Located off the north coast of Venezuela, Bonaire is a Caribbean island which together with Aruba and Curacao forms the island group known as the ABC islands. The name Bonaire is thought to have originated from the Caquetio word 'Bonay'. The early Spanish and Dutch modified its spelling to ‘Bojnaj’ and also ‘Bonaire’, which means ‘Good Air’.

The island was originally inhabited by the Caiqetios, a branch of the Arawak Indians and in 1499 explorer Amerigo Vespucci arrived . Due to the lack of natural resources, he named the island ‘Isla Inutil’ or ‘useless island’ and sent the local inhabitants to the plantations located in Hispaniola. The now uninhabited island was then used as a penal colony, with convicts from other Spanish colonies being shipped to the island. In the early 17^th century, the Dutch West India Company began mining for salt. Even to this day, the export salt is a major contributor to the local economy.

In 2010, the country officially left the Netherlands Antilles (due to its dissolution) and became a special municipality of the Netherlands.

Bonaire is also known for its pristine coral reefs and easy access diving. The island offers near perfect conditions for diving and with 84 sites to choose from, it lives up to it’s reputation as a diver’s paradise. With Bonaire having such a reputation, it was fairly obvious what my onshore activity would be.

Due to the ship tour I had planned on doing being cancelled, I had organised a private dive trip . This worked out quite well as I ended up being the only person and so had a private trip. We did two shore dives at different sites – Angel City and Salt Pier.

Angel City was a nice little coral dive where two lines of reef (separated by a white sand valley) merge together. The walk in was little bit hairy as on either side of the entry there was a healthy collection of fire coral mixed in with the rocks and sea grass. On this particular dive we saw quite a few species of fish – Trumpet fish, Spotted Drum; Porcupine fish; French Angelfish and Parrotfish as well as a HUGE Spiny Lobster.

Salt Pier is located at the pier where salt from the salt pans is loaded into ships for export. As all the pillars of the pier are encrusted with sponges and coral it is a very pretty site that has a lot of fish life around it. We saw many schools of fish congregating in the shadows of the pier, as well as a turtle, barracuda and some squid.

Mum opted for a snorkelling tour, but she reported that the water a little bit choppy but that she still had fun and saw fish and coral .

On the animal front, other than the wild donkey’s that roam the island and inhabit the donkey reserve, the other drawcard animal is also the country’s national bird – Flamingos that mainly live in the northern part of the island. Due to time constraints we didn’t get a chance to get to the north of the island to try to see the Flamingos in their nature reserve. I did however see a pair of them flying past the ship while I was eating breakfast, but I didn’t have my camera with me. It was a bit of a shock to see two of these large pink birds flying past where the ship was docked.

In the early afternoon, Mum and I reunited. After a little bit of souviner shopping and recounting our adventures, we headed back to the ship. In was on the walk back that we encountered a somewhat exciting animal walking along the waterfront – an Iguana. I think it liked having its photo taken as it kept posing for us.

Unfortunately not everything to do with the day was pleasant. While waiting in the post office to get some postcard stamps, one of the older passengers started to get angry at the post office staff for not serving us quick enough – heaven forbid we have to wait in a line. The sad thing was that he had just walked in and then made a fool of himself as after wasting 15 minutes talking to a staff member, he still had to join the end of the line myself and several other people had been patiently waiting in . He was also very grumpy when he was being a pork chop, someone in the line reminded him that he had tried to jump the queue and if he had some manners he wouldn’t be at the end of the line.

Then there was the guy who decided to collect some chairs people we knew had been sitting on but were no longer using so that his friends could use them. One of the people I was with said something and the guy went off his brain. I think there was some history between the two people, but the kind of language used by this random was appalling. Worst of all he couldn’t leave the argument alone and started mouthing off as I was leaving the deck area with a couple of other people.

I can only put these people’s bad behaviour down to the warm weather.

Fun fact:
As they were the drawcard of the island, here are some Flamingo facts – they eat with their head upside down and their beak in the water so that their tongue can suck out the food; there are the brilliant pink colour due to the carotene found in the shellfish and shrimp they eat; they can fly 300 miles to get to a new habitat.