Shore Dive Experience Levels without Guide

[hroark2112]

Hard sole booties! Or Chuck’s.

 

[rayaa3]

So it is likely useful to read all of the rules...

RULES AND REGULATIONS

That was an interesting read.

I want to say my 2 'orientations' were about 30 seconds in the shop of "stay off the coral".

I will say the 2nd shop I used - a larger op with a couple of tank pickup/drop spots - did ask us to do a shore dive on their shop, and watched from the beach to see if we resurfaced to ask for more weight - even though we were confident of our weighting...that's almost a check dive I can't imagine these shops putting a DM in the water for a check dive for every visitor. It would be labor intensive.

This last visit I think the orientation was even less about anything in the water and more "have these tags on your person if you are in the water - even if snorkeling" and "if you go up to the park - don't forget your paper receipt to get in without paying - it's a long drive back."

As I think back to it - they also had multiple receptacles for trash fishing line collected from dives.

Rebel scum.

In all seriousness about the staying off the coral bit and orientations. I won't lie, I don't always enjoy having a finger waved in my face to remind me of the rules particularly when I consider myself conscientious. That being said...we've al seen that guy hugging the reef with two gloved hands - a fin wedged in some place - trying to stabilize himself in some current so he can get that perfect shot of the juvenile whatchamacallit that he is focusing on right now. I suppose if you don't at least start with wagging your finger at everyone, that particular moron has the plausible deniability to say "wha? that's a problem?" when someone tells him "hey dude, you are acting like a jack ass.".

I've seen that guy in a number of different places...and as a percentage of divers I've seen, he does show up less in places that actively tell you not to do these things. In Okinawa that guy was like 1 in 6 divers.

Any ways - I'm off topic and ranting. Bottom line - I didn't know about the rule - and remove the advice. I'm sure if you got caught breaking the rule there would be a hefty fine involved.

That being said - if you are going to do it...

1) find a spot without coral.
2) make sure the current isn't going to push the line into coral
3) don't leave it behind
4) don't get caught.

-Ray

 

[boat sju]

hojam,

how are your fins with the booties?

 

[Hethen57]

On topic question for Bonaire shore diving veterans, when you head out to shore dive with your two tanks p/p in the truck, do you typically dive both tanks at the same dive site or can you reasonably dive two different sites in the same general area of the island in an outing and use the time in between as part of your surface interval?

 

[drrich2]

You can readily dive 2 different sites. In some places you can switch sites well inside of 5 minutes' drive.

If you want to do 2 tanks at one site, my preference is enter and head north and back tank 1, south and back tank 2 (or vice versa), if not much current, so I still cover 2 different areas.

Another option is at some southern sites like Angel City with a double reef, you can swim out over the sand 'canyon' between reefs and dive the outer reef, then use your 2nd tank to dive the reef that's closer to shore.

But you'll see a number of dive sites are really close together. Windsock and Bachelors Beach are pretty close, and you've got Hilma Hooker, Angel City and Alice in Wonderland. But you can roam farther. A lot of people like to take a half hour or longer interval when diving, and that's time to haul out, strip your gear, head up/down the road, park, gear up and go back in (by then, it'll probably be over 30 minutes, but can still be well under an hour).

 

[HoJam]

hojam,

how are your fins with the booties?

Needless to say, I'll be looking to purchase new booties with a hard soles! LoL

 

[diveallthetime]

I have Seasoft Sunray Low Cut Boots google them. have used for probably 6 trips to Bonaire and they are great. they are 3mm you can find them for about $80.00.

 

[morty343]

My late contribution because I hadn't seen anyone else mention these yet -- I bought one of these poles to help with solo shore entries. (Item link) I did my entries with a camera rig hung from my chest D-rings. This gave me two free hands: one for my fins and one for the hiking pole. I really didn't want to take a spill with the camera, and the pole saved my bacon more than once in knee-depth water. I would then wade out to chest depth water with a full BC, where it was easier to bob around and pull on my fins. Then as I snorkeled towards the reef, I folded up the pole and stuffed it in a pocket (my octo pocket slot in my case). To keep from losing it, I put an S-biner on the wrist strap and clipped it to a D-ring. (Note that the rubber pole "foot" just pushes on and can slip off in the water. To prevent this, I drilled a hole through it and the pole, and ran a zip tie through it.)

I found that one of the trickiest things about some shore entries is that the solid limestone in very shallow water is the same color as sand; but it can vary in depth by a half foot up or down from one step to the next, and there is no visual way to tell if you are about to step onto a hole, because it's all the same color. The pole allowed me to probe each step and know what to expect as I moved forward.

Also, I bought these scuba boots before my recent trip there and I thought they worked really well on the ironshore

 

[woodcarver]

Dive Friends Retail carries low top 3 mil CDT boots for $40 or high tops for $50. Excellent hard sole boots. Run slightly narrow, but not much. Unless your feet are REALLY tough, hard soles are absolutely required. (For those with REALLY tough feet, Mako's Kevlar booties will keep the urchin spines at bay. But you will feel every sharp edge of the ironshore).
Can't beat Bonaire for shore diving. Plenty of options as far as ease of entry goes, regardless of how steady or not you are getting in or out.
Only other suggestions I would add to the mix is to not get too shallow when you stand to take off your fins, that can get you rolled by the surf. And eyeball the path you plan to walk from underwater before you stand up. That way you have an idea of where the holes are.

 

[shoredivr]

BSDME is by far the least useful of the three major guides for Bonaire. The reef smart is in a tier of its own by a huge margin. The local guide, that is also in Dutch, is next, BSDME served as a coaster and wasn’t even that great at that.

Well that’s sweet, on the Internet you can cast aspersions on somebody’s work with no repercussions to yourself.