Day 84 3rd April 2011

Iguana

Aruba Shops

Today we stopped at Auroba, an island in the Dutch Antilles. It is a Sunday so the local town is quite quiet. It is obviously a duty free place since it is full of jewellery shops and other high value goods. Most of them are closed since it is a Sunday. We walked along the marina to a local park that overlooks the sea. It was full of iguanas running across the grass or climbing the palm trees. They had obviously been photographed by thousands of people since they were not frightened. It was 27c but there was a strong wind blowing so it seemed cooler. We stopped for a drink overlooking the marina and watched a fishing boat. One of those that you hire to take you out to fish return and show off their catch. Some very large fish had been caught and they held them up for everyone to see. The road around the marina has many small stall type shops so we popped in several of them on the way back to the ship. 

The ship is moored near to a cruise terminal and compared to many other ports security is light and almost invisible. In New Zealand we were endlessly asked for passports and our ship cards. In contrast at Aruba a security officer accepted a wave of your cards from a distance as proof that you could come in. On the ship they were scrutinised and all bags scanned in the normal way.

The ship is secured on the port side so from our side (i.e. starboard) is the open sea once you cross the reef which is only a few hundred yards away. We sat on the balcony during the afternoon allowing time to drift past.