ALLURING ARUBA IN APRIL!

 Wednesday, April 6, 2022

Aruba

86F, sunny and windy

 Aruba greeted us early this morning with lots of sun. This island is located about 14 miles from Venezuela in the mid-south Caribbean Sea. It is one of four countries that form the Kingdom of the Netherlands, including the Netherlands, Curacao, and Sint Maarten. The citizens of these countries are all Dutch nationals. Its capital is Oranjestad, which is where we are docked.

 

Unlike much of the Caribbean region, Aruba has a dry climate and an arid, cactus strewn landscape. The climate helps tourism because it is clear and sunny all year. The population is about 116,000 (2019).   I wonder how soon we can move to Aruba.

Right off ship!

We walked along the waterfront 

By 9 a.m. we were off the ship and walking to the city—about a mile.  We like the Renaissance Center – it has a Starbucks!  It also has some fine shops, like Tommy Bahamas, Lilly Pulitizer, Gucci, Prada, and so on, but our favorite is Aruba Aloe—skin care products made in Aruba. One year we took a tour of their acres of aloe and their factory.   We need to do that again.

The second floor of the Renaissance Center -- 

the Mariott Renaissance pool

 

We continued walking around along tree lined streets filled with shops. TK wanted to take the trolley that circles the area and fortunately there was room when it stopped near us. A couple years ago when we were here it had just been established and we were the only riders. Now tourists know about it and we were lucky to find a seat.

More fabulous shops

The trolley tracks

Believe it or not, the trolley stopped for a break by this darling shop

The driver said the trolleys were purchased from San Francisco!

 Someone on the street handed us two $15 vouchers for the Renaissance Casino, so got off the trolley at that stop and we headed that way. It took TK about a half hour to lose the $30 and that was the end of that!

 

Renaissance Center with the Casino on the 2nd floor

Along the waterfront was another marketplace and I kept seeing information for a Dutch Pancake House. The menu looked really good, 15 kinds of pancakes, other breakfast, lunch, and dinner items-----these were the sweet pancake options: pancakes

Peach on the beach - $ 13.75
Peaches, powdered sugar & Grand Marnier flambé

Brandied raisins - $ 13.25

Rum raisins & powdered sugar

​Picasso - $ 14.75

Various fresh fruits, ice-cream (vanilla, banana or strawberry), whipped cream & powdered sugar

​Strawberry fields - $ 15

Fresh strawberries, ice-cream (vanilla, banana or strawberry) & powdered sugar

​Blueberry hill - $ 15

Fresh blueberries, ice-cream (vanilla, banana or strawberry) & powdered sugar

​Tropical wave - $ 13.75

Peaches, pineapple, coconut flakes, ice-cream (vanilla, banana or strawberry) & powdered sugar
 

Fruit delight - $ 15.50
Fresh strawberries, blueberries, banana, whipped cream & powdered sugar

​Chocolate delight - $ 15.50

Fresh strawberries, banana, nutella, whipped cream & powdered sugar

Caribbean banana - $13.25

Banana, ice-cream (vanilla, banana or strawberry), piña colada mix & powdered sugar

​Shawn’s sweet special - $ 14.50

Banana, caramelized walnuts, honey & powdered sugar

More at https://www.thedutchpancakehouse.com/      I did notice that they had fake maple syrup available.

 

TK did not seem interested, so we walked along the water back to the ship.   Back on board we both had raspberry gelato and a grilled ham and cheese sandwich (for me) and TK had a mufaletto.   

Second page of tonight's menu--why did I not take a photo of the appetizers, salads, and soups??

For Friend A:

This looked really good at the cafe!

 

Culinary Take: The dessert at dinner was lemon meringue cheesecake! It was great, almost as good as Cheesecake Factory.

TK’s Takes: The coffee package leads to more people trying coffee drinks they never had which leads to more people at the café.  This leads to a big line in the morning. He also mentioned there was no port talk with suggestions of things to see and no shopping talks with suggestions of good places to shop. Fortunately, we have been on the islands enough that we know where to shop!

TK even took photos to accompany his Take today!

Gelato shop--no line

Six of the 12 gelato flavor choices. Raspberry is the best.

They make their waffle cones here.

Line for the cafe--this line is moderate 

compared to morning time

TK's Take #2:  He just started spouting off about the carrot cake he ordered for dessert tonight so I thought I would share.  It appeared to be a spicy bar cake with shredded carrot in orange Jello on top. Dried shredded carrots were on top of that for a sort of garnish. Now he is spouting off that he should have taken a photo of it. Classic TK. Fortunately I asked the waiter to bring another lemon meringue cheesecake for him because I wasn't sharing mine.