Bonaire site recommendations for my first and last trip

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

Sinbad, if you like seeing big creature I would suggest you visit Bonaire East Coast Diving FB page. Plenty of turtles (in fact I think there is a turtle conservation area there), tarpons (you will also see them at Salt Pier and night diving out of Windsock or Something Special), moray eels and eagle rays. They have also seen nurse sharks, hammerhead and manta. I used them in 2012 and intend to dive again with them this upcoming February.

This gets my interest. It seems though that there is less diving on the East and most of the dive sites are situated on the west coast. Why is that? Is it because most of the islands infrastructure is on the West so it gives divers easy access? Or it is because the West had better diving so it made sense to make the town on the West side?

 

[Hintermann]

A dive destination should be enjoyed for what it is, not what it is not.

I admit you are right at that. The problem with me is this OCD to have everything organised, including a holiday (for Pete's sake!). A liveaboard cruise comes closest to fulfilling my "specifications" and still allow me to enjoy the diving. This include working along with and around the other people on the boat, which usually happens by the second day. For example, if you want to ask someone something and cannot see them, there are only 3 or 4 places, all of them around the corner, where they'll be; or if a diver is late for briefing, it is easy to quickly find out if they are coming or not without having to wait in the hope that they'll turn-up.

Since there are almost always more variables (and so the need for flexibility) associated with land based diving, I don't quite feel so comfortable. Delays, plan changes, cramped dayboats, getting to and back from the hotel room (sometimes between dives), sorting lunches, lugging gear back & forth, fewer and often uncertain night dives etc are a hassle to my way of thinking. But I am NOT arguing that my way of thinking is the right one...far from it. Just putting forward my case, that's all.

 

[Lorenzoid]

This gets my interest. It seems though that there is less diving on the East and most of the dive sites are situated on the west coast. Why is that? Is it because most of the islands infrastructure is on the West so it gives divers easy access? Or it is because the West had better diving so it made sense to make the town on the West side?

The East side is not only more sparsely inhabited, but moreover, the sea is much rougher. This is why East-side diving is almost always done with an experienced guide.

 

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

The East side is not only more sparsely inhabited, but moreover, the sea is much rougher. This is why East-side diving is almost always done with an experienced guide.

Make sense. Any recommendations for the guide?

 

[jimbeeler]

Make sense. Any recommendations for the guide?

Many use Bas Tol:

BAS Diving

Jim

 

[uncfnp]

Hi Sinbad

This is a compilation from several trip and I am no videographer but you can see some pretty good creatures in Bonaire. Normally we mostly dive the north but this last trip the winds were down so we hit the southern sites. Huge bait balls and the most turtles I have even seen on a drive trip, including Florida. Loved Sweet Dreams, Vista Blue and Red Beryl.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZEYTtKkZBA&feature=youtu.be


This one is from this Fall.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V-_ZqeW4xSg

Lisa

 

[scubadada]

Some of our most enjoyable Bonaire dives have resulted from unpredictable sightings of very large numbers (i.e., thousands) of schooling bigeye scad and boga. Neither fish species is large, of course, but the schools themselves are positively wonderful to watch and interact with. If you are lucky, you will become immersed in such a school and disappear from the sight of your fellow divers. I have photos of my wife being consumed by a school of bigeye scad until there is nothing of her visible but 6" of blue fin. Awesome!

Diving in a huge, dense school of boga is one of my most memorable dives, absolutely dazzling

 

[drrich2]

Bas Tol with BasDiving.com for east coast guided shore diving. I don't recall off-hand about the boat diving.

Waves pound the east coast pretty hard. The west coast is the leeward side of Bonaire, so the island protects the dive sites off the west coast and the waters are quite calm by oceanic standards.

The main activity I see on the east coast is a place called Jibe City at Lac Bay, where people wind surf. On the west coast, down near the Atlantis dive site, people kite board.

Hintermann:

I think if you did more than one trip to Bonaire, and got your customary workflow down, you'd really like it. After all, shore diving, you (& a buddy if you're not solo) are the only ones making or changing any plans. There is no schedule unless you make one. There's no one else to coordinate with.

Richard.

 

[scubadada]

In some ways Bonaire offers some of the advantages of a live-aboard and a land-based op. You can handily do 4 shore dives/day. Especially if you're at a resort with a good house reef, you can do a night dive. Earlier this year I went solo and spent a week during which I got in 28 dives. That compares favorably with what I read about live-aboards. I'd still love to do a live-aboard someday; I'd like to see that happen in 2015.

But you can roam the island if you want to. Eat in different places, if you want to. Choose between boat or shore diving.

A dive destination should be enjoyed for what it is, not what it is not. If you go determined that Cozumel, or Raja Ampat, or Saba, or wherever is the end all be all of how diving should be, then most other places will fall short.

But if you want to dive 4 or 5 times/day, any time of day or night you want, how you want, solo if you want & nobody telling you that you can't, picking your own sites, well, there is something to be said for that.

Conversely, someone who's sold on 'the Bonaire Way' could probably go around dissing other dive destinations because most are lacking in some or all of those respects. But is that the way to richly enjoy an exotic vacation?

Richard.

P.S.: I still reserve the right to diss cold water destinations. Just say'n...

I've only been to Bonaire three times, largely because there really are so many places to visit. Bonaire is one of my favorites, my wife's favorite. Four to 5 dives per day is really quite easy and it's all at your own rate and time. I'd really like to find a way to return soon

 

[uncfnp]

Diving in a huge, dense school of boga is one of my most memorable dives, absolutely dazzling

Is that the fish in the bait balls in my two videos? You are right about it being incredible. We went back in for second dives at the same site when we saw them. They were at 20 to 30 feet at the southern sites. We must have spent 15 minutes at one safety stop just swimming in and around them.