Trip Report Bonaire Trip Report - V.I.P. Divers/Aqua Viva Suites

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2022 Bonaire Trip Report​

I was blessed to spend 14-days in Bonaire late winter Feb. 16 – Mar. 2, 2022. In 2019 I wrote a destination overview of Bonaire, so I’m not recapping that. I’m writing specifics on where I stayed, who I dove with, the rental truck agency, a 4 dives/day 12 day 48-dive experience and related issues. I’ll explain my decision process, as yours may differ, and throw in orientation guidance regulars don’t need, but people new to Bonaire might (especially if not with a group; I recommend starting with a group!).

Going Solo, the Big Tank Factor, Retirement Budget​

Bonaire is ‘solo-friendly’ – some dive op.s may want to see an SDI Solo Diver or PADI Self-Reliant Diver certification (I have the SDI), and none are policing diving at any but their own site house reefs (if that). If you travel alone and aren’t comfortable diving solo, consider traveling with a group, or BYOB (bring your own buddy), or at a dive resort there might be a means to help connect. But unlike a live-aboard, where tagging along with the group is an option, in Bonaire, people who require a buddy need a plan to have one. If you’re a solo diver, hey, pool’s open!

A number of us discussed earlier this year designing a budget shore diving trip to Bonaire (Budget Trip Challenge – Bonaire). Some noted you save big when more people share a room, even if you rent more than one truck, but I was solo and not looking to join a group. I like big tanks; @USC8791 reported 100-cf tanks at Tropical Divers Resort (across the street from the entrance to Plaza Beach & Dive Resort Bonaire), but I contacted TDR and it sounded like the supply wasn’t clearly big. Then I heard V.I.P. Divers had a supply of 100-cf AL nitrox tanks.

Due to budget constraints I chose a 2-week trip rather than 2 1-week trips to pay half the airfare and checked baggage fees, and hopefully catch up on diving missed earlier in the pandemic. I chose Wednesday-to-Wednesday dates, since in another thread @tursiops noted they can be much cheaper – and I saved around $722 on American Airlines airfare vs. a Sat.-to-Sat. trip. I only drive automatic, which is more expensive and there are far fewer available in rental fleets.

For cost control I focused on non-waterfront accommodations, though the lack of a convenient on-site house reef would discourage evening/night dives and lower the total dive count. I liked Dive Hut in 2012 (affiliated with WannaDive), but had no reason to think they had 100-cf tanks now. In years past I’ve stayed at Dive Hut, Eden Beach Resort (prior management and before renovations), Buddy Dive Resort and Sand Dollar Condo.s (using Dive Friends) – all north-of-town properties. Liked them all, but a southern end of Kralendijk option closer to southern dive sites would be a good new experience.

Tropical Divers Resort is a resort with accommodations and dive operation; V.I.P. Divers is a dive op. affiliated with many accommodation options (which made for tedious online researching). I finally learned immediately adjacent to them is Aqua Viva Suites, a good budget housing option. I was closer to my gear and tanks from there than at the far end of Sand Dollar Condo.’s property in 2019, and comparable to my Buddy Dive Resort experience (if not closer). Aqua Viva Suites’ owner offers housing/diving/rental truck package deals with V.I.P. Diving, and had a good offer on 2-week package.

 

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Location​

V.I.P. Divers is at the corner of a road that’s not directly waterfront, but very close (there’s a row of buildings across the street in front of it). You can cross the street and walk north to Sebastian’s Restaurant, beside which there’s an alley leading to the sea (where people often do their checkout dive). I found ‘Sebastian’s Reef’ mediocre (see next 2 photos), okay for the purpose but I didn’t repeat it. Aqua Viva Suites is directly behind V.I.P. Diving.

You can pull up Google Maps (and use street view to enter and look around V.I.P.’s dive shop!), but I’ll describe getting around practically. Picture yourself standing in front of V.I.P. dive shop, facing the ocean (westward). Get in your rental truck and…

1.) Turn right (head north) – you’ll soon pass Bruce Bowker’s Carib Inn, then Divi Flamingo Resort, on your left, then come to a sign that says Flamingo Casino. Turn right, heading inland (east). You enter a round-about, keep going straight, and immediately on your right is Bonaco (gas station, and they took my VISA credit card). Keep going and shortly you see Warehouse Bonaire Supermarket on your right. Keep going and you see Van den Tweel Supermarket on your left, just before the 2nd round-about.

2.) Turn left and around to head inland (head east) from V.I.P., and you pass Aqua Viva Suites, Joe’s Restaurant and in between Tropical Divers Resort (left) and The Plaza Resort Bonaire (right), at road’s end take a right, and you swing around the Courtyard Marriott property, then past Waterland Villas and the airport and cruise the west coast-hugging road that takes you to southern dives sites.

3.) If you want to dive the northern dive sites, go to that round-about just past Van den Tweel, enter and turn left, headed north. You’ll soon hit another round-about; enter and go straight through, staying north. Then you hit a round-about in front of the big yellow Church; enter and turn left, headed back west toward the ocean. This’ll take you past Tops Supermarket and Pasa Bon Pizza on your right (I park near Tops of the grounds of some big yellow building before I reach it, and walk other places I want to do in the area, like the one-way strip with Gio’s Gelateria and Jewel of Bonaire). At the end of the road, turn right and you’re on the north-bound road that’ll take you past the dive resort strip (Eden Beach Resort/Den Lamen/Sand Dollar/Buddy Dive Resort/Captain Don’s Habitat/Hamlet Oasis) to the northern dive sites.

4.) In a nutshell, this location makes driving places in south and central Kralendijk quick, access to major supermarkets simple, and yet I wouldn’t expect to walk everywhere in town. There are restaurants in walking distance (e.g.: Sebastian’s, Joe’s).

Here's a Google Map section of Kralendijk where I’ve told it to plot a route from Aqua Viva Suites to Van den Tweel to Pasa Bon Pizza, to show a route you may want to familiarize yourself with.

Here, I've added Bari Reef and replaced Aqua Viva Suites with Donkey Beach, to highlight a route for getting back and forth through Kralendijk between the northern and southern west coast dive sites.

 

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Aqua Viva Suites​

Had a good experience corresponding with the owner. Sometimes takes a bit for e-mail responses, but that’s not rare dealing with Bonaire. It’s a modest sized property with several units, an onsite pool and I saw a grill and hammock. The parking area is long and you need to turn diagonally toward a wall; I’m not good at 3-dimensional maneuvering so I was in and out of the truck getting parked close enough without hitting the wall. Backing out requires using the side mirrors to pass between the path sides at the exit, not hard once I got the hang of it.

The cleaning lady came twice/week and left 2 toilet paper rolls each time. I bought a big pack at the grocery store to supplement that. The room was clean, comfortable and the shower water hot enough for me (not that luck warm ‘solar-heated’ water I recall from years ago elsewhere; granted, I don’t broil myself). Small tubes of shampoo (very sudsy - I could wash my hair 2 or 3 times with just one) and conditioner were in the bathroom, and little hand soap discs (I liked their shampoo, but for hand soap I’m an Oil of Okay Ultra Moisture man and brought my own). I was surprised to find a microwave in the room. The minifridge was small and had a very shallow freezer section, the door could hold a ½-gallon of milk, and it had space for multiple soda cans and a jar of jam. Dishes and silverware were present.

There was plenty of cabinet and drawer space. The safe used a key. By turning it a little, I could get my old 12-inch Macbook through the door, plus iPhone, wallet and passport. I would guess you could fit a 13-inch notebook in there? Not sure.

If you use an outlet extender designed for a double outlet (e.g.: a plastic pin goes in the ground of the unused outlet, to secure it), be aware some outlets were single outlets – only 2 outlets, 1 by the microwave and 1 in the bathroom, were double outlets (for plugging in 2 things).

The air conditioner did a good job. 2 Towels were provided for outside use (aside from those in the bathroom).

For the 14-day stay at the room, automatic pickup truck with CDW insurance, 13-day unlimited shore diving package with V.I.P. Divers, and transport to/from the airport, I paid an advance deposit of $685.50, a final payment on arrival of $1,599.50, so a total $2,285. When you compare rates to non-solo travelers, be mindful truck rental is a big part of the package price, and often averaged between at least 2 people. For one guy, that’s a good price!

 

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V.I.P. Divers​

Nice staff and dive shop, a drive through option to get tanks or you can park around front. The nitrox analyzer clamps to your tank’s yoke valve, hit ‘On,’ turn your tank valve on, and I was told wait about 20 seconds and take the reading. It also shows pressure (but in bar); take note of that. Out of 48 tanks, most were good fills (important since 100-cf AL tanks have a rated fill pressure of 3,300 PSI, not 3,000, and need the full fill), but I had 2 short fills – one 1,730 PSI (I was way up at Oil Slick Leap so I dove it anyway, just stayed close and shallow), and one later much less short (don’t recall exactly; maybe around 2,900 or a bit less?) that I caught at the shop and put in the ‘empties’ section and replaced. I learned a bar pressure between 200 and 250 bar seemed to indicate a good fill. One of the staff told me he calibrates the nitrox analyzer every day.

That's the cluster of 100-cf AL nitrox tanks; the number varied. I counted 8 tanks at least twice, 10 another time. Once in 12 days of diving there was just one, but another came off the fill line very shortly.​

For my 48 tanks (not counting one I swapped for a bit low pressure), based on my Oceanic VT3’s pressure record in PSI. Be mindful these pressures were recorded once the dive started, so I bumped the octo. and triggered a little air blast back finning out, that’s not counted here. Looks to me like if we discount the short fill, they average around 3,200+ PSI. If anyone likes to 'see the data,' here you go:

1. 3,086 (that’s after using it to fill my 3-cf Spare Air!).
2. 3,492.
3. 3,198.
4. 3,210.
5. 3,224.
6. 3,204.
7. 3,248.
8. 3,200.
9. 3,270.
10. 3,374.
11. 3,188.
12. 3,342.
13. 3,230.
14. 3,194.
15. 3,300.
16. 3,322.
17. 3,266.
18. 3,286.
19. 3,428.
20. 3,326.
21. 3,260.
22. 1,730 (not a typo.; a short fill).
23. 3,264.
24. 3,136.
25. 3,292.
26. 3,256.
27. 3,316.
28. 3,096.
29. 3,214.
30. 3,144.
31. 3,168.
32. 3,194.
33. 3,110.
34. 3,208.
35. 3,326.
36. 3,292.
37. 3,302.
38. 3,316.
39. 3,498.
40. Some kind of computer or software misfire; the 10 PSI start, 0 end is bogus. The Cobalt 2 gave the start pressure as 3,069.
41. 3,238.
42. 3,310.
43. 3,434.
44. 3,346.
45. 3,300.
46. 3,270.
47. 3,024.
48. 3,444.

On tank o-rings – historically the low hiss of escaping air due to old o-rings was a common part of Bonaire shore diving. With V.I.P.’s tanks, I seldom heard that, if I did it was very slight, and the one time I didn’t get a good seal, I replaced their o-ring with one of mine, still had the problem, put theirs back in instead and then it worked fine…so I don’t know what happened there.

Their gear room has an electronic combination lock access 24/7. There are some tanks for people who want to go night diving. One of the staff told me to let him know if I wanted to go night diving and he could put a 100-cf tank in for me, since I was diving 100-cf.

You pick a spot, write your name on tape and stick it on a blue box, and that's your station. They have wetsuit and BCD hangers for use, so you don't need to bring any.

 

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Prinz Car Rental​

The Aqua Viva Suites owner paid a taxi driver to pick me up at the airport and take me to Aqua Viva Suites, where I was provided the key to a nice, new-looking, low mileage (kilometerage?) automatic transmission rental truck. That key was in an electronic fob (e.g.: push button to lock/unlock). I didn’t have to deal with going to the rental car strip near the airport or other hassles. Very easy pick up. The truck was in practically new condition and did fine all week.

When it was time to turn it in, I was to take it to Prinz (at 3 Kaya Jawiri – head to the round-about past Van den Tweel, go through headed north, take your 1st (almost immediate) left, then your 2nd or 3rd left (either can work to circle this little block) and find it. I saw no sign, just a big awning over some vehicles, and one truck had ‘Prinz’ on it. I got there over 2 hours before the time I’d planned to come (which I thought of as ‘be there by’), and no one was in. I took my phone off airplane mode, called, and they came soon, got the truck and took me to the airport. Seemed like nice people.

Oh, ever wonder what happens if you take your phone off Airplane Mode in Bonaire and use roaming to make a call? I’m on an AT&T family plan in the U.S., and here’s the text AT&T sent me:

“AT&T Free Msg: We've got you covered! International Day Pass has been added to this line. Use your phone like you do at home in over 210 countries. Go to www.att.com/IDPTravelTips (free view) for tips on using your phone while traveling abroad. Don't want IDP? Text NO to 221 to remove and return to standard international rates: $2.05/MB, up to $3/min, $0.50/msg sent, $1.30/photo or video msg sent.”

Online, it looks like that International Day Pass costs $10 for 1 line.

Tip: Shore diving means climbing into your rental truck repeatedly damp or wet with salt water, and cloth seats can absorb this day-after-day. Not good. People differ in how they manage it. I tried covering the seat and seat back with one big towel, but that didn’t work well. I put one big towel over the seat back, and 1 big towel folded double in the seat, and that did (long as I took them to the room at the end of the day and let them dry).

Bottom Line: I was happy with the truck, Prinz and the staff lady I dealt with.

 

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Dive Conditions​

Weather – Tended toward high around 86, low around 77, partly cloudy but mostly sunny, occasionally a little sprinkling, it obviously rained substantially 2 nights (judging by next day puddles) and rained a bit by day once. Despite the moderate daily highs, the southern Caribbean sun is brutal, and it ‘feels’ in the 90’s walking around in the sun (and sunburn can be fast – use reef safe sunscreen like Stream2Sea, which worked very well for me).

Late in the trip. My arm was mostly covered up in the day that 2 weeks; my hand and wrist were not. Even in winter, that southern Caribbean sun is powerful.​

Water Temp.s - Lows were mostly around 77-degrees (per VT3, which I’ve suspected may read a degree low but uncertain about that) with rarely if ever a noticeable thermocline. For me, a 5-mm Aleeda brand wetsuit ‘shirt’ (part of an old Farmer John style wetsuit) worn over a thin, weight-neutral Henderson brand Lycra full body suit (for sun and sting protection; very thin, not much thermal protection) did well, but I’m big and chubby (i.e.: ‘bioprene’) and fairly cold-resistant; many people would want a 5-mm full suit (or at least a 3-mm, not a bad idea for abrasion protection shore diving even if you don’t get cold). Water in the summer is significantly warmer.

Current – Usually negligible and never a serious problem. Slight, hardly noticeable current did make diving into it inexplicably difficult on a couple of dives, and I had a slow ‘drift dive’ for one of my 48 dives, but not much of an issue (even at the far southern sites I hit – Red Slave, Sweet Dreams, Vista Blue).

Viz. – Around 50 – 70 feet. Not as good as I expected at times, but plenty good enough. The southern reefs have a sandy ‘canyon’ between the (not a true) double reef system, and that may serve as a source of sediments.

Entries and Exits – ‘Challenging’ often, with a few sites easy. I used a trekking pole (as suggested by @USC8791 - see Walking Sticks – Bonaire Shore Diving Tips & Tricks by Kevin and Liz Grogan), and it cut my falls rate down! Diving solo, no buddy could stow it on my tank with tubing after entry, so I zip tied 2 bolt snaps to it and after entry snapped it to my left top BCD D-ring and crotch strap D-ring. It stowed nicely out of the way (but sometimes poked my leg a bit when back-finning during swim outs). Very happy with this.

Bachelor's Beach is pretty easy, after you go down the stairs and rocks. The sandy slope is steep walking out, though.

The Lake's easy entry, and obvious entry/exit point (by that wall near the truck) might make it a night dive option for some.​

Some Easy Entry Sites – Aquarius, Bachelor’s Beach and The Lake stood out. The Lake’s sandy ‘canyon’ is more like an oval you can fin around at a leisurely rate and make it about a 1-hour dive with little navigational difficulty, and the entry/exit beside a building is easy to spot from the water.

Best Reefs – The far southern dive sites – I was particularly taken with Sweet Dreams, Vista Blue and Margate Bay. Red Slave’s visibility was worse. Warning: the kite boarders base at the Atlantis site, but ‘roam’ – I saw them at Margate Bay, Red Beryl and Vista Blue. They don’t start first thing in the morning – make it your first dive of the morning, and you may avoid them (a strategy suggested by Reef Smart Guides Bonaire). Lush gorgonians shallow and mid.-reef provide a lot of beauty. Karpata was also striking. Surprise – the Hilma Hooker site reef was quite good.

Not all Bonaire's reefs look like this, but some do.​

Navigation – Some have opined you don’t need a compass on Bonaire; I used to think, but I was wrong. Over the southern long, sandy swim outs with no discernable slope one can get turned around, as can happen on the outer reef. Instead of just north or south 25 minutes +/- at 50 – 60 feet, then head back at 30 – 40 feet, I did some ‘oval’ courses – head south 10 minutes at 35 feet +/-, then north 25+ minutes at 60 – 70 feet, then back at 30 feet +/-, and kill some time at the top of the reef wall if I had much extra gas. Tended to get roughly 1-hour dive times.

Air vs. Nitrox – I forgot to set my VT3 for Nitrox, but did set my Cobalt 2. I decided to leave the VT3 set for air to see whether my 4 dives/day x 12-day regimen would be doable on air (for someone without nitrox certification, or who didn’t want to bother analyzing tanks, just ‘grab and go’). On one dive, the VT3 alarmed that I was low on time, with an NDL of 5 minutes at current depth. On another dive, a different day, I saw it was low (albeit not that low). So in a nutshell, yes, I could’ve done my dives on air.

 

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Comments on Observed Animal Life​

Bonaire is fairly ‘fishy’ with the usual general menagerie – sergeant majors, grunts (e.g.: small mouth, French, blue-striped), black bar soldier fish, school masters, queen and French angelfish, trumpet fish, small grouper (graysbys and conies), tiger grouper, cubera snapper, file fish (e.g.: scrawled, white-spotted), horse-eye jacks, moray eels, tarpon, barracuda, green and hawksbill sea turtles (some have seen loggerheads), etc…

Was blessed to find a frog fish for the 1st time, on a Salt Pier dive. It was gone when I checked back another day.

I saw one hawksbill sea turtle on the vertical reef wall at The Cliff dive site. I had maybe 4 or so small green sea turtle sightings over the sandy bottomed swim outs or one where that meets the reef wall.

I saw 2 rays; an eagle ray swept past the bottom of the reef wall at Oil Slick Leap, and a southern stingray went down the reef to the sandy canyon elsewhere.

I had never seen a pork fish or black grouper in Bonaire; now I’ve seen one of each.

This small school of jacks at Red Slave I don’t recognize; they’re not horse-eye, and look like Crevalle jacks but not as large as those get.

More tiger grouper this trip than usual, but mainly juveniles!

 

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Barracuda were pretty common, most small but some decent-sized.

Tarpon were out…I saw a number by day, even away from the Hilma Hooker wreck.

I think that's a Cubera snapper; saw a number of these guys, some quite big, but they were very stand-offish.​

Porcupine fish were very common.

Spotted morays were common; I saw several big green morays, maybe 2 golden-tail morays and 3 sharp-tail eels. Another diver reported a chain moray.

Envious of @morecowbell’s green moray shot, I got closer than perhaps wise grabbing snap shots. At least one of these guys I almost could’ve offered to floss.

 

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Don’t know what these fish that remind me of freshwater bass are. Likely some sort of grouper?

Note: IIRC, the 2nd and 3rd fish (above) are the same; it lost the dark color when it fled).​

Get close with flash and the dark becomes red.​

Saw sand divers (a.k.a. lizard fish) often in pairs. Saw a school of scrawled filefish – counted 13.

One midnight parrotfish at Something Special (I'll post a crop of my shot; it didn't let me get close). I used to see these fairly often, but not anymore.

 

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Spotted drum, graysby, coney, anemone, rainbow parrotfish (and a big one; a pair approached me in the shallows and split off, one to either side of me).

Saw squid on 2 occasions; I didn’t do any night dives so not seeing octopi wasn’t a surprise.

Surprisingly few lionfish (and most of those quite small); taking them for the local restaurant industry (particularly Cactus Blue Food Truck, from what I heard) seems effective for the mainstream west coast reefs in recreational limits.