Aruba 2012 Day 6 (page 6 of 10)

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Day 6 - Happy Valentine's Day!!!!!

A few notes about Aruba in general that I don't think I've mentioned so far. The bathrooms everywhere we've been are clean and not scary. Granted, we have been eating in some nice places, but some of these places have the bathrooms off the side of the malls & such, and everywhere is fine. The odd thing is nearly all of these places have signs that request no paper AT ALL in the toilets. It's hard to remember to toss the toilet paper in the trash can (which thank goodness is located in the stall with you) but maybe it has something to do with the sewer bubbling up in various areas at times.

The lizards are EVERYWHERE. They run across the road as you drive, they sneak across the beach as you walk, they scamper through the yard of the condo & sun themselves in our jacuzzi outside. So if you see a lot of pictures, that's why! Tonight we actually saw one - a baby or some sort of small species. He was approx. 2 inches in length - MAYBE - from snout to tip of tail. Pretty cute actually!

Dutch is widely spoken, as is the main language of Papiemento. Mike can speak fluent Dutch & that perks up a number of the waiters. But we rarely have trouble communicating in English, and Mike is constantly surprised at the amount of Dutch he hears spoken by tourists around him. When Greta made reservations for supper one night, the gal answering the phone actually pronounces "van Meeteren" the Dutch way - not as Greta spoke it in the American way.

Speaking of Dutch, it is bizarre that in nearly every souvenir store or stand, there is a large assortment of Delft Blue (blue/white Dutch ceramics) items right next to the lizards statues & the shell-motif items. I don't think it's true Delft Blue, at least not what I've seen, but it's weird to see everyone. Here you see the blue/white tile with a windmill, there is a pink lizard, here is a mini set of wooden shoes, there is a t-shirt with a picture of the beach....

And if you are reading this, I (Greta) apologize for the typos. I'm typing it in "Notepad" and so there is no spell check, no thesaurus, nothing -- and I'm usually too tired to proofread once I'm done - so the typos are there for the whole world to see & cringe at. Yes, I realize I just ended that sentence in a preposition, but I'm from Minnesota, and we do that sort of thing! And I will switch to/from the first person - and because I was a math person, it bothers me somewhat that it's wrong, but not enough to go back and fix it. And yes, the exclamation point is overused, but this is vacation, and everything is fun & exciting! :) If any of this abuse of grammar & spelling bothers YOU that much, just pretend you are 3 years old & look at the pictures only - HA!

But back to Valentine's Day. We got up that morning, and the boys made breakfast. Scrambled eggs, bacon, toast & juice. Mike & Jim have different ideas on the PROPER way of making the eggs, but no matter, everything turned out very tasty. It was cleaning day (once a week, a cleaning service comes in and cleans the entire place) and so by the end of the day, we had a fully cleaned condo & all fresh towels (although we do have a washer/dryer in the condo so when this needs to be done, it's a quick job) & kitchen stuff. Wow - what a Valentine's Day! Someone else did all the cleaning & cooking - nothing could be better.

We were about to head out for snorkeling when we met up with someone about our wireless internet. It has not worked since we got here. Mike has a cable, so we have wired internet (which is why you can read this now) but that's it. We was smart enough to listen to what Jim/Mike had to say & concluded that he couldn't help. He assured us that it would get fixed (something about the user password needing to be re-set by the provider) today, but as of 9:30 pm, we still don't have wireless. But that's OK (at least to Greta, the non-technical person in the place) - it's vacation!

We headed out to Mangel Halto Beach - which was halfway between our condo & Baby Beach. Mike found on the internet that it was supposed to be great snorkeling because it is rather unknown w/o facilities, and therefore, the coral has not died due to too many people touching it or stepping on it. We got there OK, and it was right in the middle of an area of a small town that was anything but fancy - no resorts, a local bar & pretty simple private homes and/or duplex type places - kind of a lower-rent area. But we parked our car & Mike found the beach access & we schlepped all our stuff (chairs, cooler, bags, towels, snorkel gear, cameras, etc) down to the beach to one of a few palapas. Shortly after we arrived a few more people came but it was definitely not crowded. We were in a protected cove area and could see a reef breakwater a ways off. Interestingly enough, after a few hours, it was amazing to see that a lot of the water moved out due to the tide going out. Rocks & grasses appeared by the time we'd left that were fully invisible (underwater) when we'd arrived. I just looked at the link posted in the beginning of the paragraph & it mentions a wreck to see - now we REALLY need to go back.

Anyway - the snorkeling. BEST LOCATION EVER!!!! The coral was amazing - huge brain coral balls that were almost 3 feet in diameter, and some sort of bacon-type coral that stretched on in giant fields. Every fish in every color, shape & size appeared. Crayola couldn't make a box of crayons big enough to see what we saw today. You'll have to look at some of the pictures & videos, but it just cannot capture what we saw. Some of the best fish we didn't even get a good picture of but it was truly amazing. There were fish the size of a grain of rice & others nearly 2 feet long! Jim & Mike even saw some sort of little squid - amazing. If we go snorkeling again, THIS will be the place we go!

Mike & Greta walked out to the shallow part of the breakwater & saw a little brown/yellow eel sneak under a rock. There were also some neat shells with the animals still inside, gripping onto the rock. Back near our palapa, we even found a little hermit crab trying to sneak away. Greta carried him further away (wooo - it was like air travel for him) so that he survived. He had a pretty orangish-red shell. We also collected a few pretty shells that were vacant from any inhabitants.

On shore, we got a couple pictures of some birds & such. The ones we got today were a gull of some sort, a brown pelican, American Oyster Catcher (short legged wading bird) & the Crested Caracara (hawk). The forked-tail bird that was hovering over our sunset cruise a few days ago was called a Frigatebird. For reasons like this, the internet is GREAT to have in your room!

Around 2:30, we packed up & left for the condo. We showered/changed and then headed back down-island to Flying Fishbone. As you can see by the link, you sit ON the beach and dip your toes in the sand (or water if you are close enough). The servers are barefoot as well. Tom & Sue Cook highly recommended this place and it did not disappoint. Our waiter WAS on island time, so things moved very slowly, but on the other hand, we were not on a schedule, although there were people waiting, so we were surprised he didn't hurry a little bit since we were ready to go, but he was not ready. One other thing we've noticed here on the island is that the servers do NOT push drinks. You usually have to ask for refills on whatever you are drinking. Water is the exception though - Aruba is known for its "sweet water" and everywhere you go, it seems there is a designated person filling your water glass with ice water, so you never go thirsty. But the water is free, so it's surprising to Americans that they don't ask about your other drinks. And while you sit on the beach, hang your shoes on a little stand, you sit & watch the sun sink into the sea - what an awesome place for Valentine's Day!

Oh, the food - you know I can't leave you hanging. We started out with a chilled seafood appetizer. On the plate was shaved/smoked salmon, a seafood salad, peppered/seared tuna, shrimp and a crab claw. For our main meals, Jim had the Wahoo special, Trina had the chicken (the best looking plate), Mike had a shrimp/blue cheese baked casserole (weird, but amazingly good), and Greta had scallops w/spinach in a paremesean sauce. For dessert, Trina had a french crepe pie, Jim had a strawberry/lemon curd trifle, and Greta & Mike both had baked Alaska, which they lit on fire AT your table. Everything tasted wonderful!

Then back to our condo for a quiet evening, and the first batch of Rum Runners, in honor of the tasty drink we had on the sunset sail a few days ago.

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