I've never been to Aruba but I've been to both Bonaire and Curacao in the last couple of years. So some general comments/suggestions:
Bonaire is all about diving. There's very few beach areas that aren't on some resort's property. The only one I can really think of is Pink Beach and someone recently posted that a recent storm washed away much of the beach. The other public beach is the windsurf beach at Lac Bay on the south east side of the island. But there's no diving close by.
Resorts that have some sort of beach on Bonaire:
Eden Beach
Harbour Village
Plaza Resort
Divi Flamingo
Other's like Buddy's and Sand Dollar have a sandy area but it's on top of the ironshore so difficult to even get into the water. Plus I'd wear boots if wading there. So probably not what your wife wants.
Pluses for Bonaire are great diving at most sites that are easily shore accessible. And the reef is just a short distance out at most sites. And it's some of the most pristine diving you'll ever find, the whole island has been a marine park for decades and there's no rivers so no natural run-off. Downside is that with one or two exceptions, there's no large stuff. You'll see Tarpon and the occasional ray or maybe some dolphins but except for the wilder east side, generally no sharks or larger pelagics. Personally I rank Bonaire as the 2nd best place I've dove, Grand Cayman being the first. And I'm working my way through the Caribbean...(see profile)
To get to Bonaire from our coast try to meet the red-eye Continental flight on Friday night out of Houston. Otherwise you can do a red-eye from LAX (or SFO?) through Miami and San Juan. But it's an all day layover in San Juan typically (or overnight the day before) as the flight leaves at 5PM but you can't get there Sat. afternoon due to connections. There's also a weekly Delta flight through Atlanta but the mid-week departure was just cancelled afaik.
Useful sites for info about Bonaire:
Info Bonaire - The Bonaire Information Site - The Most Current and Up-To-Date Information
Bonaire Talk - The place to discuss everything and anything about Bonaire!
Bonaire Pros -- Dive travel & windsurfing vacations to Bonaire - travel agent
Grand Cayman scuba diving - Bonaire diving, Curacao diving, Cozumel diving, Costa Rica diving - ask for my travel agent - Dani. She's a diver also.
Curacao has very similar diving to Bonaire but 10x the population. It's much more industrial and kind of gritty in some places. It's on the same reef as Bonaire so a lot of it is similar except in the Mushroom Forest (coral reef) area, there's nothing similar to that off Bonaire. A lot of the shore entries on Curacao are farther out to the reef also. And most of the shore dive sites have been somewhat improved, there's either a resort or a diveop on-site or close-by. Most also charge a small fee to dive there.
They do have some georgeous beaches - many of them are off named dive sites. So your wife could sun while you dive at the same spot. Sunset Waters resort has a great beach with good diving through the breakwater 100 yds. offshore. Other good beach/dive combos are Varsenbaai, Porto Marie, Playa Jeremi, Playa Lagun and others. All except Jeremi have an on-site dive op. And refreshments, umbrellas, shaded areas and snack shops/restaurants on-site. Bring everything to Playa Jeremi if you go there, nice beach but nothing else within a mile or two.
Probably better than 1/2 our diving last April was shoredives off named beach sites.
A really nice option closer in town is the Marriott in Piscadera Bay. It's a beautiful newer resort on a natural sheltered cove with a beautiful beach and great pool area. They have an on-site diveop for boat and nearby shore diving. Their own casino and a couple of good restaurants - one right on the beach. Pricey though...
The Hilton next door is older and their beach isn't as nice. They had a nice bar, so-so restaurant and there is diving off their property but the reef is torn up and has lots of junk strewn about.
Right next door is Hooks Hut, a combo diveshop/bar/restaurant right on the water also. They have a nice (smaller) beach and a dive right off their site. They get a lot of the Hilton's dive business since they're located on a much better section of the reef.
Farther into town there's other options at Lions Dive, Breezes (AI resort) and a couple other places. Both are affiliated with Ocean Encounters the biggest diveop on Curacao. I've only gone by them so have no details about either.
Another option on Curacao is the Dive Bus. They pick up anywhere in town and take small groups to some of the better shore dive sites daily. And they're good people, they gave us some suggestions even when we couldn't dive with them due to schedules. Suzy from the divebus is on SB regularly - her user id is thedivebus.
More Curacao info:
The island of Curacao - A real, different Caribbean vacation | Bon Bini Curacao
Curaçao Actief
The Dive Bus - HOME
Curacao is much easier to get through via AA through Miami. There's two daily flights, we were able to get there early enough to be on Curacao by about 2PM. All the big car rental chains are at the airport - you'll need a car it's pretty spread out. Most of the restaurants/resorts are in town and IMO the better diving is farther west. The best boat dive is Watamula off the west end of the island, the best shore dive we did was probably Varsenbaii.
Another option is to fly into Curacao and then catch a local flight to Bonaire. Insel Air, Dutch Antilles Express and one more (can't recall) fly between Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao daily. Divi Air flies between Curacao and Bonaire daily. +/- $200 r/t PP.
If you overnight in Miami, you can catch the early AA flight to Curacao and connect with DAE flights to Bonaire. It may also be possible on the later AA flight, a DAE flight landed just after ours and people were waiting to board it.
PM with other questions. I won't necessarily follow this thread.
