Aruba is not the type of place that we are drawn to and I am sure many of our friends and family are wondering why we decided to go to a Caribbean island like Aruba. We are not cruise people OR fancy hotel people like most of the people that visit here. We had 3 weeks to fill up in our itinerary after we noped out of going to Ecuador when the cartel gang leaders took over a TV station and released several of their leaders from jail in January. So we decided to give the Caribbean beach life a chance and reserved 8 days in Aruba and then 13 in Curacao. Unfortunately, we have to do it on our retired nomad traveler budget instead of the fancy cruise and fancy hotel budget that is common on Aruba. We found an Airbnb a mile from town and a mile from the beach that had a private pool that was only shared by 2 other units. It was on the bus line so we wouldn’t have to rent a car…or so we thought. After getting here we realized that the bus line by our place only came by a few times a day and didn’t really go where we wanted to go. We ended up having to walk to town to get a bus that went by all the beaches. We tried to rent a car for a couple of days to see the sights on the other side of the island but all the rental cars on the whole island had been reserved. So… we spent a lot of time around our airbnb pool and really had a relaxing time. Sometimes that is really just what you need anyway.
We did a lot of walking around Aruba and tried to see the real Arubans. We went to the History museum and wandered around the shops downtown. Oranjestad is the main city and has a Dutch colonial feel with a few old buildings but it didn’t really excite either of us. But it seemed to be mostly a cruise ship stop and a lot of downtown had shuttered shops from Covid times and a few Caribbean beach restaurants to feed the North Americans. We had a great couple of meals of poutine and burgers and a Canadian restaurant that we liked. We had a couple of local made meals and beach cafe food but really made most of our dinners at our Airbnb.
We did have some good days checking out the beaches. The white sand beaches made the water look an other worldly looking turquoise color. I can see why people are so impressed by the Caribbean waters. Tons of people were on the beaches we saw and having a good time swimming in the small waves and 80 degree F water. But there wasn’t much snorkeling going on. Aruba isn’t really known for turtle or tropical fish watching. It is mostly a fantastic place to soak in some rays on a beautiful beach. It costs $50 a day to rent an umbrella and beach chair for the day so we brought some beach chairs from our airbnb and spent a whole day under the shade of some trees. We also had some good beach lunches including one with a fellow nomad traveler. It is always fun to talk travel with other nomads…
We shared our Airbnb pool with a Dutch couple in one unit and another unit that was a long term rental with a local couple. One night, we had a fantastic dinner party with all of us including the Dutch couple inviting their daughter (who teaches at the local university), and our Airbnb host also joined us. Our host grew up on the island, but now lives most of the time in Miami. We learned so much about the island by eating, drinking and talking with everyone. Sometimes the best travel encounters are things that don’t really get planned, they just happen. We had so much fun that I realize we didn’t take any pics… We ate fish they got from the local fisherman and I did take picture of the fresh catch a couple of days later.
Overall, we feel a bit guilty that we didn’t get to rent a car to see the some of the beaches and attractions that we couldn’t get to by bus. If this had been a family trip years ago, we would have made more of an effort to get to know the people, food and island a bit better. But we travel most of the time and it is OK to spend a few afternoons soaking up the sun at our private pool and making a good meal for ourselves.
We are now heading to another Dutch Caribbean island- Curacao. We hope to compare the 2 islands and our experiences on each. So we are now super excited for 13 nights on Curacao.