Cruise Day 11-Bonaire, November 11th

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Cruise Day 11-Bonaire, Tuesday November 11^th

Today dawned bright and sunny! We started out our morning in the MDR for breakfast then headed off the ship about 9:20. I wasn’t sure which beach we wanted to go to so I went to an information booth to ask their opinion. They recommended Sorobon Beach so I said let’s do it! It was on the opposite side of the island from where we were docked in Kralendijk but it was only about a 12 minute drive via taxi.

View of the port from the ship

Once we got out of town, we were driving down a desolate road. Our driver gave us a bit of information as we drove. He said the area we were driving through was a protected space because of the salt fields. A lot of salt is harvested from this island to be used in chemicals and additives though not used for consumption. He said 300 years ago, slaves used to have to harvest the salt. (we could even see some of the previous slave huts!) It’s also a very windy island so there are HUGE windmills (the kind that a wind farm would use, the technical name escapes me.)

We arrived at Sorobon around 9:45 and were just in awe of the water!! Bonaire is one of the top 3 islands in the world for underwater diving and I can see why! The water was unlike any we have seen in the Caribbean! Unfortunately, we didn’t do any snorkeling or diving while here as it would’ve been difficult with Ava & Olivia. Maybe someday if we return we will do that.

At this specific beach, you could walk almost a mile off shore and the water was no higher than your waist if that! There were some roped off areas of coral that you had to avoid that were right off shore but once past that, there was tons of open space to walk or float. Way out in the distance was a reef that broke the waves so the water was very calm. Since it was so windy out, there were many windsurfers out on the water.

The dark spot is a protected coral reef, but do you see how far out people are?? Yep, barely water up to their waist! And look how beautiful & clear the water is!

We bring some small float rings with us to the beach when we cruise, so I took one and went out and floated around for a while. It was so relaxing! We ran into a gal who hung out with us in Barbados so we spent some time catching up.

O & A floating

We experienced 2 small rain showers while there that lasted about 10 minutes each, then the sun came right back out. While it was raining, it felt warmer to stay in the water then get rained on!

One of our floats is a kiddy one that the girls can sit in. Kevin took Olivia offshore for a bit in it and when he came back, she had fallen asleep in it! It made for an adorable picture! Nothing better than napping while floating on the water.

No worries, everyone was within arms reach of her during this photo, she slept for quite awhile like this!

The view from our beach chairs.

Panoramic photo of part of the beach.

Around 3 we headed back to the ship to shower and get ready for dinner. We met up with 3 other couples, friends of ours from previous cruises, after dinner for a while. This afternoon after boarding the ship, we heard the Alpha call go over the intercom which is never a good thing. It’s the equivalent to 911. Our friends said they saw a body bag being carried off. We felt bad for the poor lady they saw walking off with ship crew behind them. In talking with crew, this happens most cruises at least once. You figure the amount of people on a ship and a long cruise like this where the average age was 50-70+, it's bound to happen. (if we hadn't been in port when this happened, there is actually a morgue on the ship!)

My sweet Ava cheesing it up, playing with playdough while waiting for her meal at dinner.

My salmon appetizer tonight (I forget what it was called but it was good!) In the background you can see our handmade, personally requested, braided loaf of challah we got each night.

Since there were no activities going on this evening, it was a pretty quiet night. Because of our short stay in Aruba tomorrow (7am-1pm), we wanted to get to bed at a decent time so we can make the most of our time there since it’s our last island to visit this trip.

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All photos can be clicked on to enlarge. The photos I am sharing are a combination of ones I took as well as my kids and husband on a variety of cameras and iPhones, hence the varying quality.