We decided to explore the Caribbean a bit and go diving in Bonaire. En route we stopped in Miami for a weekend to visit Shane and went snorkelling at Looe Key. The driving took its toll on Shane who enjoyed a well deserved rest at our over-night stop. The next day we snorkel with, among other things, Caribbean reef shaks and nurse sharks (here pointed out by Yueng).
We celebrated our bravery in fine dining style before heading off to Bonaire - "The Shore Diving Capital of the World"...
We arrived late at night, were met at the airport and given keys to our truck that would transport all our gear around the island for the next week. Next morning we got up early and went to out first dive spot - Oil Slick Leap. Yueng made the giant stride entry with spectacular applomb. Here is the movie.
With our arrangement we had total freedom to dive on the Island. There are over 50 shore diving site that you can just drive up to and plop into the water and we had access to unlimited air tanks that we could collect and dump 24 hours a day. Consequently we managed to get quite a bit of diving in (18 dives) which included some night dives. Night diving is pretty interesting because all sorts of different animals come out at night. In the day you get all the fish but at night the shrimp and crabs and all that stuff becomes active.
When you breath compressed air you end up with excess nitrogen in your blood. The deeper you go the greater the pressure and so the more nitrogen passes into your blood. Consequently you can spend less time at deeper depths and should allow longer gaps at the surface in between deeper dives than shallow dives in order to let the nitrogen leave the blood stream. At most we could get in 4 dives in a day. There are a number of wrecks around the Island, the biggest being the Hilma Hooker that sits at 100 feet between two reefs. it is home to a number of 4 foot tarpon that were happy to pose for photos.
The Island is around 30 miles long and is surrounded by a coral reef that starts in 30 foot of water and then drops down to over 100 feet. There are sponges, hard and soft corals and all sorts of beasties. The reef is in excellent condition since it has been preserved as a marine park for twenty years or so.
Our daily plan was very flexible. You just drive up to one of the dive spots, with the yellow markers, don your gear and plop into the water. Easy peasy.
The southern third of the island is convered by solar salt evaporation pans that wild flamingos enjoy. We took breaks between the dives to explore the surface of the island.
There are a number of special creatures that can be seen diving on the Island. There are both Frogfish and seahorses. The seahorses often curl their tails around the sea rods so we spent a lot of time scrutinizing the base of the colonies trying to spot them. Instead we found other exiciting fish. There were loads of trumpet fish that were often extremely well camoflaged in the sea rods and also filefish, which are almost invisible until you see them move. Then there are all sort of snails called Flamingo Tongue which munch on the corals.
