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We are Ton & Mariët. The two of us left the Netherlands in the autumn of 2019 to live here on sunny Bonaire. When we were younger, each of us did a lot of travelling on our own and lived or visited many places in the world. This pattern didn’t change when we became a couple in 2007. It was exactly 10 years before we arrived here that we started dreaming of having our own guesthouse somewhere in the world.
For Ton, Bonaire has been a second home for almost 20 years. Not because he lived or had a house here but because he and his friends spent their diving holidays here almost every year. After Mariët visited the island for the first time in 2013, it wasn’t long before we shared a love for Bonaire. During the winter of 2016-2017 we had the chance to stay on the island for four months. That’s when we really decided to do something about moving here for good. The people, the culture, the nice warm sun, the coastline, the scuba diving, the kitesurfing, the outdoor life: this beautiful island had it all. This would be our new home!
Finally, in 2019, we found a wonderful place to live that ticked all the boxes and we dived into making it your new home away from home on Bonaire!
So welcome to our beautiful Casa Mantana Bonaire! We’d love to tell you more in person about the origins of its special name and the meaning of our logo.
Bon bini na Casa Mantana Bonaire!
Ton & Mariët
The name "Casa Mantana"
The unique name we chose for our guesthouse on Bonaire – Casa Mantana – is an interesting fusion of ‘Manta’ and ‘Montana’.
Montana (‘mountain’ in English) can be translated in Dutch as ‘Bergen’, the name of a beautiful village where Mariët has her roots. This is also the place where we lived happily as a couple surrounded by our family and friends for almost 10 years.
Montana (‘mountain’ in English) can be translated in Dutch as ‘Bergen’, the name of a beautiful village where Mariët has her roots. This is also the place where we lived happily as a couple surrounded by our family and friends for almost 10 years.
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The Manta Ray is the symbol of freedom among the Maori people. This is also one of the unusual and unique fish species found in the waters off Bonaire. Freedom is what we were looking for but also what we want to share with our guests.
The logo, officially called ‘WHAKAREREKE’ in the Maori language, means something like ‘TO CHANGE’ and for us symbolises a ‘path to major change’. |
"Sometimes in the waves of change we find our true direction"