Bonaire

As part of the Netherlands Antilles, Bonaire is also a part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. During the Napoleonic Wars, the Netherlands lost control of Bonaire twice, once from 1800-1803 and again from 1807-1815. During these intervals, the British had control of the neighbouring island of Curacao and of Bonaire. The ABC islands were returned to the Netherlands under the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814.

From 1816 until 1868, Bonaire remained a government plantation. In 1825, there were about 300 government-owned slaves on the island. Gradually many of the slaves were freed, and became freemen with an obligation to render some services to the government. The remaining slaves were freed on September 30, 1862 under the Emancipation Regulation. A total of 607 government slaves and 151 private slaves were freed at that time.

As we approached the island from the east and passed by the southeast corner, we could see the small (re-created) slave huts and the huge mountains of salt from the still active salt pans. Seawater is let into the salt pans with tidal action and the sun evaporates the water. Huge bulldozers replaced the slaves for scraping the remaining salt into huge piles.

The island is ringed by a coral reef which is easily accessible from the shore along the Western and Southern sides. Furthermore, the entire coastline of the island has been declared a marine sanctuary, preserving local fish life. The coral reef around uninhabited Klein Bonaire is particularly well conserved, and we did most of our SCUBA dives in this area. Each afternoon the local kids would practise sailing all around our boats and they were fun to watch.

We dove with the crews of de Swerver and NightHawk while Emily snorkelled above with the ladies. I reviewed our SCUBA instruction book with Emily and even got her into the SCUBA gear for a taste of this sport. She had a little trouble equalizing (common with small young estuation tubes) but managed to float free at about 12 feet below the surface.

I retrieved an old 35mm film underwater camera from deep within our bilge and we have a few more shots to share with you.

Tom