Holidays

The holidays on Bonaire start with the arrival of Sinter Klaus.  It is always an amazing sight to see him and his Pete's arrive by boat.  The Pete's paint their black faces blacker, put on crazy colorful costumes, and hang on the boat riggings doing crazy things.  The band is playing and pleasure boats accompany Sinter Klaus in a water parade while the people of Bonaire cheer from shore.  Children eagerly await his arrival and often dress in costumes like the Pete's. It's a whole day affair.

Next comes Thanksgiving for all the American Expats.  We started our traditional turkey dinner with orange-cinnamon rolls.

 It took me about two months to collect all the supplies for our dinner.  I brought a can of pumpkin from the States for pumpkin pie.  I found fresh cranberries at the store (which was a miracle) in October and put them in the freezer.  A friend snagged a can of cranberry jelly for Rick and donated it to my cause. I had to by a full turkey this year because the boneless breasts didn't show up.  I waited late to buy potatoes and they were all out of the big ones so I had to get a bag of small new potatoes.  All this involved going to 5 grocery stores multiple times to get the supplies.  It felt like I was on a treasure hunt.

 

The best part of thanksgiving are the left-overs.  We love turkey sandwiches, left over cranberries and pie with mounds of Cool Whip.  I even made turkey soup, just like my mother always did, with veggies and turkey.

On Bonaire, the Antilleans do not celebrate American Thanksgiving (big surprise) but they do have Black Friday.  All the stores offer specials, appliances go on sale, Christmas decorations are put up and out for sale and the parking lots are packed. The island just about goes grid lock with all the traffic. We couldn't resist the fun so we ventured out to look around. We came home with hand soap and a squeegee.

It now "legal" to put up our Christmas tree.  

Happy Holidays from Bonaire.

Golf

One of the things that Rick misses is playing golf. Recently, we brought his golf clubs to Bonaire in the hope that one day he may get a chance to play. That day came at the Piedra So Golf Course on Bonaire.

This is not your typical golf course. You sign up and pay your fees on line,  rent a golf buggy (the push kind, not the driving kind), drive to the other side (east side) of the island and play on rocks and dirt. The wind blows about 20 mph.  Sometimes you are hitting the ball into the wind, sometimes its a cross wind and once in a while the wind is behind you.  No worries about staying out of the trees because there are none.  There are lots of thorny scrub bushes, so  ball retrieval is impossible. There are also no greens and everything is "the rough".

The tee box at each hole is a mound of dirt surrounded by rocks with green AstroTurf on top. This is the only green on the course except for AstroTurf greens.

 

Wood tees are not used.  These hard rubber golf tees are used so that your clubs don't get damaged by the rocks when you swing at the ball.  The tall one is for the driver, and the others are used for shots from the fairway.

This is a typical fairway from the tee box to the green.  This golf course has 9 holes. One of the holes is located about 100 yards from the sea so you can pretend you are at Pebble Beach at the par-3 7th hole famous for its stunning view. Okay it's not a stunning view but its as close as we are going to get.

Rick played with our neighbors who visit from time to time from the Netherlands.  The two sisters took Rick on his maiden golf outing to Bonaire's golf course. Rick had his golf shoes, glove and clubs but the sisters, who also own their own clubs, wore flip-flops to play golf.  Rick was a little amused about it because one of the sister's flip-flops broke and she had to play with one bare foot and one flip-flop. They did not keep score - this was just for fun. 

That's how golf is played on Bonaire.