Vacation…What Vacation?

Nancy and John often get asked how our vacation is going. Our answer is always, “this isn’t a vacation, this is our life.” The next question is generally, “Well, what do you do all day?”

Good question! We generally start our day at different times. Nancy, the early riser, heads downstairs around 5:30 to make coffee. While here in Aruba, she then heads out to our covered porch to commune with the birds as the world wakes up...especially these three little guys.

While watching the sun rise, Nancy plays online crossword puzzles with friends and reads the news on her iPad. John heads downstairs around 7:00, grabs a cup of coffee and heads back up stairs to read the news. After all the bad news has been digested, they both begin their day. Nancy heads to the gym where she’ll spend hours on the treadmill or elliptical while streaming TV and movies. John heads over to the gym three days a week…he’s not quite as dedicated as Nancy.

John’s gym workout is only about 40 minutes and after that it’s a dip in our pool, which is great in the morning before the sun warms it into bath water.

The rest of the mornings are spent with Nancy in the gym and John either searching for grants for the non-profit he’s a part of (www.mothergoosereadtome.org) or doing watercolors. John has a watercolor paper book that he takes on trips to paint interesting things he sees. We have watercolors from our trips back to 2016 including Galapagos, Bali, Mexico, Italy and now Aruba. He also has a bunch of blank postcards composed of sturdy watercolor paper on which he paints pictures that he then sends to his grandkids.

Click on each picture to expand.

Since we were in Italy last year, we’ve been trying to keep up the idea of shopping for just a day or two and it’s no different here. We generally have lunch around 11:30 and after that head to the grocery store of our choice, Ling and Sons. We share the meal planning and cooking so we each go our own way in the store to pick up the items we need for the next dinner or two.

Next is an adventure to the wine store. Back in Mexico, we found that the wines in the grocery stores were pretty terrible. If you remember, halfway through our two months around Cancun, we found a great wine store that we then visited every couple of weeks. Well, the same thing is true here. The wines in the grocery stores are subpar so John googled a better place to buy wine. When we drove to the first place, it was boarded up and closed. The second place we found is called H&H Fine Wines and it was truly a find. H&H is owned by a gentleman named Bobby and his wine selection is excellent. He’s got wines from all over the world and supplies many of the better restaurants in Aruba.

Wine sample dispenser- one quarter of the wines - Bobby checking out our wines.

On our first visit, we were happy that they had not only this great selection of wine but also a four-bottle wine dispenser. Though, the real surprise was when we said we’d like to try a sample of one of the wines, the person waiting on us went into the back room and came out with two Riedel wine glasses. If you’re not familiar with Riedel, they have been producing crystal glasses in Europe for the past 265 years and are one of the favorite glasses of wine lovers. It was really nice to be drinking out of nice crystal instead of the cheap glasses at most of the Airbnb’s we’ve stayed at.

H&H also sponsors wine tasting dinners in different nice restaurants in town. We were invited to one dinner, but unfortunately, it’s on the day we head back to Philly. Maybe next time.

After our shopping trips we head back to the condo. John spends the afternoon reading and Nancy splits her time between reading and working out again...she’s trying to make up for the months of decadence in Italy and beyond.

Around five, it’s time for an early evening cocktail and prep work for dinner. Aruba doesn’t use Daylight Saving Time, so it gets dark around 7 PM. We have dinner around 6:30 while watching TV. We’re always looking for recommendations on programs to watch, so if you have any suggestions list them below in the comments section. (Remember if you do not want to sign in with your email, you can sign in as a guest...just please put your name at the end of your comment so we know who wrote the comment)

Some evenings before dinner, we head to the beach. It’s much too hot for old folks like us to sit out during the day, so we go in the late afternoon. Some of the shoreline near us is rocky, but most of the beaches in Aruba have the whitest sand we have ever seen. We don’t stay long, maybe a half hour, but the water is so clear and inviting it’s impossible not to enjoy a quick dip.

A rocky section of the beach (with one of the two pirate ships that ply the sea near North Beach - a shot of the turquoise water - the Sandy beach near us.

Some nights we go out for dinner. There are so many great places to eat here in Aruba. We can’t imagine what it must be like in the high season, which is mid-December through mid-April. At this time of the year, most restaurants outside of the high-rise tourist hotel areas are not busy at all. We like to try new places and don’t often go to the same restaurant twice, but we’ve found two places that we really like. The first is “Lucca Trattoria Aruba” and the other is…wait for it, “Screaming Eagle,” which isn’t as weird as it sounds.

Lucca is right on the edge of the tourist section in Palm Beach. There’s a large indoor area and a smaller outdoor area near the bar. We first went there because we read the pizza was amazing. And, since we had been so good on watching our carbs, we decided we needed to balance our fish and veggies with a few good old pizza carbs.

One of the best parts of Lucca was meeting Kevin, the bartender and Jack-of-all trades. Keven makes one of the best Martinis and Manhattans this side of Parc in center city Philly. Plus, he’s very personable and attentive to diners. We met him on our first visit to Lucca and the other night we went back again and he remembered who we were.

Kevin preparing the martini for Nancy - a guy making pizza - Kevin pouring John's Manhattan.

Now the Screaming Eagle might sound like a dive bar, but far from it. It’s a French fusion restaurant in the heart of South Beach. Let’s let Frommer’s explain Screaming Eagle, “This upscale spot is heavy on the lounge factor, with special attention paid to diners whose ideal night is eating in bed. While there's a choice of seats indoors or on the terrace, one section of the house is geared toward those looking for romance. Sumptuous canopy beds decked out in white with dim lighting set the mood, enhanced by dishes delivered on wooden bed trays.” We ate outside on the terrace, not feeling adventurous enough to try to eat in bed. We’ve only been there once but enjoyed meals and the great wait staff. We hope to go back but our days in Aruba for this trip are winding down.

The front of Screaming Eagle - the lounging beds to the left - our quiet terrace table.

We have a rule about going out to dinner, ‘never go out on weekends!’ We figure that since we’re retired everyday is a Saturday except Sunday…our week consists of six Saturdays and one Sunday. But we prefer to stay away from restaurants when most other people go out, i.e., Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. But two weeks ago we were again jonesing for a pizza. Nancy found a place called Casa Tua, which had great reviews for a pizza place even with a Mexican sounding name. It’s right in the center of one of the most touristy sections of Aruba, plus it was a Sunday. Wow! It was like going to an Olive Garden on a Friday night in a busy mall around Christmas! But, all-in-all the pizza was really good and we got to be with more people at one time than anywhere else in Aruba!

Sunday at Casa Tua

One last place before we move on…Nusa. We finally found a restaurant specializing in Rice Table. Rice Table, as you might remember from our last post, is a Dutch (by way of Indonesia) specialty where there are many dishes served with rice, hence Rice Table. Nusa is located in Oranjestad, the main town in Aruba; when we arrived we were welcomed with a table especially for us.

Nusa’s menu has three choices for Rice Table: you can pick 5, 7, or 9 different dishes with your rice. After asking our server what she would suggest, we went with five dishes. You can see from the picture above four of the five dishes plus some sauces and chutney. It was good, not as good as those in Amsterdam (if memory serves).

For the first seven weeks, Aruba’s weather has been 86F everyday with a constant wonderful breeze. Well, last week we had our first storm since coming here in early July and it was a beauty. You can see from the video below that the thunder and lightning were almost constant from 4 AM until later that morning.

Plus, the rain was torrential, filling up the top three inches of our pool, flooding the street and coming in thru the front door (4 beach towels to dry it up). The wind actually blew the top off our lamppost.

Now, since the storm passed, we’ve had four days where the palm trees barely move…the wind seems to have disappeared and the temperature has been moving up to the high 80s with much more humidity. Maybe now is a good time to head back to Philly where we noticed it 79F today. This warmer weather has brought out more wildlife like these beautiful little Bananaquit also known as the “chickadee of the Caribbean" and these colorful Aruban Whiptails.

We'll gang, we think that's all from Aruba. Next week we're heading back to Philadelphia where we'll be for at least a month. After that, we're not sure where or what...but we'll keep you posted.

Nancy and John