Aruba - days 1 and 2

Okay so day one was really just us schlepping from the airport to the hotel (Bucuti) and chilling out, then eating at the hotel restaurant (the Pirate's Nest). I had the Keshi Yena which is a traditional Aruba dish, and the version at the Pirate's Nest was vegetarian. It was really delicious. Of course now that I'm at home I realize I should have begged for that recipe, since usually it is cooked with chicken or fish and the recipes don't really sound like what I ate at all. I have a few recipes that kinda seem similar, I think when H. is gone I'll work on trying to get a good veggie recipe created.

I mean you're not surprised I'll likely go back to being vegetarian once he's outta the house, right?! And this will keep me busy. Hahaha.

Anyway, so I took some pictures of the hotel but because it was overcast, they're not the best ones of the group. I'll show you more of the hotel later.

We did catch a wee bit of a sunset that poked through.


The next day was a little nicer. Here is the view from our room and also a shot of some of the dragonflies. Every morning there were hundreds outside of our door then by mid morning they disappeared. Very fun to watch.

We then checked out the Butterfly Farm. Here are some pictures from there.








These ugly, 5 inch caterpillars are Owl Butterfly caterpillars. They're so impressively huge and ugly. Apparently they'll just crawl away and cocoon! Did you know that when they cocoon, all their organs turn to liquid and everything re-forms into a butterfly! How crazy is that?

Also Aruba is known for the fact that it rarely rains! So there are a lot of cacti.
We're special in the fact that we went there when they had rain! Lucky Us!


Then that night we went to a pretty decent Cuban restaurant called Cuba's Cookin. They had a free mojito coupon, which I highly recommend taking with you! And also - it is best to take some one with you who doesn't like them - then you can drink theirs too! I highly recommend doing that. And ordering the Ropa Vieja.