The Lowdown on Bonaire and Curacao
4/10/2006 at 11:00 AM
Tags: Diving, Beaches, Bonaire, Radio (all tags)
Travel Writer Alex Robertson Textor was in Bonaire and Curacao at the end of March. He'll be filing five dispatches for Jaunted this week about the relatively unknown (unless you're Andruw Jones) Caribbean islands. The first, Eight Reasons for Non-Divers to Visit Bonaire, starts below and continues here. Take it away, Alex:
Divers love Bonaire, and Bonaire loves divers. The island is one of the best places in the Caribbean to dive; Bonaire license plates are emblazoned with the slogan "Diver's Paradise". Dive-set visitors may look at you cross-eyed when you tell them that you're on Bonaire to do anything else. Here are eight things--other than diving--to mention to them the next time you're confronted with their small minds cradling ultra-conventional travel philosophies.
Story continues here...
1.
Beaches. Nobody goes to Bonaire for the beaches--that's the best reason to visit them. You can spend huge blocks of time camped out on the craggy, rocky outcrops that pass as beaches on Bonaire without encountering another soul. The rental trucks of visiting divers are parked here and there, usually next to bright yellow rocks designating dive sites, but the beaches themselves are empty.
2.
Cheap Sleeps. Bonaire is full of good budget hotel options like
Ocean View Villas, where a spacious room in an inn with a courtyard garden costs just $80 per night in high season. Try to find a deal like that on Grand Cayman.
3.
Oil Slick Leap. This diving and snorkeling site north of Kralendijk has a handy ladder leading right into the water. The snorkeling just offshore is fantastic. Oil Slick Leap's only drawback is the steady stream of divers parking their pick-ups in the adjacent parking lot to suit up.
4.
Mega Hit FM. The default Dutch-language radio station inundates Bonaire's airwaves with a play list catholicity that sums up the cultural influences on the island: Latin pop, hip-hop, American pop schlock, Dutch hits (fine, those don't exist, but if they did, Mega Hit would spin them) and European pop classics. English-language tourist information bulletins are broadcast in between blasts of Shakira and Stars on 45.
5.
Donkeys and Flamingos. Any place with signs warning motorists of crossing donkeys is a place where peace and quiet is valued. Bonaire is also a huge flamingo nesting sanctuary. Flamingos are visible across the salt pans at the south of the island, on Lac Bay and surrounding mangroves, and in Washington Slagbaai National Park.
6.
Papiamento. Bonaire's first language is Papiamento, a creole tongue of Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch, West African, native, and other languages. Papiamento's mélange is a fitting complement to the island's heady cultural and ethnic mix.
7.
Wind. Very pleasant cooling tropical breezes soothe Bonaire's dry heat, making air conditioning unnecessary.
8.
History. Caribbean narratives of displacement and struggle are graphically visible on Bonaire. On the southwest corner of the island sits a cluster of tiny red huts once used to accommodate the island's slave population. The colonial architecture, both in capital Kralendijk and throughout the island, provides another draw for history-curious travelers.
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