23 days to first Bonaire trip! Please share your best tips.

[Herk_Man]

Add-on to Jersey's to-do list: Go do the Blokarts on the road between K-town and Rincon. $50US gets you over an hour of some of the most fun you can have on land. (Land sailers.)

 

[Jersey]

Herk - the blo-karts are on my list, though I admit I am not any kind of sailor. I'm a power boat kinda girl! Have driven by there many times and only once saw folks on the course. There is just never enough time to do all the things possible and there are a ton of topside activities possible. I'm not sure people realize all that is available. I've also heard great things about the mangrove kayak, the caving is supposed to be quite a workout and tour, there is horseback riding for the equestrian....can't do it all in one trip! But it gives me reasons to keep coming back.

 

[DiverVince]

Jersey..we did the horseback riding last year. It was a unique experience and a lot of fun; especially swimming in the ocean bareback with them!

 

[Skookumchuck]

We brought solar-heated camping showers for a post dive rinse. Instead of the cheap and usually leaky dry boxes sold on the Island we used dive lights with the battery removed. Most Pacific Northwest divers have a supply of unused lights as they continually upgrade. A double ended gear clip is handy for clipping off sunglasses and ball caps which are nice to have on the swim out for those of us that don't like snorkels and surface swim face up. Or you could do this..

 

[shoredivr]

Get up before dawn and do a dawn dive. You get to see the "changing of the guard" on the reef, plus when you get back to your hotel, you can watch all the folks getting on the dive boats and have the restaurant to yourself.

Take Jerry Ligon's snorkelling tour of the Mangroves: very educational about where the fish have their nurseries, plus you get to see upside-down, jellyfish.

 

[Papa_Bear]

Like this one?

 

[shoredivr]

That's it, all right! I've never seen a species of jellyfish with so many colours : red ones, blue ones, yellow ones, brown ones, green ones....like they were some kind of decorating species for the mangrove.

 

[Papa_Bear]

Cassiopeia Andromeda or Upside down jelly! Very cool and come in many different sizes too!

 

[Herk_Man]

Herk - the blo-karts are on my list, though I admit I am not any kind of sailor. I'm a power boat kinda girl! Have driven by there many times and only once saw folks on the course. There is just never enough time to do all the things possible and there are a ton of topside activities possible. I'm not sure people realize all that is available. I've also heard great things about the mangrove kayak, the caving is supposed to be quite a workout and tour, there is horseback riding for the equestrian....can't do it all in one trip! But it gives me reasons to keep coming back.

You don't have to be a sailor to do the blokarts. You are always on a reach (sailing perpendicular to the wind) except when you go around the end of the course so none of the normal difficulties with point of sail or anything.

The guys that run the place give you a good 15 minute lesson on operating the karts and once you get out on the course, if you follow their advice on how to slow down going into the turns, you'll have no problems.

It's an absolute blast!

 

[Boat Chick]

Arriving 2/27 for 8 nights...doing a full day of diving with Bas Tuesday... the UV night dive with Bas Wednesday evening, and possibly Thursday evening as well. Unscheduled time will be spent shore diving on our own.

Please share your favorite dive site, restaurant, activity, ect or tips on Bonaire.

There is so much good information on this site.

Main Diver, I just returned from my 9th trip to the island. Post Bonaire Depression has set in:depressed:

I did the UV night dive with new father Bas (OB1) for the second time. I did it my last trip and was so tripped out I had to do it again. Well worth it. I knew what to expect and what to look for. Bas got a nice meal afterward too

One thing we did on this trip that was new was to rent a small power boat from Bonaire Boats located at Plaza Resort. It was a 19 foot boat and we stocked it with food and drinks and took off for a four hour tour We zipped along the coast South, then North, then tooled over to Klein and grabbed a mooring and snorkeled (no diving from rental boats). It was truly one of my most enjoyable SI afternoons on Bonaire. If you like boating I'd highly recommend it.

Have a great trip:cool2: