Hello all!
So we spent our honeymoon in Curacao/Bonaire and got a good amount of diving in. I will post my trip report in 3 parts - Curacao, Bonaire, and a Comparison side by side of both.
Part 1 - Curacao - We had been to Curacao a few times in the past and stayed at the hilton, diving there with the seascape dive shop. They closed down and we decided to give Habitat Curacao a shot - we like the smaller, non-chain owned dive shops - feel like it's a little more mom and pop but we like supporting that kind of business.
We Arrived in Curacao an hour late after apparently our pilot accidentally missed the airport, tried to land in Aruba and then took a little fly by of Venezuela- don't ask, but I guess from up in the sky, all those little islands and little run ways look similar. Then again, maybe we had to circle for bad weather but there were stories flying around. We arrived via Taber Tours at the hotel and checked in. Our room was supposed to be a renovated oceanfront room.
So first the hotel:
We did have an oceanview room - the rooms are set up downstairs upstairs in units - we had to make a special request for blankets, sheets come standard blankets are free, but required us to ask for them. It was a little weird. We were there to relax, but noticed that the television didn't work for almost the entire week. Again - sometimes it's nice to watch a little tube. We were told the same story every day - the satellite is broken, they are working on it. The room had a beautiful balcony - table, chairs, and a lounge. Which was nice and made hanging gear to dry when we were done much easier. The floors were all tile - also, good for divers. There was a safe in the room - bonus for us. Ample air conditioning, which was also really nice. Bathroom was fine. A small kitchnenette with a hot plate, sink, cabinets, some silver ware, plates, and cups as well as a college sized refrigerator - nice to keep some drinks in. We found that the beds were actually twin beds pushed together and therew as an extra bed in the room - basically it could have been a room for 3 different people depending on how it was configured. There was a small table and 1 chair. Lighting could have been a little better.
Now, I am not complaining, we knew we weren't staying at the Hilton but a few things:
A table with 2 chairs would have been very helpful - a table that was bigger than 3 square foot would be good. There wer eno other surfaces in the room to place anything except for the extra bed. So, if you didn't wantto sit outside you had to sit in bed basically. The TV situation could have been a little better - I don't need HBO but a few channels of anything would have been nice. The room was by no means renovated. We slept fine - the temperature on the AC kept things comfortable. We also liked that the rooms had actual keys with floating wristbands - made for time in the pool an easy fix! The room could be a little more spruced up - not luxury, but a few steps up could be really nice. - I am not quite sure why blankets are considered optional. Also, they advertised wireless internet available in the lobby for 5 bucks a day. The connection was so slow it barely loaded my gmail - luckily they did not charge us. The store that sold snacks etc... was a nice thing to have - but, they seemed to be out of a lot of things. It was good to be able to buy some sodas, gatorades, beers there etc... Habitat is not really near anything so if you come either bring a car or plan to stay on the grounds. It's about a 25 minute ride into the city. They have shuttles that take you back and forth so it was nice to take advantage of that as well.
The pool was beautiful and a really nice place to hang out - it had a little deep end and it overlooked the ocean - I could have spent a few more days there easily! Plenty of lounge chairs, umbrellas etc..beach towels are a 20 dollar deposit and you could exchange them as many times as you wanted. We got our money back when we returned the towels. Note- there is no ATM on the premises.
The restaurant was great as well. About 2 days into our stay it looked like the management changed- along with the menu. The first 2 days it was pretty bland, boring, non-appetizing food. But, after everything changed, the food was amazing - it was good, healthy, well cooked, well prepared, delicious, fairly priced food. Breakfast lunch and dinner were all enjoyable -something that we usually find very rarely. The bar was nice, the people were nice, even the herd of stray cats were friendly.
There were killer mosquitos though - worse than we have ever seen or felt on the island -not so much fun.
It looked like there was a lot of maintenance work going on while we were there from the grounds to the driveway to the dive dock. We were thinking it had to do with the recent change in ownership. If they spruced up the rooms a little bit, it would be a dead sell for us to come back every year until we were too old and decrepit to dive.
Next, the diving/dive shop:
We had an absolutely amazing time diving with Clarck, Hugo, Kurt and ( I forgot her name we only dove with her once! Sorry!). We have known Clarck a few years from when we dove at the Hilton - everyone is so personal, so friendly, and such a pleasure to dive with. The boat was never over crowded and we had a blast - we did about half and half boat/shore diving.
Highlights of the boat dive included:
Watamula - by far the best boat dive site I have been to on Curacao - AMAZING!
Mushroom Forest -I always feel like I am a character on mario brothers loads of fun
Sponge Forest -beautiful sponges in all colors
Porto Marie -fun fun fun critters
Harry's Hole, - it was nuts - Kurt and us managed to spot 4 seahorses in 1 dive despite the fact that I got violently seasick - I just ask them to gear me up and throw me off the boat - once I'm underwater, I'm usually fine!
Radiho City,
and a few others.
We also went to Blue Room - an underwater cavern of sorts where you swim in about 20 feet down and come up in this huge cavern with thousands of silversides - it was just breathtaking.
The house reef at Habitat was also a blast to dive. We loved the fact that there was a line that went out from the boats to the reef and down about 100 foot so it was always a great reference point. I could have dove the house reef for another 2 weeks and not gotten bored. It is quite long - you can go in either direction - to the left or to the right as there is nothing else out there. Sometimes in the afternoon there was a bit of a current - just a great way to burn off lunch. We saw everything from file fish, to porcupine fish, to arrow crabs, sharp tailed eels, morays (chain morays, green, spotted, etc) spotted shrimp, all kinds of critters - jeuvenile spotted drums and honeycombed cowfish galore.
The dock/stairs/beach area is being rebuilt after they sustained damage from a past storm. It was definitely still manageable though. I truly hope though, that in rebuilding it they do not destroy or harm any of the house sea life as the reef comes up with the coral pretty close to shore. Again -t hey started digging around while we were there but weren't really sure what they were doing. The shop itself was great - nitrox, air, etc...tanks were always available - and if you wanted to take a vehicle and do shore diving, there were tanks up by the parking lot as well. There were some stairs from the hotel down to the dive shop and down to the water but it really wasn't a big deal- we just chalked it up to more great exercise - it was the equivalent of maybe 3 flights at the most. There were lockers for your gear, and there was tons of space outside on the deck to get things ready. Fresh cold drinking water and cups were always available and the rinse tanks were clean and plentiful.
We can't say enough about the personalized service we received while diving there.within 5 minutes everyone knew each others name - and we were lucky to meet Mintaka on the trip- we got in some great shore dives! It was just so much fun.
Eventhough we really hope they spruce up the rooms we will most definitely be back here again. We then hopped a DAE plane to Bonaire.
A few other details - after staying on bonaire for a week, we flew back to Curacao - it is soooo much easier to fly back to the states - we live in NY and with Delta and Bonaire it's just a little too complicated for us. We stayed at the Hilton for our last night on Curacao and were pleased to say that they have made some improvements as well - The hotel has really kicked it up a few notches, it was beautiful, well kept, the lobby has been redone since 2007, and the service was excellend. We would consider staying there again and maybe just doing some shore diving as we love the house reef there as well.
Our last night in Curacao we had dinner at Rijstafel Indonesia, our favorite restaurant - it's a little bit of a ride into the city, but well worth it for some absolutely amazing indonesian food. Prices were absolutely fair 100 bucks for 4 people to have dinner...next on to Bonaire
So we spent our honeymoon in Curacao/Bonaire and got a good amount of diving in. I will post my trip report in 3 parts - Curacao, Bonaire, and a Comparison side by side of both.
Part 1 - Curacao - We had been to Curacao a few times in the past and stayed at the hilton, diving there with the seascape dive shop. They closed down and we decided to give Habitat Curacao a shot - we like the smaller, non-chain owned dive shops - feel like it's a little more mom and pop but we like supporting that kind of business.
We Arrived in Curacao an hour late after apparently our pilot accidentally missed the airport, tried to land in Aruba and then took a little fly by of Venezuela- don't ask, but I guess from up in the sky, all those little islands and little run ways look similar. Then again, maybe we had to circle for bad weather but there were stories flying around. We arrived via Taber Tours at the hotel and checked in. Our room was supposed to be a renovated oceanfront room.
So first the hotel:
We did have an oceanview room - the rooms are set up downstairs upstairs in units - we had to make a special request for blankets, sheets come standard blankets are free, but required us to ask for them. It was a little weird. We were there to relax, but noticed that the television didn't work for almost the entire week. Again - sometimes it's nice to watch a little tube. We were told the same story every day - the satellite is broken, they are working on it. The room had a beautiful balcony - table, chairs, and a lounge. Which was nice and made hanging gear to dry when we were done much easier. The floors were all tile - also, good for divers. There was a safe in the room - bonus for us. Ample air conditioning, which was also really nice. Bathroom was fine. A small kitchnenette with a hot plate, sink, cabinets, some silver ware, plates, and cups as well as a college sized refrigerator - nice to keep some drinks in. We found that the beds were actually twin beds pushed together and therew as an extra bed in the room - basically it could have been a room for 3 different people depending on how it was configured. There was a small table and 1 chair. Lighting could have been a little better.
Now, I am not complaining, we knew we weren't staying at the Hilton but a few things:
A table with 2 chairs would have been very helpful - a table that was bigger than 3 square foot would be good. There wer eno other surfaces in the room to place anything except for the extra bed. So, if you didn't wantto sit outside you had to sit in bed basically. The TV situation could have been a little better - I don't need HBO but a few channels of anything would have been nice. The room was by no means renovated. We slept fine - the temperature on the AC kept things comfortable. We also liked that the rooms had actual keys with floating wristbands - made for time in the pool an easy fix! The room could be a little more spruced up - not luxury, but a few steps up could be really nice. - I am not quite sure why blankets are considered optional. Also, they advertised wireless internet available in the lobby for 5 bucks a day. The connection was so slow it barely loaded my gmail - luckily they did not charge us. The store that sold snacks etc... was a nice thing to have - but, they seemed to be out of a lot of things. It was good to be able to buy some sodas, gatorades, beers there etc... Habitat is not really near anything so if you come either bring a car or plan to stay on the grounds. It's about a 25 minute ride into the city. They have shuttles that take you back and forth so it was nice to take advantage of that as well.
The pool was beautiful and a really nice place to hang out - it had a little deep end and it overlooked the ocean - I could have spent a few more days there easily! Plenty of lounge chairs, umbrellas etc..beach towels are a 20 dollar deposit and you could exchange them as many times as you wanted. We got our money back when we returned the towels. Note- there is no ATM on the premises.
The restaurant was great as well. About 2 days into our stay it looked like the management changed- along with the menu. The first 2 days it was pretty bland, boring, non-appetizing food. But, after everything changed, the food was amazing - it was good, healthy, well cooked, well prepared, delicious, fairly priced food. Breakfast lunch and dinner were all enjoyable -something that we usually find very rarely. The bar was nice, the people were nice, even the herd of stray cats were friendly.
There were killer mosquitos though - worse than we have ever seen or felt on the island -not so much fun.
It looked like there was a lot of maintenance work going on while we were there from the grounds to the driveway to the dive dock. We were thinking it had to do with the recent change in ownership. If they spruced up the rooms a little bit, it would be a dead sell for us to come back every year until we were too old and decrepit to dive.
Next, the diving/dive shop:
We had an absolutely amazing time diving with Clarck, Hugo, Kurt and ( I forgot her name we only dove with her once! Sorry!). We have known Clarck a few years from when we dove at the Hilton - everyone is so personal, so friendly, and such a pleasure to dive with. The boat was never over crowded and we had a blast - we did about half and half boat/shore diving.
Highlights of the boat dive included:
Watamula - by far the best boat dive site I have been to on Curacao - AMAZING!
Mushroom Forest -I always feel like I am a character on mario brothers loads of fun
Sponge Forest -beautiful sponges in all colors
Porto Marie -fun fun fun critters
Harry's Hole, - it was nuts - Kurt and us managed to spot 4 seahorses in 1 dive despite the fact that I got violently seasick - I just ask them to gear me up and throw me off the boat - once I'm underwater, I'm usually fine!
Radiho City,
and a few others.
We also went to Blue Room - an underwater cavern of sorts where you swim in about 20 feet down and come up in this huge cavern with thousands of silversides - it was just breathtaking.
The house reef at Habitat was also a blast to dive. We loved the fact that there was a line that went out from the boats to the reef and down about 100 foot so it was always a great reference point. I could have dove the house reef for another 2 weeks and not gotten bored. It is quite long - you can go in either direction - to the left or to the right as there is nothing else out there. Sometimes in the afternoon there was a bit of a current - just a great way to burn off lunch. We saw everything from file fish, to porcupine fish, to arrow crabs, sharp tailed eels, morays (chain morays, green, spotted, etc) spotted shrimp, all kinds of critters - jeuvenile spotted drums and honeycombed cowfish galore.
The dock/stairs/beach area is being rebuilt after they sustained damage from a past storm. It was definitely still manageable though. I truly hope though, that in rebuilding it they do not destroy or harm any of the house sea life as the reef comes up with the coral pretty close to shore. Again -t hey started digging around while we were there but weren't really sure what they were doing. The shop itself was great - nitrox, air, etc...tanks were always available - and if you wanted to take a vehicle and do shore diving, there were tanks up by the parking lot as well. There were some stairs from the hotel down to the dive shop and down to the water but it really wasn't a big deal- we just chalked it up to more great exercise - it was the equivalent of maybe 3 flights at the most. There were lockers for your gear, and there was tons of space outside on the deck to get things ready. Fresh cold drinking water and cups were always available and the rinse tanks were clean and plentiful.
We can't say enough about the personalized service we received while diving there.within 5 minutes everyone knew each others name - and we were lucky to meet Mintaka on the trip- we got in some great shore dives! It was just so much fun.
Eventhough we really hope they spruce up the rooms we will most definitely be back here again. We then hopped a DAE plane to Bonaire.
A few other details - after staying on bonaire for a week, we flew back to Curacao - it is soooo much easier to fly back to the states - we live in NY and with Delta and Bonaire it's just a little too complicated for us. We stayed at the Hilton for our last night on Curacao and were pleased to say that they have made some improvements as well - The hotel has really kicked it up a few notches, it was beautiful, well kept, the lobby has been redone since 2007, and the service was excellend. We would consider staying there again and maybe just doing some shore diving as we love the house reef there as well.
Our last night in Curacao we had dinner at Rijstafel Indonesia, our favorite restaurant - it's a little bit of a ride into the city, but well worth it for some absolutely amazing indonesian food. Prices were absolutely fair 100 bucks for 4 people to have dinner...next on to Bonaire
