Overall
Rooms
Food
Service
Dive Shop
Dive Spots
The Delfins is really great! It was our 4th time on Bonaire, before that we stayed twice at Divi Flamingo and once at Captain Dons Habitat. The Delfins is much more modern and newer. The ambience is very nice and modern. The beach is super nice with lots of palm trees and always enough shade. There are 3 pools, one of which is a children's pool. We were there with our 1.5 year old son and it was great. There were relatively many kids on site. You can get into the sea via the beach, but you need shoes!
But with a child it was important to us not to be able to get into the water only via the jetty, which is more the rule on Bonaire.
A car is a must! Otherwise you can't get to the supermarket etc.
The food in the hotel is very good, the portions in the BBQ at the Beach were a bit small. In the Beach Brasserie they were a bit bigger and the price-performance ratio was right for us. There is also a kids menu in the brasserie.
We had not booked breakfast.
There is also the Fresku, where you can buy good sandwiches, which is handy at lunchtime after diving.
There is a hotel app, if you show your QR code, you can have everything written to your room.
To the diving center Dive Friends:
This is right next to the hotel, but still outside the complex. There is also a Dive Friends store on the beach, but for check-in, equipment
renting equipment etc. you have to go to the dive center at the back. It's about a 5-minute walk from the beach.
This is the only disadvantage of this hotel compared to the others we visited:
The dive center is a) not directly by the sea and b) boat dives are not possible from the hotel. You have to drive to Port Bonaire by car (approx. 5-10 minutes).
However, guided shore dives are offered, which is great if you don't have the confidence to do shore dives yourself.
There is also a house reef, but here too you have to bring the equipment from the back to the front of the reef.
the sea (by car or with a waggler).
From our point of view, we can say that this hotel is not the typical diving hotel, but rather appeals to non-divers and families.
If you are on Bonaire and only want to dive, it may not be the right hotel for you, as the dive center is not in front of the sea and boat dives are not possible directly from the hotel. For shore dives it doesn't matter, as you are traveling by car anyway...
About the room:
One Bedroom Deluxe Apartment
This was perfect for us!
Deluxe means in front of the beach. As the complex is quite large, we think it's worth it, especially with a child. Luckily we were on the ground floor because of the baby carriage... You should certainly mention this when booking, as there is no elevator to the first floor. The rooms are well equipped and clean.
Shortcomings: The shower has no door/curtain, so you have to be careful not to flood it. The air conditioning is only available in the bedroom and blows directly onto the bed... This is somewhat poorly designed.
We would go back to Delfins in a heartbeat. It is THE hotel for us on Bonaire.
(Automatically translated from German)