Fantastic report. Fabulous photos.
Really enjoyed it.
Thank you.
Really enjoyed it.
Thank you.
Trip Report Bonaire: Den Laman and Dive Friends, August 17-31. 2022
- Thread starter scubadada
- Start date
Please register or login
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
- Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
- A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
- You can make this box go away
OP
- Messages
- 20,493
- Reaction score
- 19,871
- Location
- Philadelphia and Boynton Beach
- # of dives
- 1000 - 2499
Thanks @RIHappyDiver @morecowbells @rmorgan @staggsSevin @Catito @jonhall @drrich2 King of the Trip Report, and @Compressor glad you liked it, my pleasure to share a fantastic trip
That new boat looks great! Last time I was there and used the ponga boats my back didn’t really like the setup.
OP
- Messages
- 20,493
- Reaction score
- 19,871
- Location
- Philadelphia and Boynton Beach
- # of dives
- 1000 - 2499
Yes, the Tiki Diver is a very nice boat. Smooth, fast, dry, even in good size swells, unlike their other boats. Plenty of room, normal height seating, real under seat storage. A camera table and a couple of nice camera rinse tubs. You can ride up front or up top. Two easy side exits and a couple of good ladders.
They take up to 14 divers, could hold more. With two groups, that is fine. At least once we had a single group, far too many divers. A group of 6 or 7 is all I easily tolerate and was, generally, the rule. We took it each day except for one day on the Pascal, that reinforced my fondness for the new boat.
Will you and your wife be taking your new rebreathers to Bonaire one of these days? Every visit we make, my wife and I see more divers on sidemount, scooters, and rebreathers.
agmason
Registered
Thanks for the great write-up and photos! You gave me frog fish envy and also got me looking forward to my trip to Bonaire next year.
Perhaps! It would be a nice spot to build hours, it’s also just such a great spot to enjoy the simplicity of a streamlined/minimal open circuit setup.
I'm actually not sure what it's called, I can't say I've ever dove anywhere between Bachelor's Beach and the Lake before. I'm certain it won't be as good as Bari though...but at least it has a house reef. I will be diving with VIP Divers this go too this go, and I've never used them before. I've heard nothing but good things and positive stuff about them. (They keep Bellafonte stocked with tanks).
I would have stayed with Den Laman for this trip but I just wasn't certain on Chogogo noise levels and was going to go check it out when we went for the next trip. It's been one of our favorite places to stay.
With any luck (like you had) there will be atleast one frog fish there for us on the house reef
Wow, this looks like a big improvement!
OP
- Messages
- 20,493
- Reaction score
- 19,871
- Location
- Philadelphia and Boynton Beach
- # of dives
- 1000 - 2499
You're not kidding. I had a fantastic solo 95 min dive on Bari Reef one afternoon when nobody else wanted to dive. Avg depth 43 feet. Yellow frogfish, the gorgeous school of jacks seen in the photos on post #5, and all the usual reef fish and creatures. Most relaxing.
Drats, meant to ask this on my other post. Any chance you have any photos of the gear storage room? How secure was it? We like staying at Divi but used Dive Friends which meant we couldn't use the on-pier dive storage at Divi (though it looks like their pier got trashed in the last storm), so always curious. If we take CCRs they would obviously be coming back inside the room with us, but thinking if we return and dive OC.
Similar threads
