Less than three weeks ago I was playing around with the computer checking airfares and WHAM! First class on United $857.81 and coach $537.81. The "new' place we like to stay at sand dollar ocean front condo was available. I had no customers that week and my pet sitter was available..... soooooooo....... off to Bonaire AGAIN!
Seriously, the only way to travel in a somewhat dignified manner is first class. It's worth the money. Your luggage are free, the food (although marginal) is free, you are the first one on and first one off. The seats are never comfortable but at least you are not cramped next to a fat guy that farts non-stop or a mother holding a squirming crying baby that kicks you the entire trip. It's a bit more civilized and breathable.
We dive with "dive friends". They are funny, nice and helpful when you need them. (They fixed Soracha's leaking guage. It needed a "o" ring for the swivel) They "save" mini tanks for me for my shore dives.
We pretty much dive the same "easy access" sites over and over again. Yet every time you dive them you find something new.. Front porch, bari reef (right in front of the condo), windsock, salt pier, dive inn and now a 'new" favorite site: airport beach.
We saw octopus, lots of big tarpon, snooks, an octopus, big lionfish, lots of morays, sharp nose eels, lots of turtles, eagle rays, barracudas and lots of pretty fish.
I made my one thousand dive here.
What made this dive trip a little different is we experienced a "fishnado".
The dive masters at Dive friends told us that we might see a bait ball at the airport beach but this was entirely different.
We did our usual dive on the reef at about 35 feet and then all of a suddenly our front path became really dark.
I mean really dark and it got closer.
It was a massive wall of fish in a funnel formation that actually pulled you into it. It was amazing and cool but then you think, "hmmmm...they don't call these little mackerel fish bait fish for nothing". You could see spots of clearing when you were in the eye of the fishnado. I spotted a giant barracuda, turtles, eagle rays and a monster tuna the size of a volkswagen bug.
We witnessed this fishnado on six of our dives at this site. When we talked to other divers nobody had seen it!
We do have some pretty good go-pro film footage we just have to take the time to edit it.
We did do some "treasure hunting" and found a new snorkel, a few coins and a single diamond earring.
We did do a night dive assuming we would see "Charlie' the tarpon. We shut off the lights and let our eyes adjust to just the moonlight. We saw a lot of flickering and jittery flash lights in clusters. I think Charlie was busy with those "new" tourists because he never came around to greet us at night (only during the day)
All in all it was a very nice trip. We banged out 3 dives a day totalling 18 dives.
But it is also good to be back home to enjoy the remainder of the summer!
Wow! How lucky is that? You saw a "once in a lifetime" event for six different dives.
ReplyDeletewe were really lucky!
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