TRAVEL NEWS
Buddy’s 40 years in Bonaire
On 19 August next year Buddy Dive Resort Bonaire, which scored heavily in the DIVER Awards in 2019, celebrates its 40th anniversary – and is planning various festivities and special offers throughout 2020.
Martien & Ingrid van der Valk bought the place in 2002, when it had 46 apartments, a small three-boat dive-centre and 20 hire cars (see inset photo). Self-driving between shore sites is a big feature of Bonaire diving.
Today (above), it has two centres with 73 apartments, 100-plus cars and two restaurants, and a PADI 5* Career Development Centre with six boats and what it says is the Caribbean’s biggest technical-diving facility. It also started the Reef Renewal Foundation Bonaire in 2012.
If your 40th birthday should fall on 19 August, you get accommodation and diving that week for free, with your group qualifying for 10% discounts on Drive & Dive packages.
If your 40th birthday is any time in 2020 you can get a 5% Drive & Dive discount for your entire group during August.
For an idea of standard prices, a Drive & Dive six-boat-dive package costs from US $1018pp, and includes seven nights’ B&B accommodation, six days’ unlimited air or nitrox for shore- as well as the boat-dives, vehicle hire throughout and taxes.
27 December 2019
