Tag Archives: Woodwind

Woodwind snorkel tour

The WoodwindOn 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.

Klein Bonaire 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. Klein BonaireThose 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.

Klein Bonaire 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!
Klein BonaireAlso 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.

Klein Bonaire 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. Klein BonaireThen 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.

Permit fish, Bonaire, May 17, 2013 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. Permit fish, Bonaire, May 17, 2013Usually 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!

Tamoya Ohboya, Bonaire, May 17, 2013Another 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!

Lionfish, Bonaire, May 17, 2013It’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.

Last sunset in Bonaire 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”…

I really can’t wait to get back there!