harryfat1

Obligatory tourist pictures by the I Love Aruba sign. I didn’t take a picture of the line but there’s a whole long line to get this picture and many people try to cheat/cut in to get their picture. I took a picture of the line when we came back from the tour (check back on post #970) and the line was just as long 4 hours later. What does that say about our society when people can’t even line up properly for a simple tourist picture without cutting/cheating? Similar to chair hogs' behavior on the ship…

Here’s the gate to keep the non-cruisers away from the cruise terminal The sun will be setting soon

Ahh, yes, the Freewinds ship. I saw this ship on every YouTube channel when the people got off their cruise ships and walked out of the cruise terminal so I know the ship is docked here year around. Only later on someone mentioned the ship was owned by the Church of Scientology. Then I became curious and looked up the info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freewinds It’s supposed to be used to train their highest-level members. So be on the lookout for the ship next time you are in Aruba. Can’t miss it as it’s just adjacent to the cruise ship if you are docked next to the cruise terminal. If you are docked where the Carnival ship is docked, then you have to walk a bit to see it

Now the cruise terminal is a lot less chaotic than at 8:30 this morning. Almost every kiosk is closed and done for the day

OK. Done with the view from above, it’s time to get off the ship again similar to Curacao as the ship is docked in town very late until 10 PM and the All Aboard is 9:30, more than enough time to check out the port area. This picture of inside the cruise terminal was taken at 6 PM so a portion of the passengers are already back on the ship eating dinner on early seating. As I mentioned before, the Aruba cruise terminal is similar to Cozumel where you have a maze of shops inside the complex before walking out. Guess it’s a good thing if you have mobility issues and don’t want to venture too far from the ship but can still visit the crazy aunt in the basement (aka shopping)

The Aruba port area looks ok but I’m sure glad we decided to utilize the NorthStar while at Cuaaco instead of here. Not sure there’s that much more to see here in Aruba if we were higher up

Since the Seaplex is a multi-use arena, when it’s not being used for bumper car/basketball/table tennis, they use it for laser tag. For that afternoon, they have it set for it Cruise port area of Aruba

Since we had time as it was only 5:45, we went up to the top deck to take some pictures of the cruise port area of Aruba. What do you get if you merge soccer with billiards? You get the RCI version of whatever this is called… Every Q-class ship has an oversized animal on the top deck. For the Odyssey, it’s the pink cat

I don’t remember what we did for the next couple of hours as I have a 2-hour gap in my pictures. We might have taken a nap back in the cabins after a long morning of bus rides all over the island. Not sure why I took this picture as the ship wasn’t moving. Maybe just trying to see how far we are from Labadee, our next stop? Looking out to the ocean. I saw a tiny dot (arrow) and it turned out to be an oil rig. Not surprising as we are very close to Venezuela and they are part of the well-disliked OPEC group

After the late lunch, we went to 270 to stretch out and relax a bit. I think it's obvious that this is our family's favorite place as well. Other people are in the back as well admiring the view Silver Seas Ship

Impressive to be able to do the SeaBob and Segway on the same day. I would imagine the arm can be sore to be stretched out for an extended period.

I think right around 3 o'clock, a worker came by every table to let people know they will be taking the food away soon so people has one last chance to grab whatever they wanted

No cruise port visit is complete until you see DI 🤪

After dropping off our stuff, we headed directly for Windjammer as we know they close at 3 PM on the dot so we didn’t have much time to waste. Not too crowded just before closing at 2:41

We made it back to the pier at 2:20. As before, my BFFs were the water guys at the pier I always wonder how much sand the cruisers bring back from a beach day like in Aruba or Labadee in their towels and clothes/backpacks? The ship workers have to work extra hard to vacuum up the cabins and hallways from all the sand we bring back in our shoes/clothes...

Huge supermarket on the way back to the cruise terminal. The tour guide/bus driver said around 1/3 of the super,markets on the island are run by various mainland Chinese conglomerates so they must value the investment value to buy up the grocery stores on the island As with many tours, they pick you up at the front of the cruise terminal but then they drop you off far away so you have to walk past the gauntlet of various shops before getting back to the ship. See the long line of people at the I Love Aruba sign? We would join that long line later in the day.

OK, an hour is up so it’s time to load up the bus and head back to the cruise terminal. Here are the map stops of what we saw today. So basically we visited the major tourist destinations in the northern part of the island. As you can see from the various tours buses and ATVs, many people visit those destinations as well. Aruba also has a baby natural bridge that is famous but this tour didn’t go there.

After getting our feet wet in the waters, we walked around the beach area for a bit. I think the majority of the folks from the tour bus never even touched the water as they ate/drank at the bar area

Very nice. Never knew that. I should check for compasses for my December Carnival cruise so I can see what a typical week will look like

The final stop of this whirlwind tour of the North part of Aruba island is Arashi Beach. It’s not the most well-known beach in Aruba, that would be Eagle Beach. Arashi Beach is more north and has more waves than the other beaches and not as smooth sand as the other beaches but since it’s part of the tour, you don’t have the option to select the beach you want. But I think most beaches in Aruba have enough of the “wow” factor anyway if you just present a picture of the beach to an average person. Just be glad to be able to feel the warm waters in December when most of the US and Canada are stuck in the cold weather. Looking back at the lighthouse from the beach area