Trip Leader: Rebecca Metcalfe, NAUI Instructor
The thing about these trips is not so much about the name of the club or the location, but the friendships between the people, the care exhibited by our trip leader, and the safety and concern shown by all divers for each other, both scuba divers and snorkellers.
Thirty-four Blue North members set out in November for Curaçao with our amazing Trip Leader, Rebecca Metcalfe, for 8 days. We are 20 scuba divers and 14 snorkeller/sunseekers. Afternoons were free to sightsee. Evenings were spent dining and socializing at a variety of restaurants throughout the resort, and at the adjacent famous Mambo Beach, on the outskirts of the capital city, Willemstad.
We arrived!
Smooth flight and transport from the Curaçao airport to Lions Dive Beach Resort at Willemstad. Rebecca arranged dinner reservations for 8:00 pm for the group at “Hemingways” restaurant at the resort. Warm breezes, high hopes and loud music!
Scuba Diving
A relatively easy start with breakfast (a fabulously delicious buffet with everything you could hope for!) Then off to the Ocean Encounters dive shop for pre-briefing, briefing, equipment rental, locker assignments and our refresher/acclimatization shore dive. Some divers geared up and walked over for a beach entry. Others geared up on board the Curaçao Phoenix, our dive boat for the week, and entered off the boat. After a shallow swim through the channel, we headed for the outside of the house reef, happy to be underwater again, accompanied by tropical fish and viewing the coral nurseries on the Lions Dive house reef near Stella Maris Reef. As you know, climate change is having an effect on the oceans. The water temperature was 85 degrees, and we noticed some coral bleaching. Given the right improved conditions, the coral may survive. The local dive community is working to grow coral nurseries which we saw on several of our dives.
Boat diving aboard the Curaçao Phoenix
Five days of two-tank morning dives for 20 divers with the dive operation, Ocean Encounters, on site at Lions Dive Beach Resort.
Diving with Ocean Encounters
Ocean Encounters was terrific and took excellent care of us all week. Many thanks to Captain Karen-Maike, guides Gianna, Brian and Jeff; and to professional underwater photographer Layla who joined us for the snorkel trip and one day of diving. You will see the results of her photography in these diving photos directly above and below, in the header and in the snorkelling pics further down. The dive site photos are provided by Dive Curaçao.
Here are our dive sites
Snorkelling
Rebecca organized a snorkelling trip for us aboard the Curaçao Phoenix on Wednesday to the wreck of the Tugboat for a wonderful afternoon of snorkelling. There were many fish on the wreck and in the reef around the wreck. The guides were terrific at pointing out a variety of species; for example, the tiny Redlip Bleny.
Also the house reef at Lions Dive provided a super easy location, right off our own beach, for snorkellers and afternoon shore divers. Bob provided a pool snorkel lesson for 89-year old Fred (Ian’s dad) who snorkelled the house reef for 40 minutes the next day. Nancy took to snorkelling for the first time and swam with the dolphins!
A new event this year, initiated by Sonya, is the “Night Snorkel“. What a fabulous way to see octopus, crabs, lobsters, drumfish and other night creatures, as well as the usual tropical fish, just steps from our resort hotel rooms. I think night snorkelling might be a permanent fixture in our repertoire!
Underwater Photos
Rhain Louis shares these wonderful underwater photos of the trip.
terminal phase
And there are more of Rhain’s underwater photos on Instagram:
View Rhain’s stunning underwater photos
photo credit: Bence’s camera
See also our Blue North instagram page for lots of photos of the trip https://www.instagram.com/bluenorthscuba/
Sightseeing
Willemstad
We had a guided tour of Punda on Thursday afternoon followed by a delicious dinner at “Scampi’s”. Despite getting their dates confused and expecting us on Friday, they did a great job of serving all 32 of us. Our visit was part of the Punda Vibes celebration with exciting fireworks to view right from our table by the sea. oooo, ahhhh
big sister who cares for the littles
Temple Emmanuel
Gouverneur de Rouville’s overlooking the Queen Emma floating bridge
photo credit: Cynthia’s camera
Beaches
Cynthia, Jim & Marianna led the way on the beaches trek and talked many of us into visiting a beach or two, such as Cas Abou, Klein Knip and Coral Estates.
Exploring
Many of us toured the island and explored the beaches, the Aloe farm, Hato caves, the city, a harbour tour, the Aquarium, Dolphin Academy, the Substation, shore diving, more snorkelling, night diving or saught out the magnificent views by climbing the high peak at Christoffelberg or driving up to Fort Nassau.
Dolphin Academy and the Curacao Sea Aquarium
The exhibits, feeding the stingrays, flamingos and sharks, the presentations and the movies were great, and so was the dolphin show! Here’s a link to one of the movies Curacao Underwater Kunuku to get a feel for what we experienced in Curaçao.
Ken provided good reviews from his experience swimming and snorkelling with the dolphins. We couldn’t resist. All agreed it was delightful.
The Resort: the views, the sparkling turquoise water, the murals and, oh my, the sunsets! To the left, Ocean Encounters, the Aquarium, Dolphin Academy, the Substation and the delicious Olas & Copas restaurant. To the right, steps away is the famous Mambo Beach with shops and restaurants, bars and festivities and, of course, the continuation of the beach!
Thank you!
Another fabulous diving vacation. Thank you, Rebecca! We appreciate you so much, and love your trips and everything you do for us! You’re the best.
Photo credits: Thanks to the Blue North photographers who contributed pictures: Kathryn Cullen and Rhain Louis. And thanks to Layla from Future Vision Imaging.
Blue North Scuba Club 