Day 1
So.. our room has free wi-fi. That's good news. I can email you any time.
Obviously, we made it to Curacao! The wedding day became the longest day ever because we never went to sleep. The car came at 3:50am. The first flight was on an MD80, which wouldn't have been bad if we weren't in row 29! MD80's (as I'm sure you are NOT aware) have rear fuselage mounted engines. The right one was literally RIGHT outside my window. The wall vibrated so much it was hard to sleep. But I must have because it didn't feel like 3+ hours.
The 2nd one was on a 757. Much better plane, but I was in the middle and the lady in the aisle seat was eating a disgusting mixture of tuna fish, chickpeas and onions. UGH!!! Then she fell asleep and snored with her face toward me so I got the lovely onion/tuna breath all the way to Miami.
The 3rd flight was 2 hours and 50 min. It felt the longest to me because I was awake. Corky forgot his headphones so he borrowed mine to watch TV. While he was blissfully entranced by some show, I got to listen to an Estonian girl getting airsick for about 30 minutes. Lovely.
We got to the hotel last night, unpacked and went to bed!
Today, the weather is cloudy, but it's HOT and humid. The resort is sort of nice.... nothing like Cabo, and I would say the one in Cancun was nicer too, except for the room. The air conditioning at least works here!
They upgraded us to the "executive floor" which means we have a huge room and access to the executive lounge which has free breakfast. We actually have 2 reservations here because Corky bought 2 nights free with his Hilton points, and that ends tomorrow so I'm not sure if they'll be making us move rooms for the 2nd reservation or not. Either way, we took advantage of the free breakfast this morning and we will tomorrow too (just in case we lose our access to that room after tomorrow.) I had cereal (twice) with milk, fruit, 1 and a half pieces of toast with peanut butter, and I stole an apple to eat later.
The lady in the lounge was really nice and when she found out it was our honeymoon she told me she'd send something to our room. Well, just now we walked back in and found a plate of cheese, some pieces of bread, tons of walnuts and honey. And wine. One of the cheeses was cheddar, one tasted like nothing, and the third smelled like manure so we didn't touch it. We also did not touch the wine. Lol!
I discovered some caged macaws on the property. They are sort of friendly. But super cute! And there are some wild green parrots that fly around squawking. I saw them when we went to the little beach. We snorkeled and saw some tiny fish and some medium fish. Corky was standing on this rock and a little black fish rushed out and bit his toe. I think the fish had eggs. Anyway, it chased after Corky, trying to bite him, until he was like 10 feet away. It was hilarious!
I contacted C [my friend] and we are going to her Zumba class on Thursday. She is going to come pick us up and then drop us back off after. I also discovered there is Zumba here at the resort in their gym! Monday, Wednesday and Saturday. So tomorrow I'll go do that.
It's a little after 4 now.. and I have no idea what we're going to do. We are looking online for stuff to do in Curacao. I think 2 weeks may actually be a little too long to be here. We'll see.
Day 2
It's only 2:40pm right now but I wanted to send an email about the first half of the day..
We went to breakfast at about 9:45am. I had basically the same stuff as yesterday. Then we went back to the room to figure out where the nearest grocery store is. There is one called Centrum Supermarket like 4 miles away. So we took a cab there and he waited for us while we got our groceries. I was SOOOOO happy to find they had the greek yogurt I like! We got apples, milk, cereal, some sodas and Corky got chips & salsa. The lady at the checkout was a total grump and only spoke Dutch.. so that was fun. Lol.
We came back and put on sunscreen (lots of it) and went down to the beach. We snorkeled for a little bit then Corky went to go look for a memory card for his GoPro while I sunbathed.
We REALLY need to find a memory card for Corky's GoPro... BECAUSE.... if we had one, then we would have caught the following scenario on camera:
We went out on the pier here and jumped off so we could swim to the next beach over and rent kayaks. When we were on our way to the pier, I saw a crab (shesh) in the sand. It was tiny and jumped away from my feet. Then when we were swimming we saw those same crabs in the sand underwater. One came rushing out from under a rock and chased after Corky.. just like the fish yesterday! He was trying to pinch his toes!!! He had his "arms" straight out (like Bijou) and was running sideways after Corky. I laughed so hard I got water in my mask.
Day 2 Part 2
After the pier/crab fiasco, we went to Captain Bligh's Bar so that Corky could get lunch (I was still full from breakfast. I got Coke Zero.) After that we walked to the Dive shop to schedule our dives for tomorrow morning.
This is going to make you cringe but DON'T WORRY!!! IT'S FINE NOW!!!! While walking to the dive shop I felt something in my right heel, like a sliver. When we got back to the room I really felt it! I could see it, but I couldn't get it with my fingers. Corky went on the hunt for tweezers. Unlike in Mexico, he was able to find some! I was able to pull a small piece of something out of my heel. UGH!!! The thing is, it's impossible to wear shoes all the time because there's sand literally everywhere! So.. that was that.
Then I went to Zumba. I was the whitest person in there. There were 2 other "white" girls (and by "white" I mean Caucasian but very, very tan) in there, but they spoke Papiamento, the native language on Curacao, so they were obviously island residents if not natives. One had a decidedly German appearance (Dad, she reminded me of M.B.) and the other looked Dutch, which would make sense given that this is the Netherland Antilles! Anyway, everyone in there spoke Papiamento except for me. Which was unfortunate because the instructor, S, cued only in Papiamento. Fortunately for me, I understand "uno" and "dos" so I was able to catch the single, single, double pretty well, but all the other directives ("shake", "turn", and "squat") went right over my head. It was pretty interesting! My knowledge of language extends far but not that far!
After Zumba we went back downstairs to Bligh's Bar for dinner. We ordered dinner (Nachos for Corky and a salad for me) and listened to a live band while we waited... and waited... and waited.... forever. I had read reviews of the Hilton on TripAdvisor so I expected slow service but really, an hour for nachos and a salad??? That's a little insane. Fortunately, the live band was playing all the european/brazilian/portuguese hits which means... Zumba music!!!!! Also they did a Papiamento version of Gangnam Style, Blurred Lines and some Maroon 5 tunes. I went through 2 diet cokes with lime before my salad came. It was actually pretty gross. So I had some cereal and an apple when I got back upstairs.
We are going to go to bed in about an hour or so because we have to be up at 8 to eat breakfast before we go diving. I'll email you tomorrow once or twice, like today. :)
Day 3 Part 1
Hi!
This morning we went scuba diving. We were with 2 other people, Brazilians who live in Spain (go figure.) They were probably around our age but it was hard to tell. The dive instructor had to ask me my age - apparently I don't look over 18. Lovely. Anyway, we did a shore dive down to about 30 feet. We would have gone deeper if we'd had more time... which we would have if it weren't for the Brazilian Spaniards having freak outs every 5 minutes and shooting to the surface! At one point, the guy had a fit and flapped his fins on top of my head. Needless to say, I was irritated.
I swallowed about a quart of ocean I think. Now my nose, throat and mouth sting. But we saw lots of fish and an eel, and tons of coral and other flora rolling around in the current. I also found some live sand dollars. The instructor turned to make the "OK" sign to me (which I was supposed to return) but instead I handed him a sand dollar. He laughed in a bubbly fashion.
We haven't really done much else today. Corky just had a "quesadilla burger" for lunch (yes it was horrifying.) We are going to C's Zumba class tonight. We are also going to try to get a memory card for Corky's camera so we can hopefully catch on video him irritating the underwater population of Curacao.
I'll email you later.
Day 3 Part 2
Hi
So! Before I forget to mention this to you: the Hilton must have a deal with KLM because every day we see gaggles of KLM pilots and flight attendants in the lobby area. Today, that girl from Zumba last night who looked German appeared from the hotel wearing a KLM flight attendant uniform! So that solves that mystery. She's Dutch, but speaks Papiamentu. Interesting.
Corky and I went down to the beach today at about 2:30 and I sunbathed while Corky went snorkeling with his GoPro and fins and got some footage of the little black fish flying out from the rock and attacking his feet. It's funny.
C came and got us at 6:30 and took us to her Zumba class. It was in this teeny tiny studio with hollow floors that were slippery. There were about 20 people crammed into this tiny space. It was SO HOT! She let me teach 4 songs in a row! I did Applause, Mamba Negra, Udd Udd Dabangg and Ice Cream and Cake. The last one is a fast, fast merengue. By the time it was done, I was pouring sweat and my face looked like a stop sign. It was funny.
After class, C drove us around Willemstad a little before she dropped us off. She showed us some cool places to hang out in the city, as well as giving us some advice about activities we should try. She dropped us off in this area called Otrobanda. Willemstad is divided into 2 parts, Punda and Otrobanda. They are separated by this huge inlet of water that is spanned by the Queen (or princess) Juliana bridge (Koningin Julianabrug in Dutch). We wandered around before we found a place to eat dinner. I had fish, Corky had a Dutch thing called Keshi Yera or something... it was cheese with chicken, veggies and raisins inside. And french fries... again! I had tuna and vegetables. And diet coke... again!! Lol. Then we caught a cab back.
Then we took an apple and went to visit one of the parrots on the property. His cage is kind of off the beaten path and I feel like he's lonely. I bit off a piece of apple (because we don't have a knife) and fed it to him through the bars. He just woke up so he was a little cranky, but he took the apple and started eating it. His eyes started closing and he tilted his head back..... it was so cute. He was falling asleep with the apple in his fist. We put another piece in his bowl for him to have later. We also dropped a few pieces in the other parrots' bowls, but they were hiding in their nest box and didn't come out.
Then we walked to the pier and I stared at the sky while Corky stared into the ocean. We had totally parallel conversations while still hearing every word each other said. It went something like this.
Me: There's cassiopeia...
Corky: What is this rock formation?
Me: ... and there's the little dipper..
Corky: ... it's too square to be natural.
Me: Did you know there are barn owls in Curacao?
Corky: Tomorrow I'm going to dive here and see...
Me: Look! Orion!
Corky: Tomorrow night I'm going to use my dive light.
On a side note, I think our hotel room is haunted. Three times I've seen a shadow figure in the room that I can't place. Twice on one side of the room and once on the other. Very weird!
I'll email you again tomorrow, of course. We are going ATVing in the afternoon. :)
Day 4
I don't know why my emails aren't getting to you instantly (or almost.) Isn't that the point of the internet??
Okay... so today We woke up at around 9:30 and went and had breakfast. I ate about the same as I do everyday. Then we went on a walk. Yesterday when C took us off the resort she showed us a sidewalk where people can walk. So we walked about 2 km both ways (4 total.. sorry I know you can do math) and we saw the Curacao equivalent of squirrels: iguanas!!! They are huge, green and everywhere! They go running across roads and sidewalks. Sometimes they stand in the grass and shake their heads up and down a bunch, to signal their displeasure with our proximity. They're cute... but C thinks they are gross. Lol!!
At 1:30 the taxi came to get us and take us to our ATV adventure. Eric's ATV Adventures is housed in this sketch area in a half-constructed building of some kind. There was nothing in it but a hastily made table and one chair. We were supposed to wait for 2 more people but they never came.
Our guide was Dutch but looked like Kalif Alhassan. He said his name was Chico but I don't believe him. Anyway, he was great! He took us to an aloe farm (yes Mom, we got you a present!) where they had three HUGE fields of big aloe plants. They were probably up to my mid-thigh level, although we didn't walk up to them. We got some pictures in front of one of the fields. Then we drove off the farm and passed a bunch of chickens. One ran away from our ATVs but the rest didn't seem to care.
Then the guide took us to the east side of the island, called the Wild Side, where there are no beaches because the waves are crazy. There were tons of cacti everywhere! We got some pictures there too. Then we drove some crazy off-road trails up onto "mountain" (read: hill with rocks.)
We got to a cave. We scrambled up a steep incline. The guide had to stop after 100 yards to catch his breath. Corky and I waited patiently. Then we went up a little more and into this cave. Then this happened:
*fluttering sound*
Me: OOOOOH!! Bats!!!! Hi there!
Guide: Don't you mean "ahh!" You are not scared?
Me: No...? They're cute! Look how tiny they are!
Guide: (laughing)
Corky: Has anyone ever told you the bats were cute before?
Guide: No.. she's the first one.
Corky: Yeah... she's a unique one.
Me: Oh.. they're mad, let's take a picture! Look how they swoop! OOOOH!!
Yeah, so... lots of bat squealing. They were SO CUTE!!! They were like 3 inches tall! So little and silent when they flew. They would fly right down in our faces and then zoom up and away. I took some pictures of the bats with my phone, but I'm not sure you could really see them.
Then we went to this restaurant place to grab some water or soda because it was so hot and we were sooooo dirty. Well... this happened:
*we walk in*
People behind desk: Hi there!
Us: Hi!
*start to walk past*
Me: OOOOOOH!!!!
Corky (instantly): Bird! Where?
Me: Look, look! She has a cockatoo!!! Wait! I have to go see it!
Yeah... the lady behind the desk had an umbrella cockatoo that she was skritching. His name was Luna and he was the cutest thing I'd seen since the bats! I of course showed her pictures of our birds and we "bird talked" for a while. That place was called Amazonia.. and yes, we are planning to go back!
3 hours later we returned to the start. We were tired, dirty, sweaty and hot. Corky said he was impressed by my abilities on an ATV, but not surprised.
I had cereal and apples for dinner in the room and then Corky and I went down for him to get a Surf & Turf dinner. A few nights per week the hotel has themed buffet nights. This wasn't exactly a buffet but it was a "create your own." So Corky picked Rib Eye and "Shrimps" as they say here. I tasted the steak... it was mediocre but expensive as heck! Corky says everything here is expensive. I said he's fortunate I don't eat much! I eat breakfast (which is free) and then dinner, but not usually lunch. Which is nice for his wallet, and for me.
After dinner, I went to the Executive Lounge on our floor. We had been in there right before dinner for Corky to get a beer and the attendant is this young Dutch girl (who looks local) named H. I went and asked her if the parrots on the property have names. She said she didn't know but she didn't think so. I said, "well they do now!" We conspired about it and she printed up two signs for me. One says "Hello! Our names are Patrick and Red." And then it says it in Dutch and Spanish. The other one says "Hello, my name is Jamol!" I am going to find scotch tape and tape the signs to their cages under cover of darkness tomorrow hahaha.
After that, Corky got his stuff and we went down to the dock. He put on his fins, mask and snorkel. In the pitch dark, he jumped off the dock with his dive light. He was looking for seahorses but I don't think he found any. He did find leaves, fish and an eel. He came looming up the beach out of the water with his light and freaked out a few people on the beach.
The last thing we did was sneak some apple to Jamol. He was so tired he couldn't even hold it in his foot! He just ate it with his eyes closed. A few times I thought he was asleep! But he cleaned out the apple peel and dropped it. He's so cute.
Tomorrow I think we are going to go into Willemstad in the afternoon. I hope you receive this email.
Day 5
This morning we had breakfast, same as usual. Then we went to see if we could get on the 1:30 shuttle to Willemstad. We were told it had one spot left (and there are obviously 2 of us) so we should come down at 1:30 and see if it checked in full. If it didn't and there was an extra spot, we could go.
In the meantime we went to the beach. Well, the pool, actually, but it's like 10 feet from the beach so it's basically the same thing. Corky decided to go jump off these rocks into the ocean. We noticed a PADI (scuba) flag bobbing on the surface, which meant there were divers down. They tie this string to a buoy with a PADI flag (it's red with a diagonal white stripe) to their equipment and then as they swim around, the flag and buoy follow them so people know where they are. Corky had his snorkel and mask. He can dive with his mask on, just holds his breath. So he bottomed up and went down, down... he found the divers, waved hi to them, scared them to death, and shot back up. He said they were about 30 feet down! Can you imagine??? You're in a wetsuit, all decked out in scuba gear, at depth, looking at fish, fish, fish.. and Corky in his swim trunks and snorkel!?!?!?!? LOL!
After sunbathing for a while, we came back up and showered and changed. We went down at 1:30 but found that the shuttle had left already. Apparently it checked in full! So we caught a cab. We walked around the two sections of Willemstad that I mentioned to you before. Otrabanda was nice right up on the water, but if you walk like one block back it becomes rather sketch. Punda is the other way around. It was a lot of shops that had bright colored shirts that said CURACAO. Kind of like the cheap T shirt shops in Hawaii.. except not Hawaii. Lol. We saw some humongous ships go under the Queen Juliana Bridge and out to sea. I took lots of pictures. We ate dinner by the water. Well... Corky ate dinner! I got a salad but it was so disgusting I hardly ate it.
However, I'm sure you'll be amused to know that within about 30 minutes of sitting down, we were totally surrounded by pigeons. I have no idea why! I hadn't even fed them any bread yet! I noticed people looking at us... then I looked around and saw like 8 pigeons just sitting there, looking up at us! It was so funny. Corky was like "of course... YOU'RE here! That's why they all came over!" One even flew to my chair! It was very adorable.
We went and had ice cream. I had butter pecan. That is all I will say on the topic. :-(
Now it's about 7pm and we are back in the room. I refuse to eat anything else until morning! And no one better try and make me, or it might just be the last thing they ever do!
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