Bonaire July 2012 Day 7

Thursday, July 5, 2012

We had made plans last night to get up and leave a little after 8 a.m. this morning to go to the dive shop (they open at 8 a.m.) and get tanks for our first two dives of the day. Then we were going to stop and get breakfast at El Mundo on the way through town since we were heading up north to do our two dives, one at 1000 Steps and the other at Karpata.

I think we got out of the hotel about 8:30 or so -- it is hard to get us all moving when we have adjusted to island time. Then we stopped downtown at El Mundo and had breakfast. Tim had a Dutch pancake with apple and the rest of us had American style pancakes. After stuffing ourselves, we headed on down the road to our first dive site, 1000 Steps.

This dive site has a bunch of steps to get down the side of the cliff to the dive site (like 60-70, just feels like 1000). Tim was nice enough to carry my stuff down and up for me since I did not want to aggravate my back. It is great having Tim along--he is our little pack mule. He has way too much energy!!! Jody managed to carry all her own gear down and back up--what a trooper. Of course we had to listen to her whine about any other steps we had to do the rest of the day...

We had a nice dive here. I got some really good footage of a giant lobster that decided to come out and wander all around the reef trying to find a new den--or at least that is what I assume it was doing. I have never seen a lobster do that ever before. Usually once they are spotted they back into their den and you don’t see much of them. We had a lot of things that were out of the ordinary today, though.

After we hiked back up the hill and loaded the car we headed down the road a little ways to our next dive site, Karpata. By the time we got there we still had about 30 minutes left on our surface interval so we watched some other people getting in the water to see how they did it. This entry was a little more challenging and there were some pretty good waves coming in.

As we were getting our gear ready there were a bunch of Iguana’s congregating around us. I think people must feed them at this dive site and they must have thought Tim had some food. Tim was not paying attention and two of them started running toward him and when he looked up they scared the crap out of him. I don’t know who was more surprised, Tim or the iguanas.

After our laugh at Tim’s expense we all headed down to the water to get in. It was a little challenging with the waves that were coming in, but we managed to get in with not too much trouble. Right after we got in we saw a big school of blue tang and a really big parrotfish swimming along with them. We saw a couple more lobsters, but nothing overly exciting until the end of the dive. At the end of the dive I was trying to get some more footage of the giant parrotfish when Tim used his noise maker to get my attention. I thought to myself this had better be good. I looked toward him and he pointed to an octopus that was out of its hole swimming around.

I swam over to it faster than you can believe. I got quite a bit of footage of this octopus. He was swimming, changing color and too busy hunting to worry about me taking video of him. It was amazing.

That was definitely the highlight of today’s dives and probably the trip. After we managed to get out -- some of us not as gracefully as others, we hiked back up the hill and loaded the car to head back to the hotel to have some lunch. We had left over pizza so that made lunch very fast and easy. As soon as we had some pizza we loaded up the car again to head down the road just a short bit to do our third dive at Bachelor’s Beach.

This is a nice sandy entry here so it make it a little easier to get in. We swam out a ways and took a group picture and then continued on with our dive. We saw a scorpionfish, at least two octopus, a very photogenic angelfish, a tiny and I mean tiny goby, and a couple snake eels out hunting.

Eric and Tim decided they were going to do a night dive too, so we came back to the hotel and they had a little snack before they headed down to the hotel pier to do a night dive. Jody and I decided we were tired and stayed behind in the room. The guys said their night dive was really cool. They said they turned off their lights a couple times and it was the best light show they had ever seen before--the bioluminescence. After the guys got done with their night dive they were pretty hungry so they came back to the room and we all had some more left over pizza before we headed off to bed after a tiring but fun day.

Bonaire July 2012 Day 6

Wednesday, July 4, 2012.

I think we were all on Bonaire time today. We all had breakfast this morning and then decided what the plan was for diving. We decided we would head back down south and dive White Slave and then Invisibles. We got to the White Slave dive site and there was no one there. We thought it would be a good day to try diving this site as it can have some pretty good current and today didn’t seem to be as windy as other days, thus we thought it might make it an easier entry with less wave action.

There was not much current when we got in and we swam out a ways before we dropped down. Right after we started going down I looked beneath me and there was a spotted eagle ray feeding in the sand. Right after everyone had seen him he quickly swam off. I did not get any video and Eric didn’t get any pictures either. We had a nice dive but towards the latter part of the dive the current started ripping. It was all we could do to swim and stay in place, so we headed back for the shore. Unfortunately, we had to fight the current all the way back in to shore. We definitely all burned some calories on this dive.

By the time we got to Invisibles we still had about a half hour left to complete our surface interval before we could get in the water again, so we watched all the other divers coming and going. When we had completed our hour surface interval we gathered all our gear and jumped in the water. There was much less current at this site, thankfully. There were a lot of fish at this dive site and it was a very nice dive.

We all had a good laugh and Jody put on quite a show for everyone when she went to get out of the water. She had all her gear on and fell down and could not get up and was being washed around like a beached whale--I didn’t laugh quite as hard about this as everywhere else as I have been in this situation before. After we hoisted Jody out of the water we all got out and loaded up the car.

By the time we completed these two dives it was definitely lunch time, so we headed back to the hotel to drop off all our gear and get cleaned up a bit to head out and find some lunch. Jody was craving a burger, so we decided to go back to El Mundo since they have just about everything on the menu and their food is really good. So we drove downtown and had lunch at El Mundo and then after lunch we stopped by the dive shop and picked up four new tanks so we could do a dive off the pier at the hotel when we got back.

At about 4 p.m. we headed downstairs to dive off the pier here at the hotel. I decided to get some over-under shots of Jody, Tim, and Eric doing a giant stride off the hotel pier into the water. Then after some above water picture taking we got ready to drop down. Tim stuck his head under the water and looked down and spotted a giant ray. We all threw our heads into the water to see a GIANT spotted eagle ray who had obviously spotted us too and was taking off in a hurry. Of course Eric and I attempted to chase it down to get some pictures or video--which was a losing proposition.

We watched the ray swim off into the blue and continued on with our dive. It was a nice dive but we did not see anything else super spectacular.

We finished our dive and decided it was time to hunt down dinner. Tim had not been to Pasa Bon Pizza yet as we went the day before he got here, so we decided to go back there again. Their food is so good. We stuffed ourselves and then headed back to the hotel with leftovers for tomorrow. We decided we were going to get up early tomorrow morning so everyone pretty much headed off to bed as soon as we got back to the hotel.

Bonaire July 2012 Day 5

Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Eric and I slept in until about 7 o’clock and Jody got up about 6 a.m. or so. After everyone was up we all had some breakfast and finalized our plan for today. For our first dive we decided to head up North to the dive site called the Cliff, which is at Dive Friends Hamlet location. We had been told that there was a frog fish at this dive site that we could get very good directions to find.

So we loaded up the car and headed in that direction. This time we only got out of the parking lot before we remembered Jody’s weights, so we just made a U-turn to come back and get them. Then we got to the dive site and I remembered I had forgotten my long sleeve rash guard top. So I dove sleeveless today.

We got directions from the staff at the Hamlet Dive shop and headed out in search of the frog fish. We made a beeline for the area where the frog fish was supposedly located and actually were able to find it. I got some video of it, which no one will probably be able to figure out because frog fish sit perfectly still. Eric hopefully got some good pictures of it. As I was trying to get some video of it I accidentally bumped a small bit of fire coral on my wrist. So now I have experienced fire coral for the first time. You definitely know when you have hit something, but it was not terribly painful. After a short bit it was like nothing had even happened. However, it is not something I would want to do repeatedly.

We also saw a really friendly turtle on this dive and this time my video camera was working, unlike the first day. I got some really good video of the turtle going to town munching on some algae. I also got some good footage of a couple midnight parrotfish and a very large barracuda. That dive lasted a little over an hour and everyone really enjoyed that location. This location is probably one of the few in Bonaire that actually has a small wall.

We got out and rinsed all our gear off and got eight new tanks and then we all got some sodas and sat in the shade and chatted with the lady working at the Hamlet. Then we all loaded back in the van and headed down the road to our next diving destination, Oil Slick Leap.

Tim decided he wanted to do a giant stride off the cliff edge into the water at Oil Slick Leap and Jody decided she wanted to try it too, so I videotaped all three of them doing a giant stride into the water. Then I got in and we started our dive. We saw a couple schools of blue tang, gray angelfish, arrow crabs, a spotted drum, and another very large midnight blue parrotfish just to name a few things.

After that dive we were all pretty hungry so we loaded up the car and headed back to the hotel to rinse off and get a bite to eat. We still had pizza left over so we had pizza and snacked on whatever we could find lying around and then watched some of my video from today to see what kind of footage I had gotten. After that Tim and Eric decided they were going to do another dive off the pier here at the hotel to see if they could find the octopus Tim had spotted on the night dive last night.

Tim wanted to do a giant stride off the end of the pier and Eric told him he would do it too, so I went down and videotaped them both doing their giant stride into the water. The large resident iguana that hangs around here was down on the pier sunning himself, so of course I had to get some video of him too. Jody has named him Henry Jones, III.

Tim and Eric had a good dive. They saw the octopus again and a very large flounder, a super-size barracuda, and some fire worms, etc. As they came back in from their dive I got some video of them coming up the ladder. I also got some footage of the KLM flight coming in for a landing.

After they both got cleaned up we were all hungry so we decided to head downtown for dinner to another one of the restaurants we really like, El Mundo. We sat outside and enjoyed the full moon and the beautiful Bonaire breeze. Jody and I had the crab salad sandwich, Tim had the tuna salad sandwich, and Eric had the chicken satay in peanut sauce. The food there is really fresh and they make everything from scratch, even their bread. Everything tasted sooooo good.

After dinner we walked down the street to the Gelato shop and we all had some super good gelato. Then we walked back to the car and drove back to the hotel. Tim was pretty tired so he headed to bed and Eric and Jody and I played a couple rounds of Uno. Of course I won...Jody said she was just tired or she would have smeared my ass...

Bonaire July 2012 Day 4

Monday, July 2, 2012

Since there was really no reason to get up early today, Eric and I slept in until a little after 7 o’clock. According to Tim, Jody was up about 3 or 4 a.m. After we were all up and somewhat awake we sat around and relaxed and decided what the plan was going to be for today. I made Jody and Tim and myself cheese omelets and after we got done with breakfast we all got our swim suits on to head out for the first dive of the day.

We had decided that we would do the Hilma Hooker first and then a new dive site we had not done yet called The Rock. So we got to the Hilma Hooker and got all our gear ready to get in. Jody went ahead and got in the water and took my video camera and then Tim got in the water and Eric carried my equipment down and put it in the water so Tim could hang onto it. At that point we realized that neither Eric or I had our masks. So Tim and Jody stayed in the water and waited while Eric and I ran back to the hotel to get our masks. We zipped back as quickly as we could and then got in the water.

Our little mask issue actually worked out for the better. By the time we were ready to get in the water and go down for our dive all the other people were gone and we were the only ones there. When we had first arrived there were actually quite a few shore divers there and two dive boats from different dive shops. So it was rather nice having the whole dive site to ourselves.

There were quite a few barracuda hanging around the Hilma Hooker and we also found one tarpon hanging out down in the shadows of the boat. We also saw a couple eels on the swim back in over the reef. Tim and Jody both really enjoyed the dive. This was Jody’s first wreck dive.

After that we headed back to the hotel to get some more mask drops and then headed back down the road to just past the Hilma Hooker to our next dive site, The Rock. This is actually an unmarked dive site just the other side of the Invisibles dive site. This has to be one of the easiest entry and exits for a dive site of any we have done here on Bonaire. It was a beautiful sandy section of beach where you just walk right in--no scrambling over slippery rocks to get in the water here.

At this dive site you actually swim out quite a ways, as there is just a lot of sand and a few coral heads on the way out, and then you drop right down onto this giant coral sea mount--thus the name The Rock. We saw quite a few Lion fish there and there was a nice sandy bottom with lots of garden eels. We also saw a lobster that could have fed a small African nation. On the way back in there were also a few eels and I spent quite a bit of time following a flounder all over the place. I think everyone really enjoyed this dive site.

By this time I think we were all getting pretty hungry so we headed back to the hotel to rinse out all our gear and take a quick shower before we took all the empty tanks back to get full ones. Then we went down the road a little further to get a few groceries. We decided to check out the new grocery store that we were told was down the street from the Warehouse (the supermarket we usually shop at). We went into the new store and it was very nice, so nice that you had to pay to rent a shopping cart. We looked around and did not think their selection was as good, so we headed back down the street to the Warehouse.

We got everything we wanted at the Warehouse and we did not have to pay for a shopping cart either. We finally headed back to the hotel to get some lunch. I think by this time it was about 4 p.m. We had ordered a couple pizzas last night so we could have the leftovers for lunch today. So we had our pizza and for dessert we had the peanut butter chocolate chip cookies I had made at home and brought...Yummmmm!!!

Tim and Jody were tired so they laid down and had an afternoon nap. We decided tonight was the night we would do our night dive, so about 7 p.m. we headed out to the hotel pier. Jody was a little nervous about it, but we told her she had to at least give it a try. We got in about sundown and head out in front of the hotel not to far. We spent about an hour swimming around and seeing what there was to see. We saw quite a few eels out hunting, lots of banded coral shrimp, basket stars, brittle stars, tarpon, flamingo tongues, and some type of hairy little red crabs. On the way back into the pier we also saw a small octopus.

Jody survived the night dive and I think she actually enjoyed it. I think she would be a little hesitant to do a night dive on her own, but she enjoyed having someone show her the ropes.

After the dive we rinsed and put away all our gear and got cleaned up and had a little snack and some good conversation before heading to bed.

Bonaire July 2012 Days 1-3

Friday, Saturday, and Sunday June 29-July 1, 2012

My dad picked up Jody, Eric and me about 1 p.m. and we headed off to the airport. There was a fairly short line at the check-in counter and a fairly short line at security so we made it through relatively quickly. Then we headed for the United lounge and relaxed for a bit until our flight. Eric and I got upgraded to first class on the flight from Phoenix to Houston, which was nice. We were fortunate enough to leave Jody sitting in coach, Ha!

We made it to Houston okay with only a little bit of turbulence. We had about a four hour layover so we got a bite to eat at Ruby’s diner in the airport and then went to the United lounge to relax before our flight to Bonaire. The flight to Bonaire leaves around midnight and is about four hours long. I think we all got a little bit of sleep on the flight but not a huge amount.

When we landed in Bonaire it was still raining a little bit and it looked like it had actually been raining a lot just before we got there. At most airports that would not be a big deal, but in Bonaire you take the stairs down off of the plane and walk on the tarmac to passport control and then you stand out in the open as you wait in line to get your passport checked to enter the country. We experienced the rain at the Bonaire airport once before so this time we came prepared with rain jackets in our carry-on luggage. Luckily we did not have to use them, though.

We were towards the front of the plane so we got to passport control and got through relatively quickly. However, that did not help us in getting out of the airport any faster. I think there was only one little old man to take all the luggage off the plane, drive it over to the luggage carousel and unload it. Thus, the entire plane had gotten through passport control and was waiting for their luggage before anything started moving on the carousel.

Luckily one of our checked bags was the first off the plane, so I took that and headed over to the rental car pick-up while Jody and Eric waited for the rest of the bags. I got to the car rental window and filled out all the paperwork and got everything signed and she pulled the car around. When she pulled the car around I noticed that the right front tire was about half full of air. I asked her if she could air it up and she acted kind of indifferent. Luckily, because it had been raining the tire was wet and as I inspect it I noticed the side of the tire bubbling through some water. I told her that tire was going to need to be fixed. Unfortunately, they only had the one minivan (which I had called to reserve about two months ago). So she ended up temporarily renting us a small

SUV that we were to bring back at 11 when she said she would have the tire fixed on our original rental.

So we came back at about 10:45 a.m. to pick up our fixed rental car only to find no one at the counter and our original car still parked in the lot with the half flat tire. Finally she showed up in a different minivan and we were on our way.

Then we came back to the hotel and we all got our dive gear ready so we could head down to Yellow Submarine to do our check-out dive and get all our paperwork filled out, etc. We went ahead and did our first dive there too. Jody did really well for her first Bonaire dive. Unfortunately, my video camera would not record for some unknown reason, but of course we did not figure out it was not working until after we got in the water. Eric tried to fix it underwater, but could not figure out the issue. So instead I decide to point out stuff to Jody and write it on a slate so she could start learning some of the things she was seeing.

We came across a very friendly turtle who was too busy eating and doing its own thing to be bothered by Eric taking its picture. So Eric spent quite a bit of time taking multiple photos of the turtle since it was such a cooperative subject. After our dive we got all our stuff rinsed out and loaded back into the car and headed back to the hotel to get cleaned up and head out for some dinner.

Ever since our last trip here I have been dreaming about the garlic bread that we had at Pasa Bon Pizza. So we decided that was where we would go for dinner. They open at 5 p.m. and we got there a little early and they were not open yet and Jody really wanted to eat, so we headed down to restaurant at Captain Don’s Habitat. Unfortunately, we got there only to find out they did not open until 5:30 so we headed back to Pasa Bon Pizza. By the time we got back there they were open and we sat down and decided on what we were going to have.

We had a wonderful dinner. We had a really good salad, the garlic cheese bread, pizza and then Jody and I both had Key Lime pie for dessert. Eric was so tired by dinner time that he was falling asleep at the table. His eyelids were half open and his eyes were rolling back in his head. Jody thought maybe he was having a seizure, she had never seen him so tired. After we got back to the hotel Eric laid down on the bed and was out like a light. We were all pretty tired so we all went to bed right after we got back.

We had to set our alarm clock for 5:15 in the morning on Sunday so that we could get up to go to the airport to pick up Tim. We sat on our balcony and waved to Tim as his plane came in for a landing. Then we drove down and met him at the airport and brought him back to the hotel. He was so wound up and ready to dive that he did not even want to lay down and rest. So we headed out to do our first dive of the day off the pier here at the hotel.

There was quite a bit of current on the dive--or at least more than we have ever experienced the other three times we have been here, but it was still a good dive. We didn’t see anything super spectacular, just the standard critters we usually see. After our dive we rinsed off our gear and headed back up to our room to have some left-over pizza for lunch and decide where we were going to dive next. We decided that Tori’s Reef sounded like a good spot. We had dove there last year and really liked it and the entry is fairly easy.

So we loaded all our gear in the car and headed down the road a bit to Tori’s Reef. There was no one else there, so it was perfect. We backed the car right up to the edge of the water and got all our gear ready and jumped in. It seemed like there were a lot more fish here than other sites and the current was moving pretty well here too. I found a very cooperative filefish and lizard fish and Jody also spotted a scorpion fish that I got some good video of also.

Jody and Tim went ahead and headed back to shore and Eric and I stayed behind to try and get some video and/or photos of some jawfish with eggs. However, the current, camera, and fish just were not very cooperative today.

After we got all our stuff loaded back into the car and head back for the hotel, Tim decided his jet lag was finally catching up with him and Eric was getting tired too, so they both laid down to have a nap before we went out to dinner.

We decided to go back to Captain Don’s Habitat to eat at the restaurant there as it is right on the water. We enjoyed watching the tarpon that were feeding on a large group of small fish as we waited for our dinner. Then we had a very nice dinner as we watched the sun set.

Malapascua 2012, Day 9 & 10

April 14-15, 2012

Today was our last day on the island of Malapascua. Eric got up early to go out and film the sunrise and take some photos. I decided to sleep in. I got up about 8 o’clock and wandered over to the Craic House to get some breakfast and say goodbye to JD and Beth, one of the couples we met, who were leaving around 9 o’clock.

After breakfast Eric got started on packing all of our stuff up (which mainly consists of photo gear and dive gear). After getting just about all of our packing done we went back over to the Craic House to get some lunch. They had orange infused chicken on a bed of fettucini with herb focaccia bread on the menu for lunch. It was really good.

It was another warm, sunny day on the island. We had every intention of wandering around the island a bit and taking some photos, but we decided it was just to warm and we were feeling a bit lazy. We arranged to have a late check-out for our room since we were not scheduled to leave until 6 p.m., so we went back to the room and laid down and had a nap.

After our nap we got our bill taken care of and sat at the Craic House a little while and chatted with some of the people we had met during our stay before ordering our last meal on the island. For dinner we had the wild mushroom and bacon risotto, followed by ice cream for dessert.

Shelagh made it back with her dive group a little after 5 p.m. and we said our goodbyes to everyone. We put our shoes on for the first time since getting to the island and boarded our private boat transfer at 6 p.m. as the sun was going down. There were some storms over the island of Cebu and the ride was a bit rough. We got to the dock in Maya and because the water was so rough they could not take the boat up to the dock. They signaled and yelled and then called using their cell phone for them to send out a little boat to pick us up. We sat there for a while and no one seemed to be coming out to get us. We wondered if we would make it back to land. After a few minutes they pulled up anchor and headed down shore a little further with flashlights in hand to try and bring us to shore in a different spot.

Our private driver was waiting for us on shore and when we asked him about what had happened he said there was a little boat to go out and pick us up, but no captain. Fortunately we made it safely to shore. Then began our four hour car ride to the airport.

We made it to the airport and made it through security, etc. and waited in the Asiana Lounge until our flight to Inchon, South Korea boarded. Our flight boarded on time and we were on our way for our four hour flight. I managed to get a little sleep on the plane after they served us dinner. I took some decongestant for the flight and did okay going up but could not get my one ear to clear as we were coming down. Fortunately it cleared within about an hour after landing but was rather annoying until it did.

It was a rather interesting landing at Inchon. As we were on approach to the airport we looked out the window and all we could see were the tops of some very tall buildings with lights flashing, the tops of a bridge, and the tops of some mountains. The fog was thicker than thick. Eric wondered if we were going to be able to land, but it must be a common thing here. The next thing we knew we hit the runway. The fog was extremely low and you could see absolutely nothing through it.

We had reservations at the Transit Hotel in the airport for our 10+ hour layover. It is really nice that they have this hotel within the secure area of the airport so you don’t have to go through the hassle of leaving the airport and then coming back through security. We had about an hour before our reservation at the hotel so we went to the Asiana business class lounge to hang out for a while.

I went to use the restroom in the lounge and got to experience a Korean toilet. They have sanitizer that you dispense to wipe down the seat with first. I sat down and discovered the seats were heated, not to mention having about 20 other controls for things the toilet seat would do for you, none of which I attempted to use. The heated seat part was nice, though.

We then checked into our hotel room, which was actually very spacious and very nice. We laid down and got about four hours sleep and then got up and took our first real hot shower since leaving Phoenix. Boy was it nice.

Then we ventured out into the airport to see if we could find the ice skating rink. Unfortunately, I asked about it at the information desk and they said it was after immigration (on the basement level). That meant we would have to go through immigration and security and then come back and there was no way we were going to do that, so no ice skating for us.

This has got to be one of the fanciest airports in the world. From what I have read it definitely is in the top three along with Hong Kong and Singapore. We walked a good part of the airport and there is every store you will find in the Bellagio shops plus more. Fendi, Gucci, Tiffany, Omega, and on and on... There are also plenty of areas to relax and sleep. They have a relaxation area with large chaise lounges and lots of comfy chairs to sit in. They also have free showers and a spa area where you can get a massage or facial. They also have big leather massage chairs. All the plants in the airport are real. In several areas they have hundreds of live orchids in bloom.

We are just about ready to check out of the Transit Hotel now and head to our gate for our approximately 12 hour flight to San Francisco.

Malapascua 2012, Day 8

April 13, 2012

Today was our last day of diving so we got up early again to do the shark dive at Monad Shoal. I decided not to even try diving today as my head was still plugged up, but I rode out on the boat with them. Our group actually went out about 30 minutes later than usual.

Eric decided to do some video on his camera since I had not gotten any good video of the thresher sharks yet. He figured it might be even better going out later today. He thought there might be fewer boats and fewer people and the lighting would be better. They got really lucky. They had at least three sharks circling around at the cleaning station and they came in really close. Eric got some excellent video. One video actually has two sharks swimming together.

The second dive we went out to Bogtang bato, which was one of the first dive sites that we went to the day after we got here. This time there was no current like there was the first time. Eric got lots of good nudibranch pictures and some good pictures of another extremely shy pigmy seahorse.

The third dive we went out to Chocolate island again. Eric really enjoyed that dive yesterday and wanted to try it again with his fisheye lens. He had fun playing around with strobe placement, etc., and got a few photos.

We had a relaxing evening at the Craic House, even though it was a bit on the hot and steamy side with very little wind. We had fun talking with one of the owners and his fiancee and a bunch of other people we have met during our trip.