Please advise about the necessity of electrical adaptors for chargers of cameras, mp3 players, etc. Thanks Joan

your basic camera battery charger or laptop power source should be ok for the 50Hz that they use...i did notice the chargers tend to get a little warmer than usual - i guess the voltage is a little higher as well but still can be handled. some electrical engineer from curacao (can we trust him? ) said as long as you are not dealing with an appliance that has a motor then you should be ok with the electricity.

Joan,

Each power supply (converter) will have an electrical rating. For the US power runs 60Hz ~120 Volts. On Bonaire, however, the electricity runs at 50Hz ~130 Volts. The power supplies you are using (camera, mp3, etc) will have a rating on the plug. For example, I have a cell phone power supply with the following rating:

INPUT:100-240VAC~150mA 50-60Hz

This means that the power supply would work within the US and Bonaire electric range for both Voltage and Hertz.

If your power supplies can not handle the changes, many hotels in the area offer "safe" charging stations for these purposes.

Note you will also need an adaptor as a standard US plug will not fit into the Bonaire outlet. These are the same adaptors that you use in Holland (two round prongs) and they can be purchased at most Baggage/Suitcase/Travel stores.

Hope that helps,

Stephen

Do a search on this site. . . there have been quite a few posts like this.

Thank you for the very helpful tips. I can't wait to go.

Just a word of caution,
If you use anything that uses one of those "wall wart" transformers (little black thing that plugs into the wall--usually for CD players and the like) be very careful! I burned out two (on separate trips). The first time I left it plugged in to the outlet and it overheated and burned out. The second time I was very careful and only plugged it in for about 30 minutes at a time--no dice, same result. Best solution is to search for one that is rated for 50-60 Hz, not just the 60 Hz that many cheap (imported) american transformers can handle (imprinted on the device).
Charge!