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Dive Review of Captain Don's Habitat in
Bonaire

Captain Don's Habitat: "lovely and mostly quiet trip to Bonaire", Sep, 2019,

by Patricia A. Sinclair, La, US (Top Contributor Top Contributor 31 reports with 10 Helpful votes). Report 11122 has 1 Helpful vote.

No photos available at this time

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Accommodations 4 stars Food 4 stars
Service and Attitude 4 stars Environmental Sensitivity 3 stars
Dive Operation 4 stars Shore Diving 4 stars
Snorkeling N/A
Value for $$ 4 stars
Beginners 4 stars
Advanced 3 stars
Comments Returned again to Bonaire and spent a calm and relaxing week diving and doing nothing important.

The Friday before I left for Bonaire, I had a massive sinus headache, which got worse on the flight on Saturday. By Sunday I was feeling just awful and so took Sunday and Monday off and just got the sinus issues under control.

On Tuesday my original intention was to dive via the boat, but something in the back of my head kept saying no...do a shore dive by yourself, it is safer. So, I erased by name from the board for the 11AM boat and instead did a 70 minus shore dive by myself on the house reef. Relaxing and spent the time trying to remember how to shoot underwater again. Upon my return to the dock, I noticed that the dive boat was not yet back (which it should have been.) I rinsed by equipment in the clean water and did the camera rinse as well. Took my time heading to my room, and still no dive boat. At around 1:30PM the dive boat came in, there were helicopters over Klein Bonaire and boats heading out there very fast. Turns out that 11AM boat I did not go out on had lost a diver. There were 20 divers on the boat (1 DM) and his wife did not notice anything as to when he disappeared. To this day, he has not been found and they did searches until Saturday afternoon.

On Wednesday I took the boat for two dives, there were only 8 divers on the boat. The group that had lost the diver were understandably sitting out dives for the day. I managed to find some nice small critters to play with (in other words shoot). The vacation was supposed to be practice with my camera set up and try to improve my skills.

The package I bought for this stay included Breakfast and dinner daily, but no lunch (which I don't eat anyway.) Diving was 2 boat dives a day plus all the shore diving you wanted to do. Also I got tNitrox added to my package. Even so, it was still a good price for what I got.

As I generally did the 11AM and 1pm dives when I used the boat, and if I did a shore dive, it was usually in lieu of one of those two dives. The house reef is not far off the dock, and in very shallow (less than 40 feet) water and full of small life. So many bennies and juvenile fish to see (of shoot.) Sometimes I watch the animals to just see what they are doing, and how they live their lives. This time I did not find my octopus friends, but I did find lots and lots of just hatched fish - so small you could not but tell them from moving sand. That bodes well for the inhabitants of the reef...since they provide food as well as grow up and settle there (if they make it to settling age, that is.)
Several huge green turtles were found on the boat dives. AS I was set up for macro, I wasn't able to get anything of worth on them. But it was fun to watch them slowly swim off away from the divers.
Food at the resort is very good. When you are by yourself, it is really good to have one place to eat, where they end up knowing that after your dinner you like to have a latte or cappuccino and they bring it to you without the asking. On that meal plan, it covered dinner as well as dessert, may even have covered an appetizer, but that is WAY too much food for me at one meal.

Saturday came too soon, as it always does, and I had to pack up and head to the airport for my return home.
Websites Captain Don's Habitat   

Reporter and Travel

Dive Experience 501-1000 dives
Where else diving Jamaica, Bimini-Bahamas, Grand Bahamas Island, Grand Cayman, Little Cayman, Cayman Brac, Roatan, St Eustatius, Florida, Florida Keys, Dumaguette-Philippines, Cebu-Philippines, Anilao-Philippines, Bonaire, Curacao
Closest Airport Bonaire Getting There Delta or American Airlines

Dive Conditions

Weather sunny, windy Seas calm, surge
Water Temp 82-83°F / 28-28°C Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility 50-75 Ft/ 15-23 M

Dive Policy

Dive own profile yes
Enforced diving restrictions None - I was even allowed to dive solo
Liveaboard? no Nitrox Available? yes

What I Saw

Sharks None Mantas None
Dolphins None Whale Sharks None
Turtles > 2 Whales None
Corals 3 stars Tropical Fish 3 stars
Small Critters 3 stars Large Fish 2 stars
Large Pelagics 2 stars

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Subject Matter 4 stars Boat Facilities 1 stars
Overall rating for UWP's 3 stars Shore Facilities 1 stars
UW Photo Comments Boats are not really set up for photographers, unless you like you camera in a bucket with other cameras sloshing around as the boat moves across the water. While there are camera rinse buckets on shore, they are rather small and really not adequate for the larger camera setups that some people use. It was fine for my mirrorless set up, but for the honking big Nikons and Cannons they were too small.
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Note: The information here was reported by the author above, but has NOT been reviewed nor edited by Undercurrent prior to posting on our website. Please report any major problems by writing to us and referencing the report number above.

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