Adventuring

We got up this morning and lazed around for a bit while everyone got up and moving. The plan today is that we will go to the North end of the island and down the East side where it's more rugged and less busy. Paige came in and snuggled with me for a bit this morning. I said to her "Daddy is out in the kitchen watching videos". What kind of videos? "Truck videos I think". Oh, one of his two favourite things, she said as she walked away (I wonder what she thinks is his other favourite thing?)  I called after her "You're one of my two favourite things Paige"...which got a chuckle and a grin - my other is chocolate. Haha. Just kidding, it's tequila.  She came back in later and said "Am I your most favourite of the two?"  No, it's both the same. "But I'm not the whiny one"..true.

Trev got in his first nap of the day...it's 9:13am. Lol.

We have chickens and a rooster in our yard!

And I took a photo of the front door looking out at the driveway and the pool area this morning because I forgot last night.

Now we're off to go adventuring!

Every now and then there was an inlet, most of the coast is coral on this side, that was sandy and we would park the car and get some photos, get our feet wet and watch the waves. 

There was garbage washed up all over this beach. 

There were inukshuks everywhere. So we built one. We. Were. Here. Let's go. 

People had found and placed heart shaped coral or rocks into the black face of the shore and onto this rock below. 

Jay had seen all these places in the book he was looking at, this one is The Black Bridge below, it was our next stop. 

And our last stop the Gold Smelting Ruins. I didn't get out here but the rest of them did. I made the mistake of telling them I needed the washroom to take care of an issue of the feminine nature a few stops ago and Paige kept saying "let's just go, we don't want Mommy to explode". Seriously. 

After about an hour and a half of off-roading Sophie asked if we could go to a "real beach". Paige said "yeah because this isn't a real beach, this is more like a death trap" and Sophie declared later these were the most dangerousous beaches she has seen in her life. She was VERY concerned that Jay considered swimming in one of the coves.  On our way to lunch, after we got back to the main road, we passed an osterich farm. I pointed to it and said "Osterich Farm". Sophie said "Osteriches are vicious. Osteriches can kill you."  Ok captain safety - seriously where is your sense of adventure!

We saw this sign at an intersection counting the number of fatalities in 2016...10!...none for 2017 so that's awesome...we made it through unscathed. 

As Trev was guiding Jay on the app back over to our side of the island Paige said "You can't get lost in Aruba, eh?"  Lol, I had just been thinking the same thing. I think that guy must go to and from one or two places and that's it, on the main road and nowhere else because there are a LOT of roads in Aruba and nothing is well marked. 

We were looking for a place to have lunch and I said "if we see a place that looks busy let's just stop" and so we did at Los Cafeteros, which we assumed was Mexican but was Colombian(we think). And it was full of locals so we knew it would be good - and an added bonus it had a play area for the girls, which you could see from outside and was pretty much the only reason they agreed to go in. I had shrimp in a garlic sauce, Trev had stewed chicken and Jay had creole steak with a fried egg on top. It was all yummy, and there was a great homemade hot sauce we had with it too.  I went to the bathroom when we got there and when I came out Jay and Trev said "we need you, the waitress said she can speak English if we do it slowly, we need your Spanish" - wow, my level of Spanish should NOT be helpful, but it was. 

Jay said his lunch was really good and that it was a good thing there wasn't a picture of it on the menu because he never would have ordered it. Lol. 

After the delicious lunch we headed to a beach that is supposed to be not super busy and have some shade, Boca Catalina beach. The problem is there is only one small entrance to the water so everyone huddles there in the water. Jay went for a swim down the coast for some exercise.  We won't come back to this beach I don't think.  But we did end up with our own palapa after about 30 minutes of squatting in someone else's shade (though they weren't under theirs at all that whole time).

After the beach we came back home, took stock of the sour situation and decided we should enjoy one by the pool before we engage in making another pitcher. So we did, and Trev took his second nap. 

After I finished my sour I got up to make a new pitcher with Paige's help. The limes here are crap, or at least the bag I bought was. Hardly any juice, but they are very limey so made the sours Limey - only one way to fix that..more tequila..always (or never) a good idea depending on how late (or early) you go to bed!

Trev is playing cards with the girls, Jay is reading a book on Artificial Intelligence and I'm still laying by the pool. The lounge chair is not conducive to drinking but at least I have to hold a crunch every time I want a sip so I'm getting some exercise!

I liked the windblown look of my hair, but the lounger is also not conducive to a selfie (yikes) so I aborted. Abort. Abort. 

I heard Jay tell Paige if she could guess a card in his hand she could have a Twizzler. I yelled over 6 of hearts!  He said "where you talking to me?"  I said "I heard I get a Twizzler if I can guess a card so I guess 6 of hearts". He had it. I'm that good. 

We had leftover pizza for dinner and then rounded the girls up for a shower and told them they could have half an hour of iPad time after. Sophie's downloads are in Spanish. Lol. And Paige's iPad is dead so I kept saying to her "esta es muerto!"

Bedtime. 7:58pm, that's more like it.