'Life is What Happens to You when You are Making Other Plans' (John Lennon)

 We didn't make it to Curitiba, Brazil, unfortunately. Our e-visa's did not arrive in time, 6 days after they were requested (with a note explaining our time constraint), so they wouldn't let us on the flight from Johannesburg to Brazil. They don't allow visas on arrival, thus the cancellation of our flight ticket. Most countries promise e-visa within 3-5 days, and we have become accustomed to that. Rather than hang around Joburg for a few more days waiting for our e-visa to arrive, we decided to abort our trip to Brazil and move on to Aruba earlier than planned. Aruba offers a 1 hour turnaround for their ED card (Embarcation / Disembarcation) and they were true to their word, receiving one in 45 minutes while we were still in the Joburg airport.

Since we arrived in the Aruban capital, Oranjestand, a week earlier than planned, we decided it was an opportune time to slow life down a little. After a long flight and a busy 18 day, 4 country, G Adventures tour to end our 6 weeks in Africa, we deserved some lazy time. Besides, a week from now we will be joined by my bride's brother and wife, with a plan to explore all the island offers, so we didn't want to impinge on that part of our island visit. We rented an apartment for the week, attached to a private home, one block away from the oceanfront and on the edge of the busy tourist city. The daily temperature was close to 30C with lows of 25C, so we subscribed to morning walks and grocery store visits. We found a wonderful place to have dinners (West Deck), 150 metres from our rental unit, right beside the ocean and a perfect spot for sunset views. The city has a free trolley system, with a terminal close to our quiet end of town, so we used that one day to do some city exploring but it mostly took us by shopping malls and ended up at the cruise ship terminal, for whom it as likely designed. We didn't venture back into the city after that, preferring our quiet end. Our end did get a bit more action though when the Caravan Children's parade came through on our 2nd last day. Two hours of colorful costumes, dancing and local music were on display with everyone out to watch, making for a happy celebration.

At the end of our first week we were picked up by Scott and Andree in our rental vehicle, to head a bit further north to the neighbourhood of Noord where we rented a lovely 2 bedroom home, with a backyard pool, for the week. The pool got used every day because our daily trips on this 32 x 10 km tiny island country (110K pop.) never took up a full day. Eagle Beach was a much quieter sunbathing spot one afternoon, over the more busy Palm Beach where we just settled for a lunch one day. Around the island we visited the Butterfly Farm (35 species), Aloe Factory (tour and purchases), Casibari Rock Formations (climb to top), the Bushiribana Gold Mine ruins and the California Lighthouse at the northern tip of the island. We also drove to the south end of the island to the town of San Nicolas for a wander around, enjoying their marvellous wall murals and a visit to the renowned Charlie's Bar (wild guest souvenirs from around the world inside). We followed that with a late lunch break in Saventa, a fishing village, with freshly caught seafood on the menu. A snorkel trip to Tres Trapi beach to observe sea turtles occurred on another day. Once the ladies had traversed the rock steps to enter the water, I had a quick chat with a man leaving the sea, who told me he had only seen one turtle and pointed to a spot more than 100 metres away, at which point I returned to my beach chair to keep an eye on the ladies! There were also plenty of Bridge games played, whenever we had some spare hours, a card game we enjoy but don't get to play often.

  Sadly, our time together came to an end much too quickly and they returned home, while we moved on to our next island stop in nearby Curacao.

The Oranjestad, Aruba harbour, viewed from the south side on a morning walk towards the downtown. We deliberately chose a rental apartment several km's from the cruise ship terminal to avoid the daily passenger traffic in our area.

The West Deck restaurant close to our residence and near the shoreline. We always booked a table near the back end of this picture for great sunset views. Excellent food and prices made this place a common retreat.

The free trolley that went from our quiet end of the city, through the downtown area, and finishing at a terminal near the cruise ship dock. While it doesn't look very full at this point, that is only because there was a 15 minute stop at each end, so many of the cruise ship passengers had gotten off to stretch their legs but returned before the trolley left again.

The annual Carnival festival included a Children's Parade on one of the days we were there. The costumes were colourful and the parents / guardians did a good job of keeping the kids hydrated and fed in the 30C heat.

A picture taken while we were at the Butterfly Farm where overripe fruit was used to feed the tropical butterflies. The Owl Butterfly has an eye shape on it's wings to help fend off predators, making it seem larger then it really is.

The Casibari Rock Formations, where there were plenty of large boulders scattered around. Visitors were able to ascend some of them, this one being the easiest.

San Nicolas, at the southern tip of Aruba was a treat to walk around due to the colourful wall murals that frequented the town. Even the Police Station (not this picture) had a cool mural.

This business - home had a mural that resembled a 3D picture.

This mural was on a wall outside the cult Charlie's Bar. The license plates on the window shutters were a hint on what was to come on the inside.

The inside of Charlie's Bar. People from around the world brought items from home to leave in the bar. For others who hadn't planned ahead, there was a collection of currency bills (left of the guitar) that included $5 and $10 dollar bills from the great white north.

One of our last meals together before we both went our separate ways. It was a good visit together and another one will happen before long in their neck of the woods.

With both of us having afternoon flights on our final day, we drove back to the southern tip to spend a few hours at Baby Beach, which we missed on a previous drive. It was a popular site with a shallow sandy bottom, and supported by Big Mama's Beach Bar which we also supported.