ScubaBiz.Help Special Dive Week – Bonaire!

ScubaBiz.Help has just completed our first Special Dive Week. The location of the Caribbean island Bonaire was an excellent place for us to start! We are pleased to share our results.

 

Over the last months, we made announcements in our monthly ScubaBiz.Help magazine and all our Social Media platforms and divers heard the calling and came to enjoy and learn. Are you already a member of our ScubaBiz.Help Facebook group or follow our Instagram page? If not, do so right away and keep informed.

 

The reefs surrounding Bonaire present a wide scale of colours, from deep blue to turquoise, and the white beaches make the eyes watery by the strong reflection of the sunlight.

 

Just a short distance away (One mile) is the island of “Klein Bonaire.” A large marine reserve with very easy boat access to many dive sites. Some more remote dive sites are here and within reach, boasting incredible hard and soft corals that make you feel like you are dreaming while diving. Klein Bonaire is a really unique place to dive. It has to be put on any diver’s bucket list if you like to see an abundance of colourful corals mixed with fish and no human interaction as there is NO building on the island, no construction allowed and no fishing either!

 

“Divers Paradise” is written on the official license plates of the cars on the island!

Is it paradise? Our special dive week was nine days, so time enough to check things out and dive around.

 

Participants for the ScubaBiz.Help Special Dive Week came from around the globe; Europe, the United States, and more were represented during the many days of diving! Our days were filled with scuba diving, those dives executed in many different forms, both shore diving and boat diving!

Not simply diving but also bucket list diving was on the agenda: making it possible what people would like to encounter below the surface, given the fact that nature would be able to provide it!

 

A summary of bucket list items were:

• seahorse
• turtle
• frogfish
• wreck dive
• wreck dive penetration
• night dive
• deep dive (recreational 40mtr-120ft)
• special dive site: historical
• special dive site: marine biology

 

As ScubaBiz.Help, these bucket list items were very important to us, as we understand from our own experience how long it can take to finally mark an item on your bucket list (it took me 30 years of diving to spot my first mola mola). So no efforts were spared to get down to business and get the items taken off that long list! Up to the last and ultimate dive during the nine days, we completed 100% of the list and succeeded in making many divers extremely happy!

 

Worth mentioning is one specific and unique dive day spent with the Rum Runner Dive Shop team from North Carolina (USA). As Bonaire was under the influence of a tropical wave turning into a tropical storm, during their last dive day, all dive operations on the island were cancelled. All dive operators safeguarded their boats in the marinas so that it would be a day at the pool drinking cocktails. Not when it comes to ScubaBiz.Help!

 

We surprised the Rum Runner dive team by taking them out to one of the well-hidden dive sites on the island, comfortably diving from shore and showing them one of the unique dive sites Bonaire offers.

 

Bucket list items were scratched off the list, and ten happy faces were back at the surface after a beautiful dive filled with special corals and pelagic fish.

And now there was time for pool cocktails and a group hamburger dinner with lots of Mojitos at Breeze&Bites, a happy place to be!

 

But the Rum Runner’s happy times were not over yet. The next day was also made available for some extra diving as their flight times were checked, giving them some extra time for the ScubaBiz.Help team to come up with some more diving.

 

A wreck penetration dive was planned and done on the famous Hilma Hooker wreck, and even a seahorse was included on this dive to make the story complete and make happy feelings all over the place.

 

Bonaire below the earthly surface was next on the agenda:

Bonaire has a soft sub-terrain, resulting in many caves. My first visit to Bonaire dates back to 1992, and since that time, coming back to Bonaire regularly, I have had the chance to meet up many times with cave specialists and geologists. During the years, I got quite familiar with the cave systems and spent a lot of time exploring the caves on Bonaire. Time to share this adventure with the Rum Runner team! With the safety of using a rope, we descended 15mtr (50ft) into the cave system to find a large freshwater lake, fully decorated ceilings, and impressive structures. Yes, a little secret gem is hidden in Bonaire’s cactus jungle, a great and unique place to enjoy the wonders of caves.

 

Challenging? It could be for those not well-prepared, but this outfit prepared well and made the best of it! We surfaced again after spending some hours below the earthly surface, spending them in a completely different environment.

 

The Rum Runner returned to the surface with smiling faces and fantastic stories to tell.

We want to thank the Rum Runner Dive Shop team from North Carolina for their trust in ScubaBiz.Help but most of all for the positive attitude, joyful energy and the great time we had during these days!

 

It was the last surprise act of the ScubaBiz.Help team during the Special Bonaire Dive Week, and we must conclude that it was indeed a VERY Special Dive Week.

 

Will there be more ScubaBiz.Help Special Dive Weeks? Yes, there will be!