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Trip Reports: Frank and Debbie's 1st trip to Bonaire
Bonaire Talk: Trip Reports: Archives: Archives 2000 to 2005: Archives - 2004-02-06 to 2004-07-31: Frank and Debbie's 1st trip to Bonaire
Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Debbie Crosby (New BonaireTalk Poster - Post #3) on Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - 6:03 pm:     Edit PostPrint Post

Many thanks to all BTer's comments, we were able to experience a great trip to Bonaire by heeding advice and looking at private accomodations vs resorts, as well as restaurant choices. We arrived on island on March 6 flying on AA from San Antonio thru Dallas/Puerto Rico route. We packed our bc's, regs, masks and swimsuits in our carry-on as advised and were only slightly harrassed at the airport inspection sites. In the end, all our luggage made it without a problem - but it's best to take the cautious approach. Louise and Mel from Happy Holiday Homes (HHH) were at the airport to greet us and help us obtain our rental truck and show us the way to our new home for the week. We were very impressed with our HHH bungalow and wouldn't stay anywhere else after looking around the island a bit during our stay. Great accomodations! First thing we did was used the cable and lock that had been recommended on this page to bring/buy and locked our spare tire onto our truck, got a good nights sleep and was ready to approach the dive shop for our intro and briefing. We met Michael at Photo Tours and he did a great job with our briefing and info, we grabbed some tanks and took off to do our first check out dive. Upon entering the water at North Belnam Beach, it was apparent that my husband's computer had a problem and air was also leaking from one of his hoses and my newly serviced reg was breathing too fast. So back to Michael at PT and he took care of my husband's problems and then led us to Carib Inn to have our scubapro reg serviced. Bruce Bowker was very obliging and had it adjusted in no time. Kudos to both shops for the repairs! But after that our experience with Photo Tours went downhill. Their attitude was not pleasant, the dive master that took us out on the boat dives as well as the driver had unpleasant things to "gossip" about the company and did not take care of the passengers at the level I am accustomed. Throughout the week, when i would go into the shop, there was never the right person to answer my questions, or they just downright told me they wouldn't do what I was asking (ie..lead a dive to Town Pier). The Pink bus was not operational either and when i asked about it - was rudely told it was broken and they couldn't say when it would be put back into service! After a week of dealing with these guys, I finally spoke to one of them about my concerns to let them know of my disappointment with them. I was informed that they had recently been sold to another company (Yellow submarine) and were trying to work out their indifferences, as well as having employees out due to medical problems/vacations. As for the dive master that was very uninformed and rude, he was just a temp hire that had sailed into the island for a short stay. Hopefully this is a temporary problem and they will get back on track soon! My husband and I had a great time diving as many sites as we could fit into 6 days. Our favorites were Salt Pier and Hilma Hooker (both day and night). Lots of fish and life at both places. Our next favorite was Town Pier (we were able to get Murph from Buddy Dive to take us!) During the week, we saw turtles,eels(including the largest green moray we have ever seen as well as garden eels), rays, spotted eagle rays, lobsters, scorpionfish, flounder, beautiful angels, cowfish - including a juvenile about the size of my thumbnail, tarpon, octopus, seahorses (thanks to murph) and a neat thing - a large crab eating a fishtail while an eel tried to sneak up on it to steal the snack. Instead, the crab slapped the eel and he slithered back down into his hole! We had some great meals at Casablanca, Zeezicht, Donna & Giorgio, Old Inn and Lions Den. As for rental car problems - none! I had written to the manager at Budget prior to arriving and asked what we could do to prevent problems. His answer was to park where we could see our vehicle. When I asked how to do that while diving, he got a little testy and stated if I was so afraid of something happening to my vehicle, then perhaps I shouldn't rent one or perhaps I just shouldn't come to Bonaire at all! But we had absolutely no problems-even diving at 1000 Steps, Karpata, Oil Slick Leap, or Andrea II. Overall, it was a great trip and we definitely have PBD and looking forward to another trip soon.

 

Top of pagePrevious messageNext messageBottom of page Link to this message  By Tom Cousino (Experienced BonaireTalker - Post #487) on Wednesday, March 31, 2004 - 7:02 pm:     Edit PostPrint Post

Debbie,

Thanks for the post.

I stayed at HHH seven or eight years ago. The bungalos are very nice.

I also was glad to hear that Murph led you on the Town Pier dive. He is a great divemaster.

Happy to hear you have PBD. It is a sign that you will return.

 


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