with extending bottom time. It also comes in handy when searching for and interacting with marine life. It's also pretty rare for us to delve deeper than 80' or so. Overall I've now enjoyed 299 hours of bottom time on Bonaire. If I'd known that before I left the island I probably would have pushed for one more dive. Oh well, something to look forward to next time. We're already making plans for our next visit!
That's all I can think of for now... and then some.
Hope you enjoy the video! (Bonus karma points awarded if you can pick out all 3 frogfish in the sequences towards the end.)
We were on the island for 3 weeks, from Dec 19 through Jan 7th, along with another couple that had also accompanied us in 2012. It was our 13th trip to Bonaire in 19 years, and our 26th through 28th overall weeks on the island. It was also our 7th consecutive year of enjoying 3 weeks on Bonaire over the Christmas and New Year holidays. We've previously also enjoyed visits during February, May, June, August, and September. If it's not obvious, we're comfortable on the island. It fits our personalities, pace, and tastes.
We flew the Saturday Delta flight from Atlanta, just as we've done on our previous 8 trips. Coming from Idaho this means staying overnight in Atlanta going each way, but we think it's worth the extra time and expense to avoid potential winter weather issues etc. We also like that Delta continues to fly the 757 to Bonaire vs. United's 737 planes. The 757 is larger, has more roomy bulkhead and exit row seats, and offers economy class lavatories at both front and rear of the plane. It also has more first class seats, which increases the odds that Delta frequent flyers (like me) might be lucky enough to receive complimentary upgrades.
Once again we rented our truck from Poppy at Telerin. As with previous Telerin rentals the price was great, the trucks were well-worn but functional, and Poppy was quick to respond to any questions or issues etc. As we've also done previously we paid for the truck via American Express and declined Telerin's CDW policy in favor of the $24.95 Amex Premium Car Rental Protection policy. It's nice to see that fuel prices have finally dropped on the island. For several years unleaded gasoline prices were fixed at $1.28/liter and now the price is $0.95/liter.
For something new we stayed at one of the Crown Ridge villas in the Sabadeco area. These are the oceanfront villas between Andrea 1 and Andrea 2 dive sites. Our particular villa was directly in front of Andrea 1 entry point and the steps from villa to shore made for an easily accessible house reef. I have to admit though that Andrea 1 is a much less interesting house reef than what we've been enjoying at The Cliff in front of Beachcomber Villas for the past 5 years or so. Despite my best efforts I just couldn't locate anything extra-special or otherwise notable during my dives at Andrea 1.
We picked up take-away pizza from Rumrunner's Pizza Temple one night and ate burgers in town while waiting to depart on our last day. Otherwise we cooked all of our meals in our villa. The kitchen was large and well-equipped, we had a nice gas BBQ, and the seaside ambience was enchanting. Grocery prices are slightly higher than at home, but I think this mostly reflects the incremental cost of shipping food to the island. I kind of have to laugh a little at how some folks go out to eat every night because "we don't cook on vacation" while some others lament the high price of groceries. I guess we fall somewhere into the middle demographically.
IMHO diving conditions were below average (whatever that is) compared to our previous Bonaire trips. The wind had been higher than normal in the week preceding our trip and continued for our first 2 weeks. We also experienced a week or so of rainy weather that was much-welcomed topside. The combination of wind, rain, and ocean currents reduced visibility to 50' to 60' or so, water temps were around 77 degrees, and some interesting waves came in from the south at some of the far southern and northern dive sites. On our last week (the first week of 2016) ocean conditions returned to what we think of as normal for this time of year.
One interesting upside of the weather was that waves were coming in to western shores at an angle from the south. This meant that the area from Tolo north past BOPEC to Candyland was getting significant afternoon waves that were discouraging divers from entering. But we found that the NW tip of the island was protecting Nukove from these waves and entry there was easy. Most amazingly, on the day we visited we were the only other truck on that remote section of road. You can see our entry and exit for that dive in the video below.
Once again we stuck exclusively with shore diving and picked up our tanks through Dive Friends Bonaire's Hamlet shop. Robert, Andrea, and Kaj are great folks, as are the DFB staff we've encountered at all of their locations over the years. I don't know if DFB is currently "the best" on the island, but they're pretty damned good by our account. Tank fills were consistently 3000+ psi and often 3200 psi. Nitrox blends were consistently 31.5 to 32.5 on their analyzer. My only complaint was that I had to change several tank o-rings and return a couple of tanks with leaking valves or threads. I realize that this is inherent with "break/fix" maintenance strategy... but it never seems to happen at an opportune time. Our solution was to always carry a spare full tank in the truck with this in mind. I also carry a keychain o-ring replacement kit that came in handy.
We weren't too militant or hard-core about our diving goals, especially considering the lower than normal water temps. As usual my wife and I both wore 5/4 mm full wetsuits with 2 mm beanies. This year she added a dive skin layer under her suit. The skin helped with warmth and also to don her suit more easily. We saw quite a few divers wearing shorty wetsuits and some just wearing swim trunks and t-shirts. But all that I observed outfitted like that were in the water for considerably less time than us. Several times we encountered divers underwater that entered the site after us and were gone when we exited.
I logged 37 hours of bottom time this trip with average 71 minutes bottom time per dive. That's down a bit from 40 hours and 74 minutes average the past couple of winter trips. I think the difference was the slightly colder water temps this trip. You can see in the video that our dive pace is relaxed, which helps quite a bit with extending bottom time. It also comes in handy when searching for and interacting with marine life. It's also pretty rare for us to delve deeper than 80' or so. Overall I've now enjoyed 299 hours of bottom time on Bonaire. If I'd known that before I left the island I probably would have pushed for one more dive. Oh well, something to look forward to next time. We're already making plans for our next visit!
That's all I can think of for now... and then some.
Hope you enjoy the video! (Bonus karma points awarded if you can pick out all 3 frogfish in the sequences towards the end.)
