Bonaire Boat Dive Recomendations

[KaBoOm]

Hey all,

My wife and I are going to be in Bonaire during a cruise in a couple of weeks and we're wondering which dive operators you would recommend for boat diving. I know that most people say the shore dives are just as good, but we don't want to worry about the transportation etc. We hate diving with the cruise tour, too many people and they never get to the good sites.

Ideas? We'll be there on November 15th on the Crown Princess.

Thanks!!

Andrew

 

[diversteve]

How long are you there, and when do you arrive? I may be wrong but I think the cruiseships dock at Town Pier so get off the boat quickly since the first thing you'll have to do is attend a morning Bonaire Marine Park Orientation and get your BMP tag($25pp). Otherwise you won't be allowed to dive on Bonaire. http://www.bmp.org/html/about_us.html (read near the bottom of the page)

The diveops do them between 9-10AM. At the end of the orientation you're required to do one dive off the property as a buoyancy check. Some are escorted, some aren't.

Maybe the cruise tour operator accommodates this requirement some other way? I don't know, I don't cruise.

So if you do your own thing, you are going to have "to worry about transportation" as the diveops don't do pickups - at least not that I'm aware of. There's usually cabs just north or south of Town Pier, parking by the pier is kind of limited.

From the pier, the closest diveop is going to be Divi Divers at the Divi resort - about 1/2mi. south of town. Too far to walk with gear. Once you've been oriented and done the dive you can dive with anyone - you won't even need to show a c-card anywhere else.
http://www.diviflamingo.com/diviflamingo/diving.html

Your other option would be to get a cab to any of the diveresorts on the north end. Bonaire Dive/Adventure, Buddy's etc. They all do a morning orientation. Some do a late morning dive and most also do an afternoon boat dive. BD&A used to do an 11AM trip also. Probably out to Klein, it's just across the channel there.
http://www.bonairediveandadventure.com/
http://www.buddydive.com/diving.html

I'd go with BD&A since their checkout dive is Bari Reef, it's the most prolific reef in the Caribbean for fish species. You can even do an official REEF fish count while there. They have a nice dock with stairs for entry/exit.

A lot of good dive sites are 20min from shore so with a later cruise departure, you'll have no trouble doing a couple of boat dives during the day.

 

[dbh]

Buddy's does orientations at 9:00 AM & 2:00 PM.

Boats go out at 8:30 AM, 10:30 AM and 2:15PM. Of course, Island Time dictates that all of these times are +/- 30 minutes .

Dave

 

[KaBoOm]

We're in port from 11:00am to 7:00pm. Not exactly the best time, but it should allow for some afternoon diving. No problem taking a cab to wherever we need to go to get the best diving in. My main goal in doing this ourselves is to get a real idea of what Bonaire is like and what the diving is like not to be thrown on and off a boat on the closest reef to the ship!

I've sent an email to BD&A to see what they have available, any other suggestions or ideas?

Thanks,

Andrew

 

[herman]

Don't worry about being thrown off the ship at a bad site, I don't know of a bad site on Bonaire, some better than others but none bad. I would say the northern sites IMO are a little nicer than the southern ones. Most all of the boat dives are single tank dives so with your time schedule, one dive is all you are going to get in. If it were me I would go to either Buddy, BD&A or Divi and shore dive all daywhat if you want to know what Bonaire diving is really like. You may be able to get them to do a special orientation for you, never hurts to ask. In any case you could hit the afternoon one and do several dives off their dock.

 

[Damselfish]

I agree in one day you don't want to mess with transportation to get tanks and shore dive random beaches. But shore diving at one of the hotels on the water makes perfect sense. Pick a hotel, pay for a day of unlimited tanks (cheap) and I suppose the marine park fee, and just hang out there and do a few dives. You will be seeing what Bonaire diving is like. What time the op will do an orientation for you will be an important factor in choosing a place. And if the schedule works out sure, hop on a boat dive while you're there, especially to Klein or the northern end of the island.

I'm all for boat diving when I'm staying someplace, even on Bonaire. But coming on a cruiseship it doesn't really make sense to focus on boats because of the scheduling issue, and the fact that the shore dives are mostly the same. Now if the cruise ship offered a 2 tank boat trip it might be worthwhile, assuming they don't try to do herd diving for cruise people. Regular boats in Bonaire don't, so even a boatload of people will spread out anyway. And there aren't really bad sites to drop you on.

 

[Bosun]

I think there is a different Marine Park fee for Cruise passengers at $10.

 

[diversteve]

My main goal in doing this ourselves is to get a real idea of what Bonaire is like and what the diving is like not to be thrown on and off a boat on the closest reef to the ship!

Tight schedule - if you work at it, you should be able to do 2-3 dives - and squeeze in a little lunch also. The only holdup being the orientation. fwiw, we dove Bari Reef w/BD&A, then moved 2 min down the street and dove Cliff and LaMachaca at Capt's Dons all from about noon-5pm. Call a cab when you get out of the water between dives, they're close by physically but at least a 1/4 mi. walk since you have to go back out to the road to go between properties, and they all run perpendicular to the road in that area.

Actually being thrown off the closest reef in Bonaire would be a good thing. Since that's the world famous Town Pier. Where your ship will tie up. Too bad it's only dove at night - right after your ship is gone.

Any dive resort on Bonaire is situated directly offshore from the reef, in some areas it's as close as 30' or less to the coral(literally). None of the resorts are more than 5-10min. from the cruise dock.

The problem with the orientation scheduling might be that they may not be ready to do it for you on arrival without prior notification. The standard practice on Bonaire is to arrive later, do the orientation first thing the next morning and then dive all week.

Recently there's new early a.m. flights to there, so there may be more diveops doing afternoon orientations now. We stay to the south in a condo, and had our own private orientation the next morning after we got up (long flight) probably around 11 or so. Just us and the instructor, it would have taken 15mins. except my buddy did his Nitrox referral that morning.

Most of the diveops on Bonaire have smaller boats so the likelihood of being on any sort of cattle trip, especially in the afternoon is slim to none. Capt' Don's and Buddy Dive have the only bigger boats on the island, up to about 36' or so, BD&A's are around 20' or slightly more - the type with open bows and canopy tops.

Another option might be WannaDive, they're pretty accommodating. imo, everybody I've dealt with there is, Capt' Dons less so - the only resort that's $5 to dive there if you're not a guest.

hth,

 

[diversteve]

I think there is a different Marine Park fee for Cruise passengers at $10.

Might be, but do you get the tag? I still have mine on my BC.
How recent is this? 2 yrs. ago the BMP Fee was $10 for everyone.

 

[dvrliz1]

BMP tag for snorkelers is $10, for divers it is $25.00, but I think they have a special rate for cruisers. You might want to check with Wannadive as they are right in town by the cruise ships, next to City Cafe Restaurant. They provide guided dives on shore and it would probably be a better option than a boat dive, less time constraints. You can just email them or walk in and ask. They would propably be able to answer all your questions regarding getting some dives in at a comfortable pace. Enjoy!

Liz