Bonaire
Adamboluu · CC BY-SA 4.0
Bonaire, Drive and Dive
A marine park protected since 1979, yellow stones marking the dive sites, and a pickup truck to reach them.
- days
- 5
- bases
- 3
- places to eat
- 4
- budget
- mid
Bonaire made its entire coastline a marine park in 1979, decades before anyone else, and the result is the best shore diving on earth. Yellow stones along the road mark more than sixty entry points. You park, gear up, and walk in. Add flamingos, salt pans and a national park in the north, and five days is plenty. It's also below the hurricane belt.
What you get
The whole trip, decided.
Not a list of sights. A route someone has already walked, with the bookings that need doing early flagged, the transfers timed, and the costs written as real ranges instead of a fantasy number.
- 5 days
- written out morning, afternoon and evening
- 3 bases
- where to sleep each night, and why there
- 4 places to eat
- with what to order and which base it is near
- 5 local tips
- the things a guidebook does not tell you
- A route map
- showing how the whole trip fits together
- Full costs
- stay, food, activities and transport, broken out
- 6 pre-trip checks
- what to confirm yourself before you book
- A printable PDF
- works offline, yours to keep
Why this one
Worth the flight.
- Shore diving from yellow-marked roadside sites, on your own schedule
- Klein Bonaire, an uninhabited island ten minutes offshore with untouched reef
- Flamingos in the salt pans, one of very few Caribbean breeding grounds
- The 19th-century slave huts by the salt works, kept as a memorial
- Washington Slagbaai National Park, the wild northern fifth of the island
Best months are January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, December. Expect around $1,600–3,000 per person, excluding flights for the whole 5 days, excluding flights. The guide breaks that into stay, food, activities and transport so you can see where it goes.
How this stays honest
Checked August 2026
Prices, opening days and entry rules drift, and no written guide can outrun that. So costs are always ranges rather than quotes, every plan carries the date it was last checked, and the last page is six things to confirm yourself before you book anything.
I take no commission from any hotel or operator. You book everything yourself, in your own name, at the price you can see.