Bonaire Report

[doctormike]

Hey, Webcams! Great, that will help my PBD..!

Yes, bvmjethead... Robint is correct, most of the center of southern Bonaire are these vast brine pools that were hand dug many years ago and worked by slaves to produce salt, which was an incredibly valuable commodity in the years before refrigeration. Salting was one of the few ways to preserve food; think of oil today, and read Mark Kurlansky's book if you are interested...

http://www.amazon.com/Salt-World-History-Mark-Kurlansky/dp/0142001619/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-5231239-2354412?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1189001486&sr=8-1

Mike

 

[doctormike]

I am curious to hear about diving there this week to know if any reefs were damaged by the storm.

I don't know about the reefs, but here are some photos and a little video clip that I took on the morning of Sunday, 9/2/07. We were originally supposed to leave on the Continental 6 AM to Newark, but that got delayed so we hung around Buddy Dive for the morning. By this time, the bulk of the storm had passed, but you can see some of the dock damage (not too bad!). In the clip you can see the storm surge hitting the wall, which is quite a bit more activity than you usually find in the mill pond that is the sea off the west coast of Bonaire...!

http://homepage.mac.com/mikerothschild/hurricanefelix/Menu381.html