As our trip has come to an end I'm making this post to reflect on all of the activities we did throughout the week. It will be fairly lengthly so bare with me I promise to include some amazing photos. I have never been on a study abroad trip before this one, but it is hard to imagine that any other study abroad trip the same length could beat this one.
To start here is a picture of my dive partner, Hannah Lee, and I.
In this post I will include our activities that we did the first 3 or 4 days on our trip. For the most part the first half of the trip was filled with days where it seemed we had more in common with the fish than the people on land! For starters, we stayed at a dive resort in the capital of Kralendijk called "Buddy Dive Resort". Immediately upon arrival we were greeted by friendly dive instructors for orientation that were very enthusiastic about their jobs. After our brief orientation, we started gearing up for the next day, getting fitted for our BCs, weights, and regulators.
Later that night we had dinner at the resort restaurant "Blennies", a blenny is a small fish that come in a variety of colors and are around half an inch to and inch long. To the left is a picture of a secretary blenny that we captured on the trip. This blenny along with others, live in the crevices of dead and live coral heads. A member of our group, Kathryn Maley, really loved seeing this particular fish.
The first day (5/12) of our trip we stayed at Buddy's reef getting used to the water and getting back into the groove of diving. Our first dive was very successful because everyone was able to control their buoyancy well enough to continue the dive of the reef. Our diving review and practice at the Rockford quarry before the trip proved to be beneficial so we would not waste our time in Bonaire doing what we had done there.
The second day of the trip (5/13), we did our first shore dives outside of the resort. The first site was called "the lake" located near the south end of the island. I was a little bit nervous about this dive because you have to carry all your gear on your back out to the water. The whole island is dead coral and walking into the water is easier said than done here in Bonaire. Bonaire has very few sandy beaches, and the "the lake" was not one of them. That being said, if you fall, with all your gear on, you are hitting the sharp limestone HARD. All was well though, no one fell at all! After our successful first dive, we took about a 45 minute surface interval and headed about 5 minutes south to the Salt Pier dive site. Salt is really the only thing that Bonaire can produce for their economy since the island is basically a desert. The Salt Pier is where ships come in to take the salt across the world. Thankfully there was no ship docked, so the dive site was open. Dr. Unger warned us before this dive that we would quite literally, "lose our minds", and to make sure to be extra safe and cautious about checking on your buddy because you will get distracted. There was so many fish there you can't quite describe it, and the diversity was amazing. During the end of the dive while we were taking our 3 minute safety stop at 15 feet, we saw
six juvenile green sea turtles! Obviously this safety stop turned into around a 20 minute affair. Which was perfectly okay with everyone. Below are some photos captured during this dive.
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| Pictured: below view of school of brown chromis (R), and balloon fish (Middle) |
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| Pictured: Juvenile green sea turtle with smooth trunkfish, Dr. Unger in background |
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Pictured: Green sea turtle coming up for air with salt pier in background
Photo taken by Gavin Dougherty |
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| Pictured: Green sea turtle coming up for air at the salt pier dive site |
The third day of our trip (5/14), we did another first, our first boat dives. I participated in 3/4 boat dives that day because later that night I would have to go out and collect data for my senior study and did not want to be exhausted when doing so. Our first dive of the day was at a site called, "bloodlet", which is fitting because the wake that day was around 4-6 feet and Hannah and I got a brutal beating from the ladder when boarding the boat after the dive was over. The fourth dive of the day I did not participate in but I heard it was something special, which is also fitting because the name of the dive site was "something special". During this dive Dr. Unger captured a picture of a frogfish, a frogfish uses its fins to essentially "walk". These fish are very rare in Bonaire, so it was a very good find.
This wraps up the first 3 days of our trip! Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed the pictures!
Danki!
In this post I will include our activities that we did the first 3 or 4 days on our trip. For the most part the first half of the trip was filled with days where it seemed we had more in common with the fish than the people on land! For starters, we stayed at a dive resort in the capital of Kralendijk called "Buddy Dive Resort". Immediately upon arrival we were greeted by friendly dive instructors for orientation that were very enthusiastic about their jobs. After our brief orientation, we started gearing up for the next day, getting fitted for our BCs, weights, and regulators.
Later that night we had dinner at the resort restaurant "Blennies", a blenny is a small fish that come in a variety of colors and are around half an inch to and inch long. To the left is a picture of a secretary blenny that we captured on the trip. This blenny along with others, live in the crevices of dead and live coral heads. A member of our group, Kathryn Maley, really loved seeing this particular fish.
