Bonaire - first dive day

Dive Friends - we're back. I think Dive Friends is the best outfit on Bonaire for shore diving. Granted, I haven't tried many but it has 7 locations for tank pick up and they don't charge extra for nitrox. 

We registered and wanted to get the DAN diving insurance but were 1 minute too late so it won't start until tomorrow. Sticklers for rules!

We did our orientation dive at Bari's reef and second dive at Hamlet Oasis/the Cliff . Both are Dive Friends locations so easy for gear and tanks. It was so great to be back in the water again. I was surprised at the abundance of fish. Either the reef is recovering or it's just the right season but there were just so many schools of beautiful fish. We even saw a little hawksbill turtle poking around. 

One of the coolest things today was meeting a couple on the dock at Bari's reef which is shared by Den Laman and Sand Dollar who owns the apartment in Sand Dollar where I stayed in 2013. They had a photo album of their story of when the woman retired, the man dressed in scuba gear and met her where she worked in NYC because they were going to retire to their place in Bonaire. I remembered the great pictures they had in the apartment and apparently he used to take pictures for New York Times. Such a great story. He has an awesome camera. I can now follow him.

Sunset