World Travel Report: Aruba
Aruba, a vacationer's paradise. This Caribbean island is a crowd pleaser for visitors from around the globe. Here you can find some of the most beautiful beaches this part of the world has to offer as well as an array of high-end restaurants, hotels, and casinos. It's like the Caribbean meets Las Vegas.
Aruba is an expensive vacation destination and scores low in affordability on my travel rating scale from 1-5. However Aruba scores well on food, safety, and activities.
Travel Score = 3.5
Affordability= 1.5
Food= 5
Culture = 3.5
Safety = 5
Activities = 5
Hotel Value= 2.5
Transportation = 2.5
Just flying there round trip from almost anywhere will set you back at least five hundred dollars. Overall expect to pay first world prices or higher for just about everything. With some effort you could probably negotiate a week's stay in the 20 - 25 dollar a night range in the main town of Noord, but I have not personally seeked that out.
I've had the pleasure of spending a week in Aruba in October of 2015 and a week in October 2016. I came on an invite from my father and his wife. They have a time share at the Divi Resort on Eagle Beach, one of the most pristine white beaches on the island.
All week we ate at high-end restaurants, swam in the luxury resort pools, enjoyed the perfect white sand beaches, and drank tropical cocktails. We gambled at the casinos, took a day trip to the lighthouse, and even did an all you can eat and drink snorkeling cruise around the island. We snorkeled above a Nazi WWII ship wreck and saw all sorts of colorful fish and marine life.
People come to Aruba for it's fine dining. At El Gaucho's Steak House I ordered a 36 oz T-Bone. It was bigger than my head! Somehow I managed to eat the whole thing. Also the Aruban style seafood had real good flavor and spice. All over the island you can find incredible restaurants offering top quality food.
Getting around isn't third world cheap either that's for sure. A five to ten minute taxi ride can have you parting with a twenty dollar bill in a hurry. If you have gotten used to how cheap taxis are in other countries like Ecuador, you may be caught in a sticker-shock moment. Other than that, renting a car for 30 dollars a day isn't a bad option.
I felt really safe in Aruba at all times. When we drove through where the locals live in Noord, the streets looked pretty good to me. There was no overt poverty like I've seen in other near-by countries. Aruba relies heavily on their tourist economy, by the looks of things, they are doing well.
Culturally Aruba is a Dutch settled island. The main Airport is called Queen Bitrix International. You can find Dutch influence all throughout the island especially in downtown Orajestad where you will see lots of old traditional Dutch architecture. They also grow fields of Aloe Vera on the island, and they sell a lot of Aloe products to the sun drenched beach goers.
Overall if you are looking for a true vacation, fancy restaurants, beautiful casinos, gorgeous beaches, great weather and willing to pay for it; Aruba may be your ideal destination. For a long term budget traveler like myself, at times I felt a bit out of place; but I made sure to enjoy every minute of it!
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Awesome post !! I love "The Caribbean meets Vegas " part !! Haha , this definitely is where I want to be !! Food / Safety / Activities all pluses for me !! But affordability !? To bad , better hope the price of steem goes up and I get rich enough to go to this fabulous place !! Thanks for sharing , it looks awesome ! So does the food ! Yummy !! For now I will keep dreaming !!! Upped and resteemed💭💭💭💭
You're the best! Thank you!
Your welcome!!💕✌👍
it looks amazing, @world-travel-pro! Will put it my bucket list, thanks for sharing! :D
That handle has a ring to it doesn't it! I'm the World Travel Pro, Yeah! lol
I'm glad you enjoyed. Just wish I had some photos of my own, I just wasn't into taking photos back then, thought it was a distraction from enjoying the moment. I'm a strange animal. Now I'm photo crazy since I got a new camera and I'm steemit. Gonna be posting "Beach dogs of Haad Rin" Went on a photo spree of all the beach/stray dogs living on the beach here. I love dogs!
oh, I understand - I wasn't really into taking photos of myself for quite a long time, and now I'm starting to make them for steemit XD
Dogs are great, but how about cats? :D
i got one hot of a cat sitting on a motor bike like it's the queen of shiba. We'll see if I can get the post up. But like you said time is better spent socializing on here in many regards. I find it procrastinatingly enjoyable.
I think it's better to both post and talk to people, it's just that I just don't have that much time XD
but please oh please find some time to post that cat, I love cats :D
Here the post with the dogs and the one cat.
https://steemit.com/travel/@world-travel-pro/the-beach-dogs-of-haad-rin-koh-pha-ngan-thailand-and-one-happy-cat-los-perros-de-los-playas-de-haad-rin-koh-pha-ngan-thailand-y
and take a look at my new designated office. Not bad huh?
https://steemit.com/travel/@world-travel-pro/world-travel-pro-finds-his-office-in-koh-pha-ngan-thailand-world-travel-pro-encontra-el-officina-en-koh-pha-ngan-thailand
Now that I've good internet I'm spending the day here and posting and going to socialize on here. I've got a touch of ADD like behavior. I like to post and just hyper focus on that, or I get into social mode and just hyper focus on that. Not good. But that's kind of how my mind works. Great finding you guys on here. Maybe we'll cross paths someday. I'm heading to Laos in 2 weeks. Not sure if that's on your itinerary this time around.
Oh, my mind works pretty much the same 😁 I don't think I can do anything about that 😅 We're going to be in Bali in 2 weeks, so maybe we cross paths some other day :)
Will check out your posts now!
Bali is certainly a little slice of heaven. Have you been there before? Funny I just posted a bali report last week. Might be a good read since your heading there soon. Also just posted what I consider my best post yet, it's an in-depth report of my tour of Koh Pha Ngan. Are you familiar with this Island?
Great post you earned a new follower from @thefollower -_- Like money? Read my blogs for more!
Thank you!
Ohh I love the Dutch Antilles. never been to Aruba but loved our 2 trips to Curacao. So good for scuba diving!
Yes the Caribbean is a special place. That is for sure!
Our Dutch paradise! nice
only went to Sint Maarten a few times when i was working on Cruise Ships
Yes you are dutch. Great people. Glad you enjoy my travel posts. Working on a cruise ship sounds exciting! What did you do on there?
i was manager for the Retail there, hard work but great reward on destinations and could save some good money.
Glad to hear that!
This is world-class material.
Great post. !!
Thank you
Wow, Aruba is indeed a paradise. And for diving? I want to visit this country next time.
Yeah it's fantastic for that. Snorkeling is a hell of a lot cheaper though. So as an add on to my other reply.....yeah I don't manage my time on here well. I write long thought out replies to like eveyrone. I wrote like a page and a half to the whale @lukestokes we have a whole conversation going about where the value of steem comes from. I got to get focused.
Ok, please get them to give me 1% of their upvote/wealth, only if they like my content lol. Btw, I'm still living off steemit.
Ok goodluck with that!
I got a feeling you're going to be living very well off steemit a year from now.
Lol I wish, I still have to double the writings. And the others write one paragraph and get big upvotes lol.
I think you should think about becoming insta whale, you'll get a lot of followers instantly lol. And whales support other whales, that's how I see it.
Of course, don't listen to me.
It would involve moving money around that I think is working for me better and safer held where it is. But it's tempting. "Of course, don't listen to me." That is such an @diabolica comment. Interesting getting to know people's personalities on here. You go girl! Never assume you're not being listened to! Maybe when some things come due in a few month's I can go insta-whale.
Hey how many hours would you say you spend on here in an average day including writing your posts? Just curious.
Hahaha.
I don't know it depends, sometimes I get so engrossed in a story that it takes 3 hours lol. It makes me feel free and calmer, just getting the story out of my system so it's good for me. It's just early in the morning, when my mind is fresh and I have positive things to write about. Then in the evening, depending on my mood at the end of the day lol. You can probably tell the difference between my two posts each day haha.
It's interesting this guy - enz... something, on my latest post. He commented, upvoted his own comment, then he told me he gave me a follow. But all lies lol. I checked, so I didn't follow him back. And he didn't upvote my post, which I checked through steemnow.com. You see there are some cheeky, selfish guys out there, that might trick you into following them first or upvoting their content.
You can check out his mediocre posts regularly upvoted by the famous whales lol.
Yes there are all different types on here. I'm impressed that you can sit for 3 hours and write and not feel like your back in school. I enjoy writing but not for 3 hours straight! You've taken it to level of art in a cathartic way. I've enjoyed going through my photos. Have post up showing the dogs of Haad Rin (and yes a couple paragraphs too, lol) I'm now doubling up by translating my stuff into Spanish. Heck I speak the language. I guess I should.
So I was banging my head against the wall this morning. All I wanted to do is go the restaurant and have a coffee and check my email. Well after looking around and seeing 10 others eating up the bandwidth with their faces burried in their phones. I litterally couln't even open my email after 15 minutes of frustration. So I found this place. Check it out!
https://steemit.com/travel/@world-travel-pro/world-travel-pro-finds-his-office-in-koh-pha-ngan-thailand-world-travel-pro-encontra-el-officina-en-koh-pha-ngan-thailand
You're such an amazing backpacker! I wish I could do the same. 😌
Thank you @world-travel-pro for sharing this. I would like to come to this paradise in our next travel expedition. Turkey is our next venture in Sept. Upvoted and followed.
Thank you. I'm looking forward to that part of the world next year,Turkey. I'm sure you have great time there.