Caribbean Cruise 2014:
Day 6 - Bonaire
Day 6 - Bonaire
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Wednesday, March 5, 2014: It's "Frozen" day! Each day, the ship shows a new release in the theater, and then it is repeated on the in-cabin movie channels the next day. |
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We caught the 6:00 AM showing just in time to see Elsa singing "Let It Go." |
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We had breakfast in the Lido, featuring banana pancakes. Debbie had muesli, of course. Attempts to make it at home have failed. |
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We pulled into quiet Bonaire. |
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Our cabin faced away from the port, but right toward Klein Bonaire. |
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We'd be there very soon, but in the meantime, we zoomed in to see it a little better. We never did get to see what appears to be a lagoon even though we snorkeled very close to it. |
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While waiting for our shore excursion, we got a photo of Orchy on Bonaire. |
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The water was crystal clear below the dock. This was a very good sign. |
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Our tour boat, the Seacow, pulled up to the dock, and off we went. |
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We passed the AIDAluna, a German-language-based cruise ship. |
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We headed straight for Klein Bonaire, ... |
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... and dropped anchor near the reef. Klein Bonaire is part of Bonaire National Marine Park. |
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The reef was absolutely stunning with perfectly clear water, colorful coral, and fish everywhere you looked. |
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Here's an adult stoplight parrotfish, ... |
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... and here's a stoplight parrotfish (initial phase) in the back with an unidentified fish up front. |
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Our snorkel tour buddy, Edward, spotted this huge peacock flounder who was at least a foot long. |
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Here are a pair of barjacks. |
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This is a school of smallmouth grunts. |
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Here's a French angelfish. |
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This guy is a blue tang. |
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Here are a pair of whitespotted filefish. |
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Here's a school of yellow goatfish. |
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Here's a pair of foureye butterflyfish. |
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This is a queen parrotfish in the initial phase (translation: before it gets all pretty and colorful). |
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Check out this beautiful trumpetfish. |
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Our guide occasionally dove down to look for interesting things to point out to us. |
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Here's a little cowfish. |
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This pillar coral was a little more purple than shown in this photo. |
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Here are a different pair of whitespotted filefish. |
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These guys aren't at all afraid of people. |
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After a nice long snorkel, we got back in the boat and went toward the lagoon side of Klein Bonaire. The water was really choppy here and there was much less reef, but our goal here was to look for turtles. |
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We never saw any turtles but we did see quite a few jellyfish, including this odd little one here. |
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We spotted a sand diver laying, unmoving, on the sand. |
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We also saw another cowfish. |
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But mostly, we just swam and tried to clear salt water out of our snorkels as we were tossed by the large waves. It may have been worth it if we had seen some turtles, but instead, it was just a lot of work for nothing. On the bright side, though, it was great exercise and we definitely needed some of that. |
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So, we got back on the boat, ... |
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... and waved goodbye to beautiful Klein Bonaire. |
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After snorkeling comes the rum punch. This delicious concoction featured all kinds of delicious fruit juice -- apricot maybe? Mango? |
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We were dropped off at the AIDAluna's pier instead of ours, so we had a five minute walk back to our ship. We passed the AIDAluna's most excellent waterfront bar, formed by opening a couple of doors at dock level. We wanted to try out our German and have beer there. |
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But no, we had to walk some more and get ourselves and our snorkeling gear into a shower. |
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Fresh and clean, we headed into Kralendijk to get some local food for lunch. |
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We passed several of these flamingo pavers along the sidewalks. |
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The town itself is really pretty quiet, even with two cruise ships in port. Here's a look up the main street one way, ... |
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... and the other. |
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We decided to drop our tourist dollars at Grill House Emmanuel just up the steps here, ... |
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... because of the friendly placard out front describing their food. |
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Debbie ordered the Emmanuel Mix Grill, which was a decadent meat display featuring ribs, chicken, chorizo, and a pork chop, plus delicious fries and cold Diet Coke. |
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Tom ordered seafood paella and ate every bit of it, plus helped Debbie with her meal as well. |
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After our meals, we walked a block to the waterfront, where this fantastic play area was keeping a couple of kids very entertained. |
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These birds were enjoying the spoils of low tide. |
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Here's another hot spot, featuring a couple of stores and a few more restaurants and bars. |
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We took our time walking back to the ship because there was so much to see in the water. |
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Tom's sharp eyes spotted the crabs on the rocks. They were constantly in motion as they either defended their rock territory or charged another crab's rock. |
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Unfortunately, this is the only picture we got of this phenomenon because our camera was still zoomed in from the crab photo and in the bright sun, Debbie didn't notice. Here's what's happening: a group of 8 or 9 fish waited until a big wave would come and drag them up the shallow area where they'd lay on their side and quickly nibble the rocks and then get swept away again. |
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These anemones probably weren't deliberately collecting rocks, but it sure looked that way. |
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Here are some very wee fish in one of the tide pools. |
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Bonaire's license plates are brightly colored and bear the text "Diver's Paradise." |
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At 1:50, we suddenly realized that we were going to miss the 2:00 showing of "Frozen" if we didn't get moving, so we bolted back to the ship and made it to our cabin just in time. |
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After the movie, Tom dozed off while Debbie processed photos. |
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Sail out was at 5:00, so we went out on deck to watch for a while. |
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We said goodbye to our first snorkeling spot, ... |
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... and to our second snorkeling spot. |
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After dinner, we got this spooky shot of the back of the ship as night fell. |
Copyright © Deborah Schilling/Thomas Bundy