What A Day!

Bonaire.

We all went snorkelling in the morning.
Only The Captain's Mate had done it before - but what the hell!

We went out on a 'junk' built in Bangkok in the late 60s and made its way to the Caribbean by a rather convoluted route.
The owner/captain is a very pleasant Dutchman (no surprise for where we were) who gave us the history - along with some fruit punch - on the way out to Klein Bonaire (a small, flat, uninhabited island) which is a Marine Park.

SWMBO and I were probably amongst the last to head out through the very narrow break in the coral reef.
That is where SWMBOs mask slipped and she took a panic attack.
She isn't the strongest swimmer so I had to go and 'rescue' her and get her back through the gap into shallow water and then along the beach to where we would all be meeting up.
During this process I ended up being dragged over the coral and my arm came out in second place. It was swollen with big yellow blisters by the time we got to the beach, but that was definitely second to making sure SWMBO was safe and well.
After that I headed back up the beach to the start point.
However, I wasn't daft enough to go out into deep water without a 'buddy' so had to make do with the less spectacular shallow water inside the reef.
But I loved it. The worst thing was the shutter lag using the wee waterproof camera. Boy did I get some great shots of fish shadows as the left the frame.

On the trip back I had several rum punches to help dull the stinging in the arm.
Sore I may have been but I would certainly go snorkelling again.

In the afternoon I went on a bus tour organised by the ship.
The tour guide was rubbish, the 'air conditioning' was nonexistant (but the driver and tour guide had fans fitted), the vast numbers of flamingos we were led to believe were living next to the road weren't (maybe 100 and too far away virtually to see, let along photograph) and we were denied stopping at a group of 'slave huts' which were very photographic in favour of another group which had buses, flags and fast food vehicles parked in amongst them -- I did eventually manage to get some half decent shots without all the tourists, buses, flags etc (I'm not sure the guy with the high end Nikon did using his mobile phone though .... I never saw him one put the camera to his eye).

I don't know if anyone else complained on board (quite a few said they were going to) but I certainly did - for the money they charged they should be making damned sure they are getting the best in both vehicles and quality guides.