Forest Gump would be proud

[Altamira]

As Forest Gump said, "Stupid is as stupid does". Got back from Bonaire last week and thoroughly enjoyed everything about the dive environment and people with one exception: a guy who identified himself as the Dive Ops owner at the Sand Dollar Resort. The situation in a nutshell: Most of our group of eight entered the water near the Habitat for a drift dive down the reef to Bari Reef in front of the Sand Dollar. Two of us drove a truck to the Bari Reef shore dive entrance south of the Sand Dollar, swam north, and joined our group coming south from the Habitat. The group of eight exited at the Sand Dollar with the intent of having lunch in the Sand Dollar restaurant. We exited the water, climbed the stairs near (not on the dock), and began to doff our gear. Some of our group started to put their gear in lockers that were opposite the restaurant and they assumed (incorrectly) that the lockers could be used by restaurant patrons. About that time, a guy who identified himself as the Dive Ops owner came out and very rudely and abruptly told us to leave the area unless we were registered with his ops. Tried to explain that we came for lunch and apologized for trying to use the lockers. He said he didn't care about that because the restaurant was a separate operation , and we had to leave "his operations area". I asked if it would be OK to walk down his dock and enter the water on the south side to get my truck without having to swim around the dock. The jerk actually refused, so we had to walk out into the parking lot and then around a fence to get to the truck.

The smart and gracious dive operator would have said "Thanks for stopping by, put your gear over here so our divers can use the lockers, let me show you my operation, enjoy your lunch and come stay with us next time in Bonaire".

Here is the real irony of the situation. Our group had discussed the possiblility of trying Sand Dollar on next year's trip to Bonaire, but now won't happen now if he was the last dive operator on the island. The rude and obnoxious Dive Operator is solely responsible for losing the Sand Dollar a minimum of 8 lunches this year and possibly 16-20 hotel and dive packages and hotel/restaurant/bar bills for next year.
"Stupid is as stupid does"

 

[jjwdiver]

Amazing how 1 act of idiocracy can cost thousands of dollars, and who know hows much more.

 

[lmorin]

The guy who spoke to you was undoubtedly Andre who has a reputation, apparently well-earned, for behavior such as you describe. However, don't get things confused. Sand Dollar does not own the restaurant. More important, Sand Dollar residents generally have no difficulty with Andre because they use his dive shop and therefore are eligible to use the dock. Don't give up on Sand Dollar because of Andre's attitudes toward those who don't know the situation. Staying at Sand Dollar and diving through Bonaire Dive and Adventure really is quite nice and simple.

 

[Hawkwood]

My wife had had a run-in with Andre. She has yet to live down her parting words to him..." and a bon f*&%ing bini to you too!" We bring it up every opportunity we can. Butter wouldn't melt in her mouth - he really pushed all of her buttons.

 

[DeputyDan]

That was Andre all right.

Look in Webster's under AssHo_ _ and his picture will be there.

The owner of the restaurant there is Kirk and it is a totally different operation. Kirk also owns the Lion's Den restaurant down at Buddy Dive.

Someone needs to show this thread to Kirk!!!

 

[Altamira]

If the "gentleman" that gave us a hard time was indeed Andre, he did make it perfectly clear that his dive ops was not connected to the Sand Dollar Restaurant and virtually made it impossible for us to park our gear and go into the restaurant for lunch. He may well treat his patrons very well, but from his boorish attitude, he will not have any of our group as patrons in the future, and I for one would not give him a dime to support his operation. I don't think members of our group are going to let this pass either. Word of mouth advertisement can be very good or very very very bad, and if I was the owner of the Sand Dollar, I would kick Andre's ass so hard he would be wearing it as a hat. I am sure there are too many other good and nice operators in Bonaire to give our financial support in the future. BTW we stayed at the Habitat and they were great.

 

[Altamira]

Hey Hawkwood. Good for your wife. I wish we had been as fast and accurate with a response to Andre. The best any of group could come up with at the time was "So much for Bonaire hospitality" but that does not have the same lyrical ring to it.

 

[Hawkwood]

Ha! We were using the public access to the water at that. He goes out of his way to try to "hide" the yellow marker stone.

 

[Altamira]

I wonder if he is a new owner? One of our group that used the Sand Dollar frequently said he had never seen the guy before, and based on the attitude we saw, will not be seeing him again.

 

[lmorin]

Nope. Not a new owner.