Day 73 - Aruba

Day 73 – Aruba – Friday 27/7/12

Weather – Sunny 28C – 28C (and windy as the mens loo at the MCG)

Sunrise – 6.25am

Sunset – 7.07pm

Time difference - minus 14 hours ex Sydney

At 6am this morning the pilot climbed on and we followed the buoyed channel into the port of Aruba, where we tied up alongside passenger terminal Berth “C” by 7am.

Aruba is only 33km long, and is situated in the southern Caribbean Sea. Together with Bonaire and Curacao it forms part of the ABC islands of the leeward Antilles. Aruba and all the Dutch and former Dutch islands are known as the Netherlands Antilles.

Another new port for us, and another wonderful day in our holiday of a lifetime. This morning Donna went horse riding in the countryside, which she was thrilled about. It has been a long time since she has been in the saddle and had a good hit out, which she was able to do on a large horse that she cantered on through the countryside that was well stocked with cactus plants, with and those slithery reptiley things:)

Whilst Donna was out playing Cowgirl Annie, I went looking through town in search of wi-fi with which to upload some photos onto the blog that I have had ready since Halifax, which seems like a long time ago now. The Starbucks wi-fi did not work, but I had success when I logged in as a bogus hotel guest at the 5 star hotel next door. By then shops were open, so I took the opportunity to restock our cabin provisions for the last stretch home.

By the time I got back to the ship, Donna was only 5 minutes behind me, so a quick freshen up and we were back out again. We went over to the bus terminal and caught a bus to Eagle Beach, which we had been told was listed as one of the 'top 10' beaches in the world. It was only a short 5km ride to the beach, and I must say we were impressed, we can see why it was on the list. Soft white sand as far as you can see, and the most exquisite turquoise water that is just picture postcard stuff.

After a lovely swim in the nice soft waters, we decided that rather than catch the bus back, that we would walk the 5km back to town along the beach. It was quite hot, so as we dried out, and got hot, we would jump back in the water for another swim. We repeated this about 6 or 7 times until we ran out of beach and met the docks. It was a lovely couple of hours which you can only dream of doing as you salter around the Caribbean.

We grabbed some lunch at a French cafe/restaurants (baguettes of course), and then filled in the remaining time until 'all aboard' time with a bit of shopping. As soon as we got back to the cabin Donna realised here spectacles were missing, so we back tracked through the terminal and out to the last place where she remembers swapping to her tinted spectacles, a shop a few streets away. We did not sight them on our back track, and the shop keeper had not seen them, so we resigned ourselves to them being lost for good.

As we trudged back to the ship in the wind and heat, we followed the same path back to the ship, when Donna saw her spectacles laying on the bitumen of a carpark. She is sooooo lucky that saw them, and even luckier that a car had not run over them upon entry to the carpark.

An early dinner, a few drinks with friends, and a after dinner production show, Country and Western style, followed by a Country and Western Quiz, which was then followed by a line dancing session. We passed on the line dancing as we were stuffed by our exploits of what was a lovely day in Aruba.

At 6pm we thrust off berth, and once outside the harbour, we steered a westerly course through the Caribbean Sea towards the Panama Canal.