After the short night we were up early to get off the boat and get going to Curacao. Easily my favorite port of the trip.
Gotta love the rainbows as you pull in. Today was supposed to be the sketchiest of the port days weather-wise and there were scattered showers in the area. We saw them, but, they did not rain on our parade so to speak….
Suzanne had arranged for us to rent a van (stick-shift, but, the other Dad was expert at that so he drove…I would have practiced a lot before the trip if I knew I was going to be doing that!) and head north to Playa Portomari. We had to wait 5 minutes for the rental car counter to open but we were on our way pretty quickly and were at the beach well before a lot of other people showed up.
Those rocks on the left there turned out to be excellent for snorkeling.
It is a national beach, so, there was an entrance fee plus a fee if you wanted a chair and an umbrella. We set up way back along the cliff under the trees and the umbrellas. Spent almost four hours there…..really enjoyed this beach. The highlight was about an hour before we left when some other people from the cruise ship showed up. *They* had rented taxis; the paid almost 5x what we paid per person and were going to only get to be there about 1/4 of the time that we were there.
The Gopro pictures are ok; the gopro video is excellent. I will need to edit some of that out and post some pictures here….
Snorkeling for me is making sure the boys don’t get into problems and making sure Suzanne is ok. It has been a while since she had issues but Curacao was one of those days and it was while Suzanne and Cpher were heading back to the beach while I was going further out with Matthew. Was not a happy time for either of them…..
Gopro Selfie #1
Gopro Selfie #2
Gopro Selfie #3
This is the big-ass church in Willibrordus; you can literally see it for miles. We had to pass here on the way to and from the beach.
This soccer field gave Matthew and Zane a lot to be thankful for….not a blade of grass to be seen on that pitch!
First time we’ve ever seen flamingos in the wild…..
The Freedom; with part of Willemstad in the foreground
A view from the bridge….
One of the problems with being here on New Years was that everything was closed…..
Still very pretty though.
Mitch and I took the rental car for gas and to drop it off….Suzanne and the boys walked back on their own.
Crossed the pontoon bridge that swings out of the way for cargo traffic…
The aforementioned bridge
The aforementioned pontoon bridge
A better picture of the bridge….
The surf down here near the ship was much stronger than up north near the beach….
Click the picture above for the time-lapse departure video…..
Heading back home……
