Favorite Dive

Southeastern Divers, Inc.

2720 Governors Drive SW, Huntsville Alabama 35805 - Phone: 256-536-8404

"Training the best divers in North Alabama since 1980."

Max Gilbert PADI IDC Staff Instructor

"Favorite Dive"

The most common question I get asked when I come home from Bonaire is “What’s your favorite dive site on the island?” I used to answer Karpata, which is one of the northern-most sights on the island. It has a somewhat challenging entry, but the diving there is spectacular. The reef slopes steeply down, and there is an old anchor sticking out of the reef not far south of the entry point. I used to wonder how that anchor got to be there, and now I know, because of my NEW favorite dive site on Bonaire… The Windjammer!

The Windjammer is a three-masted steel-hulled sailing ship, originally christened the Mari Bahn (Gaelic for “Bonny Mary”) and was known for years as the Deep Schooner or the Wind Jammer wreck. This three masted iron bark, owned by Fratelli Denegri and G.B. Mortola, was built in 1874 by Barclay, Curle and Company, Glasgow, Scotland. She was schooner rigged on the mizzen mast, fore and aft, and square rigged on the others. She was 239 feet long, had a 37 foot beam, and weighed 1,378 gross tons. For comparison, the Hilma Hooker is only a foot longer!

At the time of her demise, she was sailing under the command of Captain L. Razeto from Trinidad to Marseille with a cargo of asphalt. The date of her sinking was December 7, 1912. When she originally made port at Bonaire in 1912, she tied up close to the town of Kralendijk, but her cargo of asphalt and the kettle in which it was melted caused such a stink that she moved north to an anchorage at Karpata. A bad storm caused the crew to abandon ship, and she broke loose from her anchor and got blown to just north of Karpata where she sank. She now rests in about 190’ of water, with the deepest part of the wreck at about 200’.

To dive the Windjammer, you do have to jump through some hoops… unlike other dive sites on Bonaire, you can’t just park your rental truck and walk into the ocean. If you do, you’ll be arrested, and your scuba gear will be confiscated – for good. The reason is because the best access to the wreck is via BOnaire PEtroleum Corporation (BOPEC) property. They have a strict security policy and monitor their fenced perimeter with cameras. If you sneak onto the property, you’re almost certain to get caught. I had to provide a copy of the picture page of my passport and Walt at Captain Don’s Habitat had to apply for a permit.

The permit is only good for a specific date and time, so the weather has to cooperate along with the security folks at BOPEC. Last year, I had the permit, but not the weather. We arrived in Bonaire in 2010 on the tail end of a hurricane, and the weather was very unsettled. Since BOPEC could not predict when they might be moving a tanker ship, I was not allowed to dive.

Like other special dive sites on the island, such as the Town Pier and the Salt Pier, the Windjammer is strictly a guided dive. I had to hire a guide and pay for his breathing gasses. My guide turned out to be none other than my old friend, Roger Haug, who has recently been promoted to Dive Operations Manager at Habitat. He’s a superb diver, and a very hard-working guy, constantly working behind the scenes and sometimes on the dive boats to keep things running smoothly.

Special training and equipment is also required to dive the Windjammer. Because she’s so deep, the dive is beyond the limits of recreational training. When people ask me why I’ve worked so hard to earn technical diving certifications, I point to pinnacle dives like this one and say “that’s why.” Thousands and thousands of divers have been to shallower Bonaire wrecks like the Hilma Hooker, La Machaca, or even the Hesper, but only a few have the training and skills to get to the Windjammer.

I contacted Walt at Rek Tek Scuba, about a month before the SDI trip headed down to Bonaire. We discussed dive plans and logistics and had the whole dive worked out before I got to the island. I dove the wreck using a 20/20 trimix blend, which is a gas that’s 20% oxygen, 20% helium, and the rest nitrogen. This blend has a Maximum Operating Depth (MOD) very near the depths I’d reach on the Windjammer, and an Equivalent Narcotic Depth (END) of 145’, which means even though I was diving to depths of 190’ to 200’, I’d only be as narked as a non-trimix diver at 145’. Walt and I talked it over, and decided that this blend, though not ideal, was a good compromise, providing adequate safety margin while limiting narcosis and cost. For deco gasses, I chose EANx50 and pure oxygen, which allowed me to start my decompression as deep as 70’, and then really off-gas quickly on my 10’ deco stop.

The dive was set for Wednesday of our week-long trip. I met Roger at the dive shop at about 8:30 A.M. and started loading tanks, which had been checked, analyzed, rigged and then re-checked and re-analyzed the day before. We drove north to BOPEC and stopped at the guard building. After our permit was given careful scrutiny we were allowed through a locked gate. We drove to a boat ramp, unloaded our gear, and then geared up in the water. I did the dive in sidemount configuration, so gearing up in the water, even with a surge, is much easier than rigging up on shore. I checked all four of my regulators – one each on both of my bottom gas tanks, and one each on both deco cylinders, took a glance at my computers, checked the rest of my rig and we were off.

It turns out that diving the Windjammer is hard work! Roger didn’t tell me until we got to the dive site just how long the surface swim is… about a quarter of a mile north of where we parked! Kicking on my back, carrying two steel cylinders and two aluminum 40s in a 2’ chop is quite a job! Like the tortoise taught us, slow and steady wins the race, and after about half an hour of steady kicking we were over the wreck. We took a few minutes to rest, and then down, down, down, down. It took about 4 minutes to get down to 190’.

The wreck is lying on her starboard side, pretty much parallel to the reef. We swam along the keel to the stern and then over the wreck to the deck. We swam in through an open hatchway and started to explore the inside of the hulk. Bonaire has its share of the invasive lionfish, and there are some huge ones in the Windjammer wreck. Roger speared three while we were on the dive! We swam forward inside the wreck, to a huge crack in the hull, about 25’ from the bow, where we exited. After getting out of the wreck, we explored the deck and the masts & rigging. We even found the anchor chain, minus the anchor, which is still at Karpata, of course. As hard as it was to believe, our planned 25 minutes of bottom time was gone, so it was time to start the slow ascent to the surface.

As we did our deco, following a pre-planned run schedule, we explored along the reef, heading south back towards our entry point. Roger continued hunting lionfish, but he came up dry for the rest of the dive. After our deco was done, we took a few minutes to explore the shallows, and Roger took me right to the edge of the STINAPA (the acronym is Dutch so I won’t bother spelling it out) Marine Park. He’d left one of his lionfish still on the spear lying next to an old tire near the ramp. When we got back, a big spotted moray was feasting on it. He’d bite the fish, and then roll over and over, to tear off a chunk which he then gulped down whole. Roger had promised a lionfish to the BOPEC guard, but that moray cheated the guard out of his dinner!

Want to share my next exploration of the Windjammer? Get started on your tech diving training. The first step is Tec 40, followed by Tec 45, Tec 50 and then trimix training. Together we’ll prepare to go to dive sites that few ever even see!

Come diving with me!

max

See you soon ~ underwater!

max

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