We had yet another great time in Bonaire. It was our 9th year and my 17th trip to the island.Next March we will be getting our 10 year ambassador award! Wooooo!!!!!!! HOOOOOO!!!!!!!!
Travel:
We flew Boston, San Juan to Bonaire on American and American Eagle from Boston. We had a 5 hour layover but it went by quickly as we met a friend that also was on her way down to Bonaire. All flights were on time or even ahead of schedule!
Restaurants:
Pasa Bon Pizza: It is a really nice pizza place just to the north of town on the main road. There is a nice dining area there with a bar. The pizzas are really, really good!!! We had the special fish pizza Pasa Bon Pizza is open till eleven at night so it is another good place to eat for those late night arrivals!
BobbeJans: It is only open on the weekends but it has excellent food for little dollars. We love their marinated steak. It just melts in your mouth but they are noted for their ribs. We went several times.
Raining Fishes: I have noticed that they have and some bad reviews but I thought it was awesome! They did it over nicely and it is located just at the end of town across from the water front. We both had the fish of the day which was Dorado in a mustard sauce. I had escargot for an appetizer and it was red in color! It was very different from what I normally get escargot but it was incredibly good!!
Lions Den: It is located on the water front at Buddy Dive resort. I am never disappointed with the food there. We both had the Grouper special that was delicious!
Donna and Georgio’s: They specialize in Italian food and Donna is such a gracious hostess. There food is excellent and presented nicely. We both had the special which was Barracuda in a Pesto sauce with shrimp and it was delicious! Their Tara Mi Su for dessert is awesome! They are located seaside right next to the Dive Inn and near the Divi. You must make reservations now in advance.
Gibi’s: We made it to Gibi’s the first Tuesday that we were there. It is so much fun meeting everyone from BT and seeing all our usual March friends. The food is delicious there, especially the goat stew. We had filet mignon this time and it was excellent! Gibi greeted all of us with his big smile.
Mona Lisa: I can't believe that it took us this long to finally try Mona Lisa. It is located right on the main road in town. We ate from the lesser expensive bar hap menu. We both had fish and they were delicious!!!
Mi Banana: We just love this little local place and it is located near the More and Save market. It is very inexpensive and delicious!!! They serve great sauces for their breads. I had the filet mignon and Tom had lemon and garlic conch. They were both great!
Richards: I love it there dining under the open sky at sunset time! Very romantic! I can't remember what Tom had but I had the escargot and the filet mignon for dinner with fresh zucchini for the vegetable. It was excellent!!
Apartment: We rented our usual little apartment located between the Divi and town. It is in a great location and the yard is really nice with a great shaded porch! We bring a hammock and I enjoyed having my siesta in it every afternoon. There were lots of birds, including the Lora, and little lizards and Iguanas in the yard to keep us entertained.
We went to Michaels Gaynor’s Chat and Browse to get our phone rentals. He is such a sweetheart!!! He will help you out any way he can! He has quite a nice little gift shop with some of Linda’s and Jan’s art, as well as others, hanging on the walls. He also has Internet service and cell phone rentals. He makes your phone rental a breeze. We bought our stash of Lover's ice cream next door and also bought some snacks at the Sand dollar store. They have Johnny cakes there!!! I love those things!!!
We always go to Jan Huckaby’s open house for her artwork on the usual Friday evening. I love J an’s art and I always bring home some prints to add to the collection.
We rented a truck again for a few days and it was real nice getting around the island. One of the days we had a flat tire and a local stopped and helped Tom Change it!! We went to visit the donkeys and rode through the donkey park. I just love it there. We did the Gotomere route and saw lots of flamingos. There were a couple of them that would come right out on the road and we were able to get some decent pictures. Then we went up to Seru Largu. I so love it up there! It is a very spiritual place for me and it over looks Kline and most of Bonaire. In all our trips we never made it to the museum at the Park entrance. Well we did and it is very nice!! Hey Pat! I took pictures of the his and hers bathroom signs! 
Gibi’s BT Nights: I always have such a good time when I go to Gibi’s. Chet and Jean were there to give out their famous Bonaire Talk Pin that they do up for all the March BT’ers. Pat and Mary were there too with his sister and husband. We got to meet David Kay and his wife Jenny! I hope I am not forgetting anyone.
Bonaire Talk Woodwind Snorkel and Sail: It was so relaxing and everyone was chatting, drinking and eating as we were sailing to our two snorkel stops. The NH BT BQ crowd were there so it is a lot of old friends now as well as the regular March group. We saw lots of great stuff including a lot of turtles!! A special thanks to Dee and her new captain Fernando for such a wonderful day!!!! I plan on organizing a BT sail whenever I go from now on!
I would usually spend afternoons snorkeling around the Divi and it is incredible! The cement pier is full of life and it is one of my favorite spots! All the usual critters were there. In the morning we would spend it either sailing and snorkeling on the Woodwind or doing guided snorkels with Renee from Renee Snorkel trips. We love doing both!
The Woodwind is a trimaran run by Dee and Ulf and their new captain ,Fenando. It is a lot of fun sailing with them and you do two snorkel stops with snacks, lunch and drinks included. We sailed to Ebo’s Reef and drifted to No Name at Kline, Andrea I, Andrea II. All were great snorkels and we saw tons of turtles at Kline Our very first sail we saw about twenty turtles between the two stops!!! It was unbelievable!!! There is also a pair of Friendly French Angels that have been hanging around there. Dee is also taking stills of everyone on board and in the water that she puts with footage from snorkeling. They are available for purchase and I think they are awesome!!!!
Renee will pick you up and drop you off and her prices a very reasonable. We love going with her as she knows where all the good stuff is and she finds easy entries for me. She knows we like taking pictures so she brings us to good spots for that and she really has a good eye for finding things. We call her old Eagle Eyes!! We saw several octopus aand scorpion fish. She knows we love Queen Angels so she brought us to a place that had four of them!!
Of course we saw many other beautiful fish with Renee, too many of which to name.
We saw dolphins our very first day. They were going by Divi just beyond the boat moorings. It was awesome!! I also checked out the statue that was created to depict Bonaire's roots. It has been put in about 20 feet of water at the end of the Cha Cha Cha pier. I will be looking forward over the next few years to see the new growth and who will be living in it! We are calling this THE YEAR OF THE TURTLE! We saw more turtles this year than we could keep count of!! It was awesome!!! We saw them mostly on the drift at Kline and than at the Andreas and Pietre's Pillar. Afew of them were friendly and one of them was just a ham and he loved gliding along with us near the top of the water column for long periods of time. It was one of those lifetime experiences!!!! Some of the places we snorkeled were: Small Wall, Yellow Hut, Torries, Old Blue and Country Garden, playa, Andrea 1 and 2, Pietre's Piller. Old Blue down to Country Garden is one of my favorites. It is soooo beautiful! We saw many different species of fish that we see often in Bonaire's beautiful waters. There were lots of squid, eels of all types, octopus, Spotted Drums, Band tail Puffers, filefish parrotfish, just to name a few of the usual characters. Tom found a baby trunkfish. You know the ones that look like baby dice! They are sooooooo cute!! We also saw two juvenile. Queen Angelfish which is one of my favorites which I don't often see. We saw several types of puffers. We saw three or four of the Bandtail Puffer. They seem to be more abundant than in past visits. Another one that we don't see to often is the Baloonfish. We found him in the Playa area all by it's self!
I guess that is about it until next time!
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By DARLENE IN MA (Supreme BonaireTalker - Post #2531) on Thursday, April 17, 2008 - 7:50 pm: 
