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As we sailed around the island of Bonaire and into the
capital of Kralendjik, Kjell's wisdom tooth was starting
to give him so much pain that I saw him make a frown for
the first time since we started the trip. I knew
that the first order of business on land would be to see
a dentist. Or else, we would have to buy some rum,
a tennis ball, some string, and a racket (an old Dutch
Dentist trick we learnt during our visit). To our
luck!, and even though the Bonaire dentist's were
extremely busy, the tooth was coming out professionally
at 4:00 pm.
After the $150.00 us procedure was performed, Kjell
ventured to ease back from 'fat lipitus' with a few 'drooling'
cuba libre's, Coke with lot's of rum. Kjell said "The
best anesthetic was looking at the female doctor. Who
wants to start weeping in front of an attractive girl?"
Later that same evening, playing cool and not weeping
payed off as Carla the dentist invited us to come with
her and her friends for an outdoor movie by the sea.
'Oceans 12',...I kept falling asleep but, kept getting
woken up by Those Damn Mosquitos!!. You can't see
them so, there impossible to catch,...and I won't get
into the ones on the boat,...welts the size of a twonie
(20cm circle)!
I figure I should be immune any day now from my
overdose of mosquito bites. But, after the movie
our new friends took us to a salsa club,...then the next
day windsurfing,...then a beach Barbque! There, I forgot
to hand in my ticket for my tenderloin and Chicken Sateh
so, we got another plate for free! I can 't
believe how much Kjell and I ate that night, we were so
hungry from the sail. Another one of the many places we
got to experience was Sunday night at Jo's. A
Sunday Night Only bar that is built with treasures Jo and
the locals have pulled from the sea. Such as
plastic gas cans turned into lights, and beer crates for
seats. Everyday is something new here on Bonaire, Diver's
Paradise island.
Bonaire has been an incredible place for us thanks to
Kjell's toothache. It's a place where we
went to beach Barbque on our second night and enjoyed
the company of some the traditionally beautiful Dutch
Women so much that we made a booking for Spetakkel's
first 'Booze Cruise' the following day. Kjell had
to stop the cruise list at 10, since he said "Boys were
starting to sign up." The cruise went to
Klein Bonaire for snorkel, rum, and rose wine.
We have to use a mooring for the boat around the islands since, anchoring is forbidden
in Bonaire due to the protection of the coral. And
since the coral dropping off so close to the shore, we
could use a moorin.g only 15 meteres from land.
It was a great visual having this amazing coral drop off
right beneath us. This reef here is one of the best
snorkeling reefs in the caribbean. The coral reef is
about half a mile long and if you walk up the beach a
bit you can float with the current back to the boat.
After our third night in Bonaire, we got dropped off at
the dinghy dock at 1:30 am to head back to the boat.
By the time we untied the dinghy, we had three girls
asking us questions about sailing. They started to
buy us beers but, we had to put a stop to it after the
first one. We were just too tired to party, and
for the first time we had to turn down airline
stewardesses.
So, we initially wanted to stay in Bonaire for 5 days and
work on the boat. Now, we are leaving after 10 and
we haven't done anything on the boat except clean up
after the night before. We get up with the
sun around 6, 7. Scratch a few mosquito bites and
then jump in for a snorkel. We are moored off the
main Island just
before a 150 foot coral drop off. The boat is
moored at 6.5 meters, according to the fish finder, and
a new record for me in snorkel diving. The other day
I noticed my swimming shorts were missing. Sure
enough, they blew off the boat and were lying on the
bottom of the sea. (crab jokes??) We have
been averageing about 2 hours a day snorkeling and we
see interesting things sumberged everyday. Right
now, we have a school of black, yelloweyed, thumbsized
baby squid (I should look up the name) hanging around,
under the boat. I can get really close to
them but, if I move fast, PSHHhhhhh, out comes the ink.
I'm not too sure about that so, I've left them alone.
We have become such good friends with this community in
Bonaire that tomorrow, when we leave, we are taking 3 new
crew members! Carla and
Kjell's friend Femka are going to sail with us to Aruba,
which is about a 24 hour sail from here. And the
other dentist, Dan, has just taken 4 weeks off of work to
come with us all the way to the Galapogos. Since,
Carla and Dan work a cross shift, and Carla couldn't
cover the Wednesday's while Dan was gone, Dan just
crossed out all four Wednesdays that he will be gone in
the appointment book. Nice Job! Dan has done quite
a bit of sailing in the Netherlands and it is his dream
to what we are doing. So, he is bouncing off the
walls. He says that this is the biggest trip that
he has ever done! It's going to be a blast with
new crew,...and easier for me! No more burning my
arm hairs when I light that damn stove. That's
someone else's 'trick' now,...maybe Dan's? That
should calm him down a bit if he get's too excited on
the boat.
"Hey Dan. Wanna boil me up some Coffee?"
WHOooooOOSH!!?. Seriously, having Dan on the trip will help us out a lot, and he has
already contributed by writing us some prescriptions for
antibiotics. Getting infections on the sea is not
good. Plus, we might be able to use them if we
meet sick people on some remote islands we might sail upon.
We have had some of our best times of the trip so far in Bonaire.
So much has happend in such a short time. we could easily
get stuck here. It is a small but beautiful island with
lots of really nice people. Unfortunatly There is
no time to write about all that has happend but we would
especially like to thank the following people:
Carla the dentist for taking Kjell's tooth and letting us
into the clique. Dan, the other dentist, for taking
us all over the island. Femke for dinner, shower and
everything else. Waldo for beeing a good drinking buddy.
And we would like to thank God for making Dutch women so
pretty... The female booze cruise crew: Sofie, Linda,
Soskia, Naomi, Sanna, (Sanna's and Sofie's Mom) Anna,
(hope We didn't
forget someone)
Thanks to Jos for having such a great restaurant and
giving us the last beer for free.
Ps, all the travel
letters is made by BOTH kjell and darryl, we stand
for everything that we write...
12.05.05
Darryl & Kjell
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NORSK
