Back in the Caribbean and new experiences, 6.oktober til 23.november

We left Gardermoen a little late, but luckily the flight from Amsterdam to Curacao was 1 (one) hour late, so we had plenty of time for the transfer. The journey went well and we were lucky to have a 3-seater to share 😃.

When we arrived in Curaçao the rental car was ready 👍. The heat and humidity hit us on arrival - it was approx. 28-30 degrees 😅.

Everything was fine with the boat and after the first night in a hotel (we booked in to a hotel for 5 nights), we started with cleaning the interior and doing various service and repairs - this was extremely hot as we had not yet acclimatised, but no complaints 😜.

Monday 10 October is Curaçao's Day, there was music and stalls in the streets. This day we ditched work and strolled around Willemstad instead.

On 10 October 2010, the island became part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, but it is an autonomous self-governing state.

Both Kai and I caught a severe cold, or corona 🤷. This was probably due to the temperature difference between working in 30 degrees C together with high humidity and air conditioning in the hotel, and then living in the boat at no lower than 27-28 degrees C at night. We therefore decided on rest and a hotel for 3 more nights.

We found a cool "boutique hotel", the Wynwood Hotel in Pietermaai. Both the hotel and the surroundings can be highly recommended 👍.

So apart from some small tasks on the boat - i.a. put on our new logo, we just relaxed and wandered around the area looking at all the murals and also a local "Olabil" race.

This did us both good and we are ready for the final finish and departure for Bonaire where we will be diving together with Caron and Martin for a whole month 😃.

The boat was launched on Tuesday 18 October 😃, and after checking out (customs & immigration) on Wednesday we took a last sightseeing trip to Hato Caves. These stalactite caves are Curaçao's largest and most prominent - they are over 300,000 years old.

Departure from Curaçao Marine was Thursday 20 October, and after calling "Fort Nassau" and asking for the opening of the "Queen Emma pontoon bridge" (a floating bridge across the harbor channel) we motored out of Willemstad and headed for Bonaire .

We had to motor for a couple of hours before we got the wind at a better angle and could sail towards the northern tip of Bonaire. It was several hours of fine sailing before we motored again for the last stretch to the Harbor Village marina.

We got a place on the "Mega-yacht" pier and it turned out that this was a very nice place in the marina, as we could walk a few meters to the beach, where we could swim and snorkel, and there was a pier that eventually became "our " place for "sundowners" and barbeque 😏👍.

We chatted with Caron and Martin after arriving but decided on a quiet evening.

The next day we went and said hello before heading into customs and immigration. It went well and back at the boat we went down to the beach and had a swim - delicious 😃.

We had a "sundowner" with Caron and Martin to "catch up" with everything that has happened since we were last together, 5 months ago.

The next day Kai and Martin picked up the car we had rented. Then we went to the dive shop and picked up air bottles so that everything was ready for the next day's diving.

We took it easy and took our first dive on "Something Special", right outside the marina.

On the next dive, the same day, we drove south to the "Salt Pier", a structure with lots of pillars that we dived between - really cool 🤩.

The next days there were more diving, 2 a day, in different places, one nicer and different than the other. 😍

We dived on e.g. "Something Special" located right outside the marina, "Klein Bonaire" a small flat island west of Bonaire, "1000 steps", "Tolo", "Salt Pier", "Angel City", "Bachelor's Beach", "Karpata", and "Hilma Hooker" - a wreck.

"Hilma Hooker" is a cargo ship built in 1951 in the Netherlands. She was originally named "MV Midland", but changed ownership several times in the 60s and 70s before sinking off the Dominican Republic in July 1975. She was raised and sold the same year, before being named "Hilma Hooker" under the Columbian ownership.

Various stories exist, but one is that she had problems with her rudder off Bonaire and was towed into Kralendijk harbor where it was discovered that she was sailing without official papers.

Local authorities decided to search the boat after both the FBI and Interpol suspected that the boat was being used for smuggling. During the search, more than 11 tonnes of marijuana were found. The boat was taken into custody, but a search for the owners was fruitless.

Due to concerns about whether she could stay afloat, it was decided, in collaboration with local divers and the Bonaire tourism authorities, that she should be towed out and moored to buoys where she is now, pending the tracing of the owners. This was a relatively safe place in terms of the local eco system and navigation, should the boat sink.

After only five days she took on water and sank on September 12th 1984.

She is now a popular diving site.

It would be too much to describe them all, but some pictures show a bit of what we saw on our many great dives.

There has been some unsettled weather, rain and thunder, and something called "reversal", which means that the wind turns and several boats that are on buoys have to either go out and drift around or enter the marina.

One of the days without diving we drove through Washington National Park, which turned out to be a very bumpy ride on dirt roads that were almost impassable in some places, but a nice ride 😊. And when we were back at the car there was a rather large iguana in the shade behind the car. It was not particularly affected by the fact that we wanted to drive.

After another "wind-reversal", and heavy rain showers with thunder, it cleared up and we took another drive with Caron and Martin on the "Escapade of London", around the south and east side of Bonaire.

There are large deposits of salt accumulation and the salt "mountains" reflected beautifully in the water.

Slave cabins stand along the road as a memorial from the slave era (built in 1850), when they were used as housing for workers (slaves) who worked in the salt ponds to collect and transport the salt to waiting ships. The cabins were for accommodation and to store personal belongings - tragic to think that they lived here😕

On the way to a hiking trail we were going to go, we drove off-road. There were almost impassable gravel/clay roads and somewhere we almost got stuck, it was only high speed and probably Kai's experience of driving on Norwegian winter roads that "saved" us.

There was a lot of laughter along the way. 😂

After a short lunch break, we laced up our hiking boots and went for a hike on a path with lots of rocks, surrounded by cacti and over still muddy riverbeds.

Kai has been struggling with an inflammation in a tooth and after a visit to the dentist and finishing the antibiotics it didn't exactly get any better when an ear started to hurt.

A visit to the doctor showed an ear infection in the outer ear canal and a prescription for ear drops with antibiotics and 5 days without diving or head under water 😢.

We had another "wind reversal" and lots of rain with lightning/thunder which led to a lot of flooding. The water in the marina was completely brown after water from a nearby lake flowed over the road into the marina and also many of the streets in the town and surrounding area were flooding.

A "wind reversal" gives murky water and poor visibility for diving, so Caron and Martin joined us on another drive.

This time towards a lighthouse on the east side of the island. The road changed character to a gravel road and eventually very little road and more mud tracks. We left the car and started walking, which wasn't the plan, so Kai and Monica went in flip-flops 🤷‍♀️- didn't work very well, so we went back to the car and bounced and jumped and "climbed" back to the main road - A "Papaki -excursion" as some of our "slightly off the beaten path/roads" trips have been called 😃🤷‍♀️. But it was fun 😂.

After several days of "planning", purchasing wine and creating a "score-card", our wine-tasting day was ready. Blindfolded, we could only comment on taste and smell. We had to decide red or white, the grape and what we could taste and smell. And of course liked it, or not. We had lots of laughter and it was amazing how difficult it was 😂.

Accidents can happen on board, and when we were going to stretch an elastic line for drying clothes, the line slipped and first hit Kai in the lip and then Monica in the eye. It hurt a lot and the eye became red and sore, but she could see fairly well.

After a dive the following day, her eye got worse, so she stopped diving for a couple of days and then went to see a doctor. He could see a little external damage, but nothing dangerous, and he said it was okay to dive. 👍

We had a fantastic night dive where we saw "ostracods" - they are small crustaceans that a few days after each full moon have a mating game and they secrete a substance that reacts with the oxygen in the water and emits a fluorescent light.

Incredibly cool, almost a bit "Matrix" 😃🤩

No pictures, too dark.

One of the ARC+ boats, "Zelda" with Sheryl and Heikki, from last season also came to Bonaire, and together with Caron and Martin we had several dives, "sundowners" and bbq together.

Lots of memories were relived, and future plans were shared.

Both "Escapade" and "Zelda" will continue towards the Panama Canal and the Pacific Ocean early next year, so our paths diverge when we now leave Bonaire and head north towards the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

We have become good friends and we will surely meet again sometime somewhere 😃.

Monica og Kai Robert