It is barely after 10am when we leave Arikok park on our way to San Nicolas for our self-guided mural walking tour. The drive looks like it will be long, but in actuality, it only takes about 10 minutes, including when we got stuck in one-way streets – going the wrong way of course – and had to wind our way around the town to find the municipal parking lot. Nevertheless, we made it quite easily – even without GPS, which is still not working.

The town of San Nicolas has been turned into an artist’s palette over the last few years. In 2016, the inaugural year of the annual Aruba Art Fair saw the beginning of a project to create and leave public art pieces (murals on the buildings) in the central downtown area of the 2nd largest city in Aruba. Every year since, they have invited many major artists as well as local artists to create murals for the festival, and beyond.

There is absolutely no one around as we leave our car in the empty municipal lot. It is Saturday morning, but we still expected more people to be out. In addition to being a “Happy Island” we guess it is also a “sleep in and relax on Saturday island” as well. Maybe that’s what makes them the “Happy Island.” We start our little tour following a map we managed to find noting the location of most of the murals, but it really isn’t hard to find them – they are clustered around a few small streets adjacent to the closed Tourist Information center. A bonus to our wandering though is this great statue of an island woman selling her wares in the plaza outside the info center. Sunny likes her so much he hops into her basket!

And then we’re off on a lovely walk through the peaceful, quiet little town streets with simply amazing artwork. We’ll let the art speak for itself, the sea life, the animals, the deck of cards on the corner, the portraits, including the woman who we swear looked just like Elton John, the 3-D effects, the man and woman muscular interpretations leaning toward a kiss on each side of a building corner or one of my favorites, the face and eyes painted on a 2nd floor balcony. Fabulous.

As we are walking, a woman in a van stops along side us and starts chatting (seriously, just stops because she sees us taking pictures). She wants to tell us about this one local artist who painted the mural we are standing near. He is only 15! And he loves to paint, has painted since he was 5 and is doing amazing things. Yes he is! And how wonderful for her to just stop and tell us that? So sweet – this island – and the people (as we will find again later) are the nicest, most helpful people we’ve met.

Done with our walking tour, we circle back to the parking lot to pick up the car, then navigate the narrow little city streets, past the totally wild Museum of Industry, housed in an old water tower, and out onto the route 1, the main thoroughfare on the west coast of the island. Our destination now is lunch, even though it is fairly early. We are making the big circuit around the south end of the island and are heading north again, in the direction of the port but we still have places to go in between. Like Zeerovers, a seafood restaurant right on the water that serves fresh catch, right from their docks. It is only 3 miles away, but it seems like longer since we are still navigating by the seat of our pants and from the broad view maps we printed out before we left. Occasionally the Sygic map program works on Ed’s phone, but while it can show us roads, it isn’t helpful in finding a lot of locations – e.g., Zeerovers!

Eventually we find the place (and I wish I had taken a picture of the entrance, because it is like this little door to a shed or something!), walk in and scope out the situation. The entrances opens up on a large open space with a counter and a long line of people waiting to order. We’re not sure what the menu is, or if there even is one since people just order whatever the catch of the day happens to be – so we watch for a bit, then walk around the corner to the right to scope out the rest of the operation which has a small window counter bar and a huge open air dining area facing the water. There is a second bar out on a lower deck, an open air fry station and this really cool sitting area right over the water. Totally cool.

We take our place in the line and watch how others are ordering so we can figure out the program. Essentially you just ask for a certain weight of fish or shrimp, and order sides to go along (they may come with it, we’re not 100% sure) then take a number and go sit and wait for the food to be delivered. When our turn approaches, we ask for 1/4 pound of shrimp (although the lady gets confused and starts pouring huge amounts of head on shrimp into the bag – she thought we said 1 pound – must be our accents!) and 2 nice size filets of what turns out to be mahi mahi. We also order a side of fries and fried plantains (I am not missing out on those – carb hell or not – I love those things!). Order paid for, number in hand, we round the corner and order 2 Balashi beers then wander out to the dining area to find a seat. It is early, so we’ve got the whole restaurant to choose from, and after settling in a front row marina table, decide to go out onto the tables over the water on the far dock. What a great atmosphere in which to have lunch! We sip our beers, watching boats out in the water and the harbor, enjoying the cool breeze as we wait for our lunch.

The food arrives in a basket all perfectly fried and scrumptious looking, and we understand the purpose of the round pipe like holders bolted to the table – it is a basket holder! Ingenious. The basket stays in place and isn’t affected by the wind – or clumsy customers knocking the thing over. The food is as good as we’ve read – perfectly seasoned and fried, the shrimp melt in your mouth and the wahoo is so fresh, it is mouthwatering. The fried plantains are to die for as well. Totally worth it!

As we eat, fishing boats come in and out of the marina, and dock at our little covered dock area as well. A family comes in and hauls out their fish and left over sodas in a huge cooler (ick – we’re eating, I’m not going to regale you with what that cooler water looked like!), another guy (a tour guide) comes in for supplies and then two guys unload a whole ton of fish onto the dock next to the restaurant area. The diners are having a field day watching them unload, as are we, and when I go to grab 2 more beers I catch him wheeling his wheelbarrow to ask about the catch – they’ve got a selection of barracuda (the big fish), wahoo and bonita (the little fish). Cool.

Finishing our meal, we take our basket dregs back up to the counter, wash up in the sink next to the fry station (there are sinks all over the place, now we know why!) and say goodbye to an incredibly fun lunch time.

Next on our agenda is the Balashi (yes, now you know where the name of the beer comes from) Gold Mine. It is only the remnants of the mine, but it is located at the top of the Spanish Lagoon and near the Frenchman’s Pass, which we want to see as well. We head in the general direction – again navigating by sight, not GPS – and after a couple of wrong turns, manage to find the turn off to get to the mine, we think. The road we are cuts off through the scrub and dunes – and while we can see the mine building at the top of a hill, we can’t discern any way of getting to it except off roading – which ware absolutely not doing! We do find a little sand track that looks like it goes up the hill – but again – we’re in a Kia Rio not a 4×4 jeep. Abort!

So, now what to do? It is only noon and we’ve got until 4:30 all aboard time and we sure don’t want to go back to the ship yet. So, we look at the map and decide to go to the other end of the island, up toward the California lighthouse and the Alto Vista chapel. What the heck? As we head up the highway to Route 1, we keep hearing some weird noise that sounds like the car. Rolling down the windows, we can’t hear it much any more, so we figure it is the wind and let it go. Veering off route 1, following Sygic which is our first mistake (but our only option), we are routed through the city of Oranjestad, instead of staying on the main road and going around the city. Sigh.

Of course, we get stuck in traffic and it takes forever to go a 1/4 mile. But at the same time, we keep hearing this banging noise under the car. Finally we pull over to the side, in front of a residential area, and I go to crawl under the car to see what is going on. As I’m getting up from the fender, a car in the line of traffic on the road stops and a lady asks if we need any help. So sweet! No, we’re good. I crawl under and it appears that the inner fender – or what I’ll call the “mud flap” – at the front of the car is loose and banging. Hmmm….I try to push it back in place and wedge it in, hoping this will do the trick. As we’re getting back in the car, another lady, this time from the house we pulled over in front of comes out and asks if we need help. Seriously – as I said before – this is the nicest place! The sweetest people. Very heartwarming!

Pulling back out into traffic, we continue to slowly make our way through town, but the stupid noise won’t stop so we decide to abandon our north island plans and make a u-turn to go back to the Renaissance and drop off the car. On the way, the banging won’t stop, and we finally have to do a little surgery on the damn “mud flap” to shut it up so we can continue on our way. What can we say?

This time, we follow our instincts and the rental car agency map back to the Renaissance – sometimes, I tell you , those GPS systems are not worth the digital platform they are built upon! – and make it there without incident. We turn the car in, again, without incident, and make our way back toward the port.

It is a far different vibe on the streets now. We were all alone on empty sidewalks this morning, but now there are 2 more ships in port and the streets are teeming. We don’t get it, but what do we know? I mean all the shops are high end shops you can find anywhere, it is not like there is a great exchange rate and you can get stuff cheap – we’re paying in dollars and trust me, nothing is cheap! As is evidenced by the prices of the beer we decide to have at Lucy’s, The Retired Surfer’s Bar & Restaurant. Cute name, cute idea, right on the harbor – ridiculously expensive! You can be assured we only had 2 beers there (while watching people be totally oblivious to the “orphan” chair situation – we ended up moving chairs all around that bar because people can’t figure out that we sat at the end and left 4 chairs empty so they could sit together) then beat feet back to the ship – only stopping for a fun photo opp on Lucy’s surfboard outside the restaurant.

And that’s it for us and Aruba. We fight the crowds to get back to the and happily return back aboard our little oasis of calm and coolness…..and no cost beer and wine! All said and done though, it was a fantastic day, one we didn’t expect to enjoy as much as we did. We would definitely consider coming back again and finding more off the beaten track things to do in Aruba. Ok, well, maybe not, but if its on an itinerary somewhere, we wouldn’t pass it by.

The rest of the day and evening proceed as normal. Only 2 more ports left – that seems pretty impossible. Time certainly does fly by, doesn’t it?