Day Three - Oranjestad, Aruba
We got to sleep in again today, had room service breakfast and watched from our deck as we started getting closer to Aruba and the gulls started hovering off our deck to dive and pick off flying fish as they escaped from the ships wake.
Pulling into the Dutch Antilles island of Aruba we watch them tie up at shore, which is quite the process, and just after 1:00, we disembark for our tour.
Today we would be doing a 4 wheel drive adventure around the island. We load into an open 4WD with 6 other people we met, 2 from Salt Spring Island, 2 from Ottawa, 1 from Toronto, and our honorary Canadian, a lady from Hilton Head in South Carolina.
Not touring in the Banana Bus 
Touring in the 4x4... oh yeah!
Apparently we could have just done this
The first stop is the Casibari Rock formations, a unique cluster of large rocks that are like a mini version of Uluru (Ayers rock) in Australia. From the top of the rock you can almost see the entire island, including our cruise ship back at the port.
The view from the top Our Canadian Crew
Often when you are in foreign countries, you see the strangest things, like this leftover tiger from an Esso parade float.
Next up is Natural Bridge, or as our guide calls it, ex-natural bridge, since it collapsed back in 2005. There is a smaller one which we called "Son of a Bridge".
Apparently some tourist showed up in Aruba and stacked some rocks, Inukshuk style, and then everyone that came after that copied them until the entire beach is lined with stacked rocks. The locals have no idea why or what it means, we're pretty sure the first tourist must have been a Canadian.
From here the "shake & bake" tour really begins, and we bounce around the north coast of the island to the Bushiribana gold smelter, the remains of a gold smelter that was built of natural stone in 1825 and functioned for most of the 19th century.
Of course no historical gold smelter ruins are complete without a Cold Beer stand.
The Shake & Bake tour continues along the rugged coast, past more crashing waves and natural bridges.
We wound our way along the coast to a little church called the Alto Vista Chapel. It was completed in 1952 and stands in the same location as the original chapel, that was built by a Venezuelan missionary to convert the native Indians, in 1750.
We're always trying to make new friends, dogs and people selling cold drinks are the best.
We took a spin past the California Lighthouse, named after the ship that crashed there, and caused the country to build a lighthouse. Because of the silver set, we had to make a restroom stop here, which took away from our beach time.
The view from this part of the island is spectacular.
Just around the corner from the lighthouse, our last stop was at the lovely Arashi Park beach, the sand was nice, and the bath water warm, crystal clear water was so refreshing. As I am floating there, I feel a poke at my feet and look down to see 6-7 small fish pecking at my toes... Some people pay good money for this type of service.
We have a good laugh as we float in blue blue waters watching the sun start to come down, and half the tour are all sitting on the rock wall waiting for the jeeps to go... Some old people are pretty funny. Begrudgingly we are told we have to get out and head back... So we slowly do. The sun is setting as we get back to our ship. This was a great tour!
We decide to go back to the ship to drop our swimsuits off and grab a super quick bite before heading back into Oranjestad to do some shopping. By the time we eat our BBQ dinner (steak, sausages, ribs, salmon, and chicken), and get back out there, almost all the stores are closed, it is almost 7:00 after all. There was a bunch of local craft huts and small souvenir shacks, so we did manage to find a couple Aruba ornaments for the Infamous Travel Tree come Christmas.
Tonight's show starts late, 11:00, but for good reason, it's the Filipino Crew show, a bunch of traditional songs and dances put on by the staff members from the Philippines. We had a couple amazing Filipino drinks before the show started, and chatted to some of the crew. Looks like we're adding the 1700+ Philippine islands to our travel list. We have been offered a tour guide and a purchase of an island...
Apparently Marocay Island is the place to go, hmmmm.
After the show, we take a walk around the key hot-spots of the ship; the night club, the Ocean Bar, the Crows nest, even the Lido deck... It's a ghost town, apparently a day in port is very hard on the old fogies, they're all in bed. 12:30, I guess we'll call it a night too, room service comes early tomorrow.
