De Republiek

After staying for about two and a half weeks with our nearly new grandparents on boat of the trawler in the Aruba nautical club it was time to say goodbye since they were leaving for Brazil ( by plane ). Fortunately we wrote a fairly new couchsurfer coming to Aruba soon after that – by boat – and so we hopped from boat to boat.

Yes dear readers I understand you feel neglected. So little for some many days! Well now, here some more pictures from Aruba, with some captions.

The good

Aruba sports very friendly people. Everybody goes about pretty relaxed although some people work really hard, while others take it more tranquillo. The beaches are beautiful and the water is clear. You can get roti and rolling tabacco. To a junk like me ( on both things! ) that’s pretty nice.

A common problem around websites is that you have so many. And many require registration even if you just want to check out their features to see if it is something you are looking for. Most people afterward forget about them. Personally I sometimes run into websites which I totally forgot I once registered at.

Most sites will try to spam their pointless newsletters you with hardly any interesting information, just to tell you “I am here, use me”.

Free website-creator for the less tech-savvy out there, Weebly does it differently by sending a cutesy, almost sad email:

Since the bus system kind off sucks and costs money and we don’t have a rental car anymore we started hitchhiking on the island.

On an island filled with all-inclusive tourists who generally book their hotels, rental cars with their flights and locals who usually own a car hitchhiking is almost completely foreign.

Apart from the boulevard, the overly luxurous Rennaissance project there is more to Oranjestad.

So how to describe the last days here? It probably boils down to driving around the island seeing the deserted but beautiful areas where the highrise-tourists won’t dream of going. Needless to say we don’t dream of being there.

In the meanwhile we started in London! Hosting by lovely Sharna, pictures stolen from Miriam.

Leaving our hosts house in London early in the morning for a train to Victoria en onwards to London Gatwick. Lot’s of fuss getting our tickets to Gatwick thanks to bureaucracy on the part of the trainsytem ( something with debitcards and online ordering ) and getting refund on the Oyster card (failed). So we were a bit spooked since we didn’t have the full credentials needed at the airport for entry on Aruba ( a return-ticket). Fortunately both the check-in as border control were pretty friendly and 11 hours and some later we are chilling in the Aruban sun.

The friendly border guard at the island tells us we need a compulsory address and fills in a complete random hotel (ok). After some haggling we rent a car (yes I drove on Aruba) and decide to find shelter for the night. First some shopping and seeing round the island.

Being low-budget people that means that any hotel ( from 60 dollars and more ) is too much. So relax at a remote village, but it became a bit sketchy. We try to sleep at a hotels carpark ( not my idea ), get sent away by the police, chill out at a lighthouse and hit Eagle beach for a nap. Next day five-o-clock starts with an almost off-road cruise to the east side of the island ( The natural bridge for insiders ) followed by swimming in the sea at the south-side.

We decide to find information about going to other shores at a local Marina. Which erupts in a very nice conversation with a equally nice elderly couple. And so we munched Chinese, a sleeping on a beautiful boat under the Caribbean sky and tomorrow we’ll check Colombian shippers for a ride to where ever

And this happened in just over 24 hours, what the fuck.