My boyfriend, Geoff, and I visited Bonaire for one glorious week. It was my second time to the island and his first. It won't be our last.

The Planning
Made easy by Ann Phelan and her buddies at Bonaire Pros. I had met Ann on my first trip to Bonaire. I knew that she had a good sense of style and joie de vivre, so I trusted every recommendation she made. Thanks Ann for everything.

Getting There
A nightmare. In the words of another BTer, we got "Air Jamaica'd". I already covered this in an earlier post (http://www.oldbonairetalk.com/newsgroup/messages/29/229443.html?1119987593), so I won't rehash. However, we are grateful for the friends we made throughout our travails. Hi Jerry & Judy from Baltimore!

Accommodations
Ann recommended Bellafonte after we told her we wanted something with a balcony, view and a little romance. After we took a look at its website (www.bellafontebonaire.com), we both agreed it was perfect. But the website does not do the place justice! The night we arrived, we ran around our room like maniacs, marveling at its beauty. I wondered at what point in my life did I reach that place where I could stay in such a gorgeous apartment with a rock star view of the ocean and a hot tub on the balcony? We were convinced someone was going to knock on the door and tell us there had been a mistake; we were actually staying in the shed in the back. We had a full kitchen, one of the most gorgeous dining tables we've ever laid eyes on, a living room and a cozy bedroom, which as an end unit, had two sides of ocean-view windows. We would like to give a shout out to Sjoerd, the manager, who was charming, helpful and funny (and came to pick us up at the airport when we arrived close to midnight). We highly recommend Bellafonte. There are only about 20 units in the whole place, so it's quiet. Plus there is a shed and rinse tank on each side of the building for dive gear and almost every room has a view of the ocean (every room, as far as I could tell, had a balcony but some faced the road).





The Eating
Lots and lots of eating.

We took the advice of many BTers and, once again, Ann, on where to eat. We didn't have a single bad meal but we also had favorites. They were:

Casablanca: We ate lunch here on Father's Day (our first full day on the island), where they were serving a special holiday all-you-can-eat grilled meat menu with unlimited helpings of French fries and coleslaw. Started off our week of gluttony just right.

City Café: This became our regular hang-out for breakfast and lunch. Geoff loved the Dutch coffee served with the little cookie. I'd be sweating my tush off and downing water faster than they could bring it to me and he'd order a hot coffee. I loved the muesli with milk best of all. They also had good burgers and fries.

Salsa: I've already posted about this, too. We luhuuuved Salsa. Ate dinner there twice. We loved the Cucumber Soup with Goat Cheese Tempura and the Beef Carpaccio. With its open air, thatched roof and low-lighting, it's a great place to stare lovingly at each other over your Amstel Bright. We, of course, had none of that as we preferred to stare longingly at the flashlights of the night divers under Town Pier.

Bistro de Paris: We ate here twice as well - dinner and lunch. I preferred my lunch meal (ham and cheese croissant) but dinner was also delicious. For dessert, I simply could not pass up the Chocolate Mousse. Geoff got the Crème Brulee. Patrice, the owner, was friendly and fun to talk to and he clearly loves Bonaire. He had great sightseeing recommendations for us.

One day, we stopped by the green house next to Richard's to pick up their catch of the day to cook that night in our apartment. It was - gulp - barracuda. What the hell, we figured, it will be an adventure. We didn't know what it would taste like (pretty good, as it turned out) and Geoff struggled with the not-so-sharp knives in our kitchen to get it to a point where we could eat it, but it definitely gave us a laugh and some funny pictures. We just hoped its brothers wouldn't hold it against us when we dove with them.




Lovers: God bless Lovers Ice Cream. God bless the Chocolate Marionberry Hearts and the Caramel Choco-Turtles. And God bless waffle cones.

Amen. The ice cream flavors with those little chocolate hearts & turtles rock! Loved your reports.

What a beautiful view you had! Thanks for the report.

I just asked for a reservation quote.

Jim, when are you going...October??? When Kelly..et..all are there? Please? :-)

Actually Cynde, we just decided to go yesterday for 2 weeks in the beginning of August. I read Carlea's post on the Bellafonte, went to their website, checked it out, sent an email, etc. Sjoerd got right back to me twice on my inquiries. Now we just have to find a way to get there as Air Rasta just smoked too much gunja through the years. They do have USeless Air flights going directly to Aruba from Philadelphia. So, right now, that looks like our best bet unless someone out there has a better and more costly solution. We are already booked for December as well. We went through a whole insane thing with AJ over that. David Franks was good enough to email me and tell me that AJ cancelled flights to Bonaire at this time. We are usually down there the same time as the Franks. We called AJ to verify and we got a, "Yeah Mon your flight was cancelled." Just wondering when they were going to give us the good news. Anyway, they will get us to Curacao, then we do Bonaire Express over to Bonaire. Oh, the things we do to see fish, drink Amstel, and eat Donna and Georgio's great food.

Jim, I'm sure you will love Bellafonte! Have a great time in August (however you get there!). Just before the kiddies go back to school, and then the much needed Christmas break!

I've given up on getting there with AJ anymore from the left coast, just not enough options. AA does take LONG...like 24 hours long, but hey, what's that than getting to my favorite island and friends?

Have fun Jim. I hope you like Bellafonte as much as we did.

Carlea