Walking through Willemstad, Curacao

Willemstad, Curacao

Arrived in Willemstad between 7:30am and 8am. The announcement for disembarkation came at 8am.

 

 

The only “customs” formality when getting off was the usual scan of your room key. When scanned, everything they want to know about you including your picture comes up on the computer screen. They look at the screen and then at then at you and nod you through. Hopefully, with all this snacking, I don’t change too much in three weeks.

We chose not to take a shore excursion. We prefer to walk and walk and find out what’s happening in the world of Curacao today. So walking we did.  We started the day with a hat and a Gatorade at some small walk-in cafe in a back alley.

 

 

We hit some of the major tourist areas on the way such as the floating bridge, the floating market and the shops (walking by). But when most people stopped walking we walked on and found exactly what we were looking for.

The floating bridge by the way also opens completely. By that I mean that it swivels at one end and two large out-board engines tow the whole bridge across the opening ending up parallel with the shore. We were just getting onto the bridge when the alarm bells rang and the gates started closing. Everyone on the bridge hurried to one of the ends and got off. We, however, didn’t see any signs saying to get off and we decided we wanted to experience this unique waterway exercise. In the end it turned out that two other couples also stayed on and no-one seemed to care. As long as you were willing to be “trapped” on the bridge for 20 - 40 minutes, have at ‘er.

 

 

 

This did allow a few unique photo opportunities as this shot of the Governor’s mansion.

 

 

 

 

 

Here Lucy and I are on the opened bridge watching the marine traffic pass through the canal. In the end the bridge was only open about 25minutes and we continued on our way.

 

 

In the residential area we came across this little Deli n’ Bistro called the “Sparkle”. It turned out that it was owned by a Mother/son team and the server was the partner of the son who was born and raised in Willemstad. She has studied all over the world but came back to Curacao for the climate and the people. I have link their restaurant on the right if you care to learn more. AND, if you are ever back in Willemstad, it is certainly the place to go and have lunch. We had an omelette lunch with drinks. They also, to our surprise, had WIFI service. Our server spoke English and was a wealth of information for us for the rest of our self-directed exploration of Willemstad.

We also found two of the above-ground cemeteries that we had read about.

We walked by one of the local school colleges just as students were leaving for the day. Dress code: All the same yellow tee shirts but other than that it was jeans and sneakers. No shorts.

There were many reminders of our experience in Congo.

This was a great day and enjoyed the island’s hospitality. Thank you Willemstad, Curacao.