Today (August 12) is our 36th wedding anniversary so we had a nice relaxing day. We slept in, had a late lunch then headed to place called Black Durgon Beach, but the owner of the inn would not let us use his dock. That’s the first cranky Bonairian we’ve encountered. (Beaches are all public in Bonaire, but using someone’s dock requires permission.)
Not to be deterred we went down a few doors to Captain Don’s place, and they welcomed us with open arms. The water was super clear and we saw just tons of stuff. Highlights included several large tarpons, a couple of turtles, various eels, and some ginormous rainbow parrotfish which were well over four feet long.
We had dinner at the Patagonia, an Argentinian steakhouse. To say it was fantastic is to understate the experience. The restaurant itself is impeccable, clean crisp and welcoming. There was light jazz playing at a quiet level, quite nice. The waiter was impeccable. The food was divine. The experience was wonderful. We could not have planned a better dinner!
We had a three course, dinner special. Soup or salad, steak with caremelized onions, fresh veggies, superb mashed potatoes, and a tiramisu Pam said was the best she ever had. Total price was 79 dollars, including two beer and pop. When the owner discovered it was our anniversary, he treated us to a complimentary after dinner aperitif. Very cool.
Here is a brief movie, using several clips from various movies we took of some fish we saw today.
(We’re back home and I have access to a computer that can process our pictures and videos so we’ll start posting over the next few days.)
While reading and having our morning coffee we were joined on the sunporch by the local cat. I think he preferred to sleep on our chairs because we used e-readers, while the people next door were making all sorts of noise by turning their pages. Disturbed his sleep don’t you know?
We decided to just swim out front of our place today and we saw some fun things. Pam got a bit of a sunburn, something she very rarely does. So we got her a rash guard and now she’s a convert.
We managed to get a couple of cool shots of a purple mouth moray that I thought deserved two different looks. He was a busy little guy, darting across the sand and along the coral like he had somewhere to go.
We took a nice drive around the island and I saw what I thought was a pretty darn cool house. Not your typical Caribbean home, that’s for sure.
Does this bird look like he’s about to jump in the pool? And he’s glancing nervously around to see if security will see that he is not a registered guest and toss him out. Thought it was a pretty fun shot!
(We’re back home and I have access to a computer that can process our pictures and videos so we’ll start posting over the next few days.)
While reading and having our morning coffee we were joined on the sunporch by the local cat. I think he preferred to sleep on our chairs because we used e-readers, while the people next door were making all sorts of noise by turning their pages. Disturbed his sleep don’t you know?
We decided to just swim out front of our place today and we saw some fun things. Pam got a bit of a sunburn, something she very rarely does. So we got her a rash guard and now she’s a convert. We managed to get a couple of cool shots of a purple mouth moray that I thought deserved two different looks. He was a busy little guy, darting across the sand and along the coral like he had somewhere to go.
We took a nice drive around the island and I saw what I thought was a pretty darn cool house. Not your typical Caribbean home, that’s for sure.
Does this bird look like he’s about to jump in the pool? And he’s glancing nervously around to see if security will see that he is not a registered guest and toss him out. Thought it was a pretty fun shot!
Bonaire shuts down on Sunday. Only one store on the whole island was open, even though there was a cruise ship in the harbor. So we headed south for a nice drive, searching for parrots, snow and salt!
We searched all over the south of the island and found no parrots. We came back to our hotel and what swoops down and nearly crashes into our windshield? Not one, not two, but three loras! Here’s a kind of “where’s waldo?” picture of a pair of them.
I’m typing this mostly from my Nook Tablet since my computer is officially gonzo. I can only use it for a brief time (ten to fifteen minutes) before it gets too hot and I need to shut it down.
Anyways – we had a nice relaxing day enjoying the sea and sand right outside our door. I’m surprised by how busy the place is, as I expected it to be quieter here in the “off-season.” Lots to see as usual, but again, lots of things we’ve seen in the past, of course. The picture to the right is of a tiny collection of squid, the biggest of which is only three inches!
We saw a puddingwife, nothing unusual about that, except the size! They say that these fish grow to a maximum of eighteen inches, but this sucker had to be two feet AT LEAST!
Here is a decent picture of a parrotfish. Great color on this one, nice and crisp. The water has been brilliantly clear today, and the sun was shining so light was great.
Pam negotiates the pylons under the dock near the Divi, and STILL she has time to wave a friendly hello!
We had a nice flight into Bonaire last evening. We had no one sitting beside us, so we were able to stretch out and grab a nap. We had a bit of trouble finding our single night residence, but found it.
It’s a lovely single family home, right on Bachelor’s Beach, called Renaissance by the Sea. It had a wonderful view out the over the large deck, with a private dock to boot. The room was large and cozy, with a very comfortable bed.
We had a nice first snorkel. It was great to be back in the ocean. Nice and warm and lots of fish to see.
Our photography is not great so I won’t bore you with second rate pictures. We saw some unusual things today. One thing that we’ve seen once in a while is an eel, being shadowed by a fish or two, while the eel is digging in the ground. The lurkers quickly grab anything that might be tasty. Today we saw that scenario at least a dozen times! And most of the eels had a barjack, a schoolmaster and a Spanish hogfish hanging around!
Our movies are not great, but I’ll try to edit a couple together and get it posted. BUT – my computer is in trouble – it seems to have blown the fan, and the computer is running super hot and and is vibrating like crazy. Hopefully it will make it through the trip…
We moved to the Divi Flamingo after our snorkel and had to dodge a bunch of jaywalkers. Man – dangerous! haha
We ran to the grocery store and got stocked up with food and drink, so we’re set for the next seven days! Pretty nice sunset too.
Here is a movie of compiled clips from various little movies we made on day one.
Pam and I are returning to Bonaire, the South Caribbean island just off the coast of Venezuela. We are arriving one day earlier than we normally do, so we have eight days there, rather than the normal seven.
We are in Vancouver International airport right now, using their free wifi. This is really an awful airport. I just can’t stand how they make you walk a kilometer south, then 990 meters back north to get to your gate, rather than open a door, and let you walk six meters to the gate. Just crazy.
Naturally I had to stop and spend a few minutes with my old friends, the Spirit of the Haida Gwaii, the wonderful sculpture by Bill Reid. It’s a great piece of art and I just feel privileged to be able to look at it for free! No museum entrance fee, just great art, in great light.
I’ve got a brief youtube video of it, and I’m uploading it using the free wifi. Enjoy!
On Friday, our last full day in Bonaire, we took the morning trip to Klein Bonaire, an uninhabited island just off the coast of Bonaire. We had wanted to book a trip earlier on the Woodwind, a trimaran, but they have gone to three sailings a week because it’s the low season I guess. Anyway, I can not recommend this trip highly enough! WOW. The young lady who owns the boat, Dedrie (Dee for short) is so passionate about the waters around Bonaire, and it came across so clearly. She really cares about the island, and doing her part to protect the environment there. She gave great talks on the history of the island, about the creatures in the water, how to snorkel, how to apply your mask – she really was an amazing person.
We got on the boat right at the docks of the Divi resort, so it was easy for us to get there. They had a mango drink ready for us, before we even got on the boat! They quickly got a couple of sails up and we made the crossing very quickly. Along the way we got to see flying fish skimming along the surface. Those little suckers can really fly long distances! Then after a talk about the history of the island (cholera quarantine, goat/donkey sanctuary, to uninhabited protected site) we jumped in for a drift snorkel. The coral there is absolutely wonderful which is nothing unusual for Bonaire, of course.
Dee told us the names of fish or coral, then would dive down and point out them out. She would literally latch on to people, and take them over to see various things. She is a powerful swimmer, an awesome diver, able to stay deep under water for longer than I thought possible! Also along on the trip was LeAnn, from a photo place on Bonaire called BonPhoto. Most of the pictures in this post were taken by her, with her underwater camera, fitted with a fisheye lens. She was amazingly personable as well. And she could dive deeply, and hold her breath a long time too – some of her pictures were taken at incredible depths – especially the ones of the turtles. Remarkable stuff.
After two snorkels, one in the area known for turtles nesting – we saw four turtles that day – we had another quick sail back to Bonaire and grabbed a mooring ball close to the lighthouse. They served us a hot lunch, a kind of goreng, with chicken and noodles and plantains. Then they gave us a brownie with caramel sauce and whipped cream. There was plenty to drink, and the conversations were of the fish we had seen. It was a really nice day. HIGHLY recommended if you ever go to Bonaire. Take the tour early in your stay – it will make you appreciate the island even more!
I’m including a slideshow of the pictures taken by LeeAnn of Bon Photo here – I’ve put her pictures in the one gallery, separate from our Bonaire gallery. She used a Nikon P7000 with Fisheye lens to take the photos.
In the late afternoon, we took a quick swim around the reef by the Divi. It was our last swim, so we just slowly wound our away around the place. We saw some cool stuff – the most remarkable was a permit fish. He’s quite a large fish, and while we’ve seen permit fish in the past, we’ve never seen one close up. Usually they swim away quickly, before we can even get a half way decent shot of them. This guy didn’t even care if we dove right down into his face and took a picture. He just continued sifting through the sandy bottom!
Another unusual thing we saw was this crazy jellyfish called the tamoya ohboya, also know as the Bonaire banded box jellyfish. It’s a recently discovered jellyfish, officially described in 2011, and it’s sting is quite painful. It’s quite long, eighteen inches at least, and quite active in the water. There have been only fifty sightings of tamoya ohboya, so we’re kind of in a very select group!
It’s always cool to see different things in the water, and this trip to Bonaire was certainly fun for that! It will definitely be hard to go back home after all the fascinating stuff we’ve seen here! One thing we did not want to see was a lionfish, an invasive species, not indigenous to the Caribbean. We had not seen one the whole week, but our last day, last swim, in the last twenty minutes in the ocean, we spotted one! Heavy sigh… We reported it right away to the special “Lionfish Hunters” group.
Here’s a traditional shot for us… the last sunset… I’m thinking we will be back here, sooner rather than later. It’s a great island for snorkeling of course, but the people were really terrific. The island itself is much bigger than Aruba, but with less than ten percent of the population! We both felt comfortable there, like we were “regulars”…
Today (August 12) is our 36th wedding anniversary so we had a nice relaxing day. We slept in, had a late lunch then headed to place called Black Durgon Beach, but the owner of the inn would not let us use his dock. That’s the first cranky Bonairian we’ve encountered. (Beaches are all public in Bonaire, but using someone’s dock requires permission.)
We had a three course, dinner special. Soup or salad, steak with caremelized onions, fresh veggies, superb mashed potatoes, and a tiramisu Pam said was the best she ever had. Total price was 79 dollars, including two beer and pop. When the owner discovered it was our anniversary, he treated us to a complimentary after dinner aperitif. Very cool.
