Bonaire

We have been in Bonaire just over a week now.  It is a nice clean relatively quite place.   We took our bikes off the boat for a cycle down to the South end of the island, and then a circle route back up the East coast.  There is active salt making going on here, with huge piles of salt waiting to be loaded on ships.  At the far end of the island we saw many flamingos on the ponds here.  The island is very dry with lots of cactus around. All their drinking water comes from a desalination plant.

       At the extreme South end of island we stopped for a rest and sat on the steps of the lighthouse that had guided us around the island in the dark while we sailed in.  Further up the East coast we stopped at Sourobon for cool well deserved refreshments. Lots of wind surfing and boarding going on here.  We were very tired when we finally got back because of the heat and being a bit out of shape sitting on boat.  We had done about 21 miles total which is more than we thought it would be.

     I was disappointed a bit in the Bonairian's because in the Netherlands which own this island, there is a huge amount of cycling and cycle routes.  But here you rarely see a bike even though they have a perfect environment for cycling, no hills, good weather, short distances to everything, and reasonable roads. Many of the people here drive large SUV's  and seldom walk anywhere. Come on Bonairian's get of your arse's.  

   When we got back from our cycle we found our dinghy flooded with water and the engine flooded.  It looked like the dinghy might have got under the dock and filled when a big power boat went by, though there was also a lot of kids playing on the dock.  This is the dock a half kilometre North of the dock with the bar on it, and it was the weekend.  A local lady helped us get the dingy ashore and bailed out and then another yachty gave us a tow out to our boat.  I cleaned out engine, removed spark plug and carburetor and dismantled it. I could see water spurt out of spark plug hole when I turned engine over.  But when all back together the engine was fine, no damage done.  

      Another day we did a 3 hour round trip walk up to the top of a hill (Seru Largu on map) for a great view of the island.  We started out from Village Harbor marina where we left our dinghy.  But when we got back, we could not get to our dinghy which was tied just up from the fuel pumps.  They had locked the place up for their two hour lunch which had just started.  I looked up at the coils of razor wire along the top of the fence, that would not go.  So I walked down abit and saw an old gate about 6 feet high and climbed over it  and then over a smaller gate and was at the dinghy which I took around and picked up Dorothy.  We probably should have tied dinghy on cafe side of marina.

    We have also done quite a bit of snorkeling around the island, using their little tourist map as a guide.  There is lots of fish, but we figure the guides over rate the snorkeling a bit.  It is nice being in cool clear water, just to cool off and also get clean as there is no showers here, unless your in the marina.

       In another week or so we will head on to the next island of Curacao.