Never too late to learn...

Do you ever stop and wonder how you ended up at this place and at this point in your life? 

I found myself thinking exactly that last week when Greg was trying to sign me up for diving lessons.  I was standing sullenly in the dive shop reception, looking at the health questionnaire and deciding which boxes to tick to disqualify myself.  Clearly the one about panic attacks was the one I needed.  I don’t suffer from panic attacks, but I’m pretty certain I could have one if I saw a shark or thought I might run out of air.  ‘It will be fun,’ said my Piscean (water sign) husband, full of enthusiasm having just renewed his PADI and having been on a couple of dives recently.  ‘You will love it!’

That’s when I went into a total dark mood.  It occurred to me that I have rubbish skin for constant tropical sunshine, I hate sand; it gets into every crevice and sticks to my factor 50 sunscreen, it tastes and feels disgusting if you get even a single grain in your mouth when eating something, I don’t like swimming in the sea; I hate water in my face, salt water up my nose, and waves scare me because I’m not really a very strong swimmer if the truth be told.  Let’s face it I can only do breaststroke, preferably in a swimming pool with my head up, getting a crick in my neck… that’s the story of my swimming.

Then I spotted on the form it said you had to be able to swim 200 metres.  I pointed this out to Greg and suggested we ‘just step outside for a minute.’

We had a bit of a heart to heart.  I said ‘Greg, I don’t feel confident about this, when have you ever seen me swim 200 metres?’ He had to agree, - in our 34 years together he has never seen me swim more than twice round the boat, and that was breaststroke.  In fact, shock horror, it is possible, that last season I didn’t even go in the water once, despite living on a yacht and being almost entirely on anchor in viridian water at bathtub temperature.

The reason I’m living this life is because I love travelling and visiting new places.  I want to see the rest of the world and this is a very interesting method of doing that, but I’m an earth sign and not a water baby, so I must manage that.

We decided upon a compromise.  Greg would teach me to snorkel first and I would try hard.  He would get me a good mask and snorkel that doesn’t let in any water and we would give it a go. I also pointed out that I might need swimming lessons to get the frog kick out of my system.

 

The first short go was not too bad.  I managed better than I thought but am not very good at clearing the snorkel.  The second go was much better, I got the hang of the kicking movement and as a result we stayed out practising for about an hour.  I was quite pleasantly shocked at how I seemed to float when my head was in the water.  You lot are probably now quite shocked at how it has taken me 66 years to get to this point.  The only downside I discovered later that evening was that I was burnt very badly on my bum where my bikini bottoms had ridden up and because I don’t own any proper kit, the bottom of my back where the long sleeved Tshirt had also ridden up. I had a few days of agony before we went again but this time, I had purchased an all in one rashi suit to protect me. 

 

Here I am snorkelling.  Even the fish are very friendly, not seeing humans as predators, they swim happily alongside you. I’ve even ventured to the edge of the reef and looked down into the deeper water.  Will I eventually try diving?  Possibly.  Bonaire is one of the top places for diving in the world, so it would seem silly not to whilst we are here. What I do know is It’s never too late to learn.

We ended up in Bonaire by accident whilst trying to find an open and safe haven for the hurricane season. It wasn’t our first choice as the trip back from here is hard work and upwind, but this year promises to be a particularly bad year for hurricanes so we needed to move from Martinique fairly urgently. Trinidad would not open its borders because of the Covid-19 crisis so there weren't really any alternatives, however now we are here we are very grateful and happy.

Bonaire is an amazing place.  The people are very friendly and helpful.  We had to do 2 weeks quarantine on our boat when we arrived, which was a lot tougher than the lockdown we had experienced in Martinique.  In lockdown you could at least go to shore to the supermarket or for a walk albeit wearing a mask.  In quarantine you are not allowed to leave your boat at all.  It took us 4 days to get here, so in total we didn’t leave the boat for 18 days which was virtually the same as the Atlantic crossing but without the benefit of our entertaining crew.  (Not suggesting Greg is at all dull, but you can have too much of a good thing!)

Viridian tucked up safely in Bonaire

Other people on yachts in the marina waved to us as they passed by, enjoying their freedom and some of them helped us by buying provisions.  Naomi and Guy from Zambezi and Brian and Melinda from Sava did some shopping for us and stopped to chat from a safe distance.  

We are now enjoying our freedom and are developing our friendship with both couples.  We crewed on Sava in a regatta sailing around Klein Bonaire island – we were fourth overall, which was amazing as we couldn’t get the main up properly on day 1! 

 

Sava racing with a reef in the Main.....

Post-race refreshment

The afterparty

Greg has been scuba diving with Naomi and Guy.  Naomi is a divemaster and they have all the kit onboard, so Greg has really enjoyed that experience as they know the reefs well and saw some amazing sea life including a stone fish.

Greg enjoying scuba diving again

  Guy also does kite surfing and is very acrobatic.  Greg hasn’t tried that yet because of his hip, but it looks like the kind of adrenaline trip he might enjoy at some point.

Colourful undersea life

 

Stone fish

 Bonaire has amazing restaurants.  They are the best we have found in the Caribbean so far.  To celebrate our release from quarantine and our 32^nd wedding anniversary, we went to The Chefs for their tasting menu.  It was a very cool concept, brilliantly executed.  Sadly, its closed for September, so for my birthday we are going to another highly recommended restaurant at Braas Boer.

We have also eaten at Osaka Japanese restaurant, Karel’s on the seafront and enjoyed drinks and cocktails at Oceans Oasis.  There are several other good restaurants we will try over the coming weeks.

Celebrating our 32nd wedding anniversary at Chefs

The Chefs busily prepping our starter

The first thing we did when released from quarantine was get our bikes out, cycle round and sign up for the best gym we could find with aircon. It is very hot and humid here now, as we are in the rainy season. The island is generally very arid with a lot of cacti, but we have had quite a lot of rain from the fringe of tropical storms and hurricanes passing to the north of us. The sun is now directly overhead and is punishing, so we are shade seeking most of the time. Because we are not able to come home as frequently as we have before due to COVID, we are strangely missing cooler weather.

Yet another tropical storm!......

We found Bon Vida gym which has good machines, classes and aircon.  We are both very happy.  We have been virtually every single day in August.  I have lost 5 lbs and Greg has lost 12lb. We are both looking and feeling fitter, so have signed up again for September.  I have been to pilates, TRX, Body Pump, Step and for the first time in my life Yoga. It helps that the instructor Ladina is amazing.  I asked her to do a personal training session on the boat, using the boat as the gym so that I can continue in future when we leave here. She inspires me to try harder and look better.  So, yet another thing I have started late in life and am loving. Its never too late to learn.

Ladina working out

 

We hired a car over several days to take us to different snorkelling sites, visit the national park and see the wildlife.  Donkeys and flamingos are protected here, and it is common to see donkeys roaming freely.  Flamingos are more nervous and keep to themselves so it’s a privilege if you spot any near enough to photograph.

  

Flamingoes feeding

Algae in the evaporating salt water turns it pink.....

The slave huts by the salt pans were built in 1850 

The cactuses are big and nasty!

Donkeys wander around freely

My mobile phone package doesn’t include the Netherlands Antilles, although Greg’s does, so I have been grateful for the Wi-Fi in the marina.  Although we are regularly in touch with Ed and Miranda and other family members on WhatsApp etc, I miss seeing my mum and having better communication with her. So, my cousin Kathryn and I took the plunge and set her up with an iPhone. She is 89 and has never engaged with technology of any kind, so it was a bit of a risk.  But hey, after lessons from Kathryn and my nephew Will, she is taking to it well.  ‘You’ve unleashed a monster,’ Greg observed after another phone call at 5.45am (time difference not yet mastered).  But it's great - she’s happier and I’m ecstatic that we can video call and message more frequently.  

It’s never too late to learn!