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As planned we left Bonaire at 6am this morning. We set off on a port tack with main and jib to assess wind speed and direction away from the island. We soon concluded it was coming from the ESE and around 12 knots, less than the 15-20 knots forecast. So out came the Code Zero and we had it up and the main/jib down just west of Klein Bonaire.

Since then we’ve made reasonably good progress albeit with the winds slightly lower than we’d hoped. We’re currently 12nm north of Curacao. It’s quite misty so we’re not getting a great deal out of the solar panels but the regen is covering everything and some.

We’ve decided on a 3 hour shift system :

8-11: Helen
11-2: Steve
2-5: Helen
5-8: Steve

and then repeated. We’ll see how this goes.

Shortly after our last change Helen decided to go down below to get some sleep. I called her back straight away as we had a fish on the port line. Unfortunately it escaped before we hauled it in. It was not the same as any fish we’d caught before. Strong hints of yellow and blue. Perhaps it was a mahi mahi or a yellow fin tuna. I was already imagining this evenings dinner before it got away. Next time.

The wind has moved a little more to the south pushing our course a little more northerly unless we want to jibe the Code Zero (which we don’t). This is along the lines of our plans anyway to get into the stronger winds between 12N and 13N. It remains to be seen what we’ll do overnight.

In the evening we had our last dive here in Bonaire. Accompanied again by the Jacksters we dived off the back of our boats after dark. Night diving is quite different in that the animal life can be quite different and the overall feeling of diving at night is quite surreal. We immediately saw a swimming spotted eel as we descended but that turned out to be the highlight of the dive. It seems most of the fish had packed it in and gone elsewhere. Nevertheless, it was worth it. When we switch our lights off the photo plankton were quite dense giving a magical effect to all our movements. My torch died almost straight away but fortunately we had one backup and no others failed.

Weather forecasts continue to look ok for our planned Friday morning dawn departure for Cartagena. Today we’ll be focused on boat prep, provisioning and tying up loose ends.

(The following pics of Helen & I were taken by Jacquie)

We all decided the quality of the reef down south was not as good as around Klein Bonaire so we agreed to head off to the north side of Klein Bonaire to the dive site Helen and I first went to. To get there we stuck out the head sail only and plodded along at 2½ knots deliberately killing time to allow the nitrogen to leave us.

Even though we’d dived “Mi Dushi” before, a different depth profile makes the dive quite different. I wanted to test the depth of the bottom as we’d limited ourselves to 70ft previously. 10ft from the bottom I decided enough was enough as we’d reached 125ft and I didn’t want to use up all our air. So we headed back to the 50-70ft range in search of the (totally) elusive sea-horses. We did sea a young turtle feeding on the reef and a number of eels among the countless other fish.

Back at the moorings we dropped of Dave to collect his dinghy and moored back on the spot that Inspiration Lady had left. We’ve given up on the local open internet connections. Our system seems too sensitive and is overwhelmed with all the coastal wireless networks. Further out we get good signals but up close its very temperamental. We’ve resorted to a pay by use service which is strong enough to counter the numerous other sites we see.

Our parts (wind gen and genset parts for Jackster) didn’t arrive yesterday although I know from the Fedex site they arrive in Puerto Rico on Monday. There is a flight in today so hopefully we’ll see them this afternoon. If we can, I want to devote a day before we leave to getting it going. We’re now looking at Friday for our departure, weather permitting of course.

This evening we’re planning a night dive. As our boats are adjacent we can all hit the water from our own boats and join up in the water. Not sure about the rest of the day.

With this in mind I have set up appropriate waypoints for our passage to and entry into the Bay of Cartagena. We don’t have detailed charts on our main chart plotter for this area but as I have them elsewhere now I was able to transfer to coordinates from one system to the other. We are ready in that respect. The only remaining detail is the weather. We’ll be keeping a close eye on forecasts over the next few days to ensure we don’t run into any avoidable nasties.

Yesterday morning we moved the boat hoping to get a better internet connection. For a few minutes we did and in that time I managed to download all my backlogged email. I learned that our wind gen is on the way and due to arrive Tuesday.

I took in our dive tanks to be refilled. While there I inquired about second hand BCDs. There is one available and we may pick it up for when John is with us and for spares. I also discussed some of our recent dives and our inability to find any seahorses. I was told that there was one to be found right where we were anchored, supposedly amongst a pile of old rope on the shallow sands between us and the shore.

Back on the boat I decided to see if I could find this seahorse. True to form it eluded me but I did spot a turtle and was followed everywhere by a pack of tame sergeant majors and angel fish.

Just before noon, Helen and I went ashore to meet Oud from Alofa. She had a couple of things of ours to return plus a bottle of wine to say thanks again for the earlier assistance we gave. We met at the Cappuccino Bar at the end of a pier in town. We stayed together for a couple of drinks before separating.

Helen and I walked around town taking pictures (for posterity) before stopping off for lunch at one of the restaurants. It was more of a Dutch fast food joint and I was dismayed when they delivered my fries with mayonnaise all over them. I should have remembered the Dutch do this.

We popped into the supermarket for some fresh veg and bread bumping into the Jacksters for the second time that day. Back on Dignity we both felt very tired so it was down to a couple of hours reading and resting. Allayne from Audrey Paige swung by in her dinghy letting us know they were off to Curacao soon and hoped to meet us there. Chances are our next meet up will be Cartagena. There plans are to take the day hop route but they should arrive before we leave. They also plan to be in the San Blas for Xmas so we’ll probably meet up then too.

Today we’re off diving again. Jacksters are again going to join us. We’ll move Dignity south where we hope to dive on the Hilmer Hooker, a nearby wreck.

From looking at our guide we set our sights on the location called “Forest”. Unfortunately, it was occupied by a dive boat when we arrived so we took the next one, “Southwest Corner”. It was on the farthest tip of Klein Bonaire and the waters were quite rolly. We quickly prepped and put on our gear and got into the water where, once below, the swell is no more. The sea life was abundant here with a huge variety of towering coral formations. At times the fish were swimming in lanes at different heights and different angles in and amongst the coral formations. I was reminded of that scene from the old B&W movie, Metropolis, where the lanes of flying vehicles snake between the skyscrapers. The area seemed to be a nursery for juvenile barracuda as we saw quite a few including three together at one point. Our deepest point on this dive was 109ft and overall it lasted 70 minutes.

We then moved the boat clockwise around Klein Bonaire to find a free mooring out of the swell for lunch.

In the afternoon we moved the boat back around to “Forest” which was now free. This was tight against the coast and again quite swelly. This dive proved to be perhaps the best so far in Bonaire. While the overall profile was quite similar with the 25ft sandy/coral bottom with a drop off to 100+ft it varied in that the reef drop off undulated with many buttresses. We therefore snaked our way along the reef and as we turned the corner on each buttress it felt like we were going somewhere new. Again the variety and quantity of sea life was amazing. I always like finding scrawled filefish which tend to be quite solitary. We found six large ones all together. We also saw (actually on both dives) immense midnight blue parrot fish as well as a graceful and large eagle ray. This sight had a surface current which was not too evident deeper down. Half the dive was spent moving up current below it. The second half was spent almost drifting back to the boat looking at the shallower coral gardens peering for the elusive sea horses.

By the time we got back it was 4:30pm. We took the mooring that Inspiration Lady had departed (to Curacao) hoping to get a better internet connection. This turned out not to be so sometime today we’ll shift the boat yet again.

We finished of the evening watching “Kite Runner” which I thought was a very good adaptation of the acclaimed book.

No diving planned for today but I will get the tanks filled.

Footnote: I sent this blog out the first time via SSB. Normally it doesn’t work this early in the morning but I tried some more distant stations. I made it via a receiver in Belgium, doubling my best distance yet, over 4,000nm away. We have also moved the boat and have good internet again.

Helen and I then packed our gear into the dinghy and went to a spot just north of Harbour Village Marina called “Front Porch”. It wasn’t clear where the spot was from the sea as my guess is is that the dive marker was on land. We asked someone in the water who gave us guidance to the spot – at least where he thought it was. One of the attractions to this spot was a wreck of a fishing boat sitting on the bottom at 80ft.

We donned our gear, always a little more awkward in the dinghy, and back flipped into the water. After making sure we were both ok we descended to find the wreck. We hit bottom at 102ft and saw no wreck. To conserve air we ascended to about 70ft and headed south, this being my guess as to the direction of the wreck. After about 5 minutes the wreck appeared out of the shadows. It was on it’s side in about 90ft with the open section away from us. We swum over it then peered under.

The dive then progressed as with the previous ones, running parallels along the sloping reef ascending 10-20ft each time. We spotted a sinister looking and very large barracuda lurking in the depths and Helen caught sight of a green moray hiding in the reef. Nearer the top of the reef we came upon what we both initially thought was murky water. It turned out to be a few of the corals spawing. Out of their tubular vents poured a fine mist like underwater volcanoes. That was a great surprise as we thought all the spawning had occurred during September and October.

Back on Dignity we rested for an hour before heading off for a walk. We wanted some leg exercise as we’d had none for a while. We walked along the seafront for a while before heading into the commercial district. We wanted to check out the supermarkets over that way before making any broader effort to buy any supplies. As suspected the prices reflected the geographic/political isolation of the island so we only bought opportunistically – ie, things we don’t normally see. In this case it was a couple of small packets of nan bread. We bumped into the Jacksters, Inspiration Ladies and their friends on Going South who were provisioning up having hired a vehicle they could share.

We walked further out of town before looping back and coming back in from a different direction. We picked up some fresh milk on the way. We again bumped into the Jacksters, et al, at the dinghy dock as they were loading up their supplies.

That was about it. Back on the boat we had our evening meal and I wrestled with the internet for a while. Something’s changed recently and it’s hard to get a decent connection. Hopefully I can get this blog out.