Today we were in Curacao, another one of the Netherland Antilles. We have been here before in 2015 and that time we went diving. This time we thought we would explore a bit of the island instead. We booked a ship’s tour, something we generally don’t do because we don’t much like being in a group. However, we liked the sound of one that would take us to Hato Caves and then to Mambo Beach so we bit the bullet.

We docked in Willemstad, a very pretty port with lots of colourful Dutch style architecture, both old and new. There looked to be a lot to do.

Just as we left the ship, the skies absolutely opened and we got soaked walking to the bus. We were drenched. The journey to the caves took about 30 minutes, they are on the north side of the island near the airport. Quite spectacular caves and well lit to show their features. There were lots of tiny bats in there but luckily they preferred to stay in their holes in the cave walls. You had to climb about 50 steps to get to the cave entrance but inside it was pretty easy to move around although ducking was necessary at times. The caves are limestone and both stalagmites and stalagtites are forming. Lovely colours from algae. At the end the guide pointed one out that looked like the Virgin Mary. It did too.

Then we went onto Mambo beach where we spent some time at a beach club where we had loungers and umbrellas. The beaches here are more coral sand than the powder like in Aruba. We had brought our water shoes with us and they were good for when we swam. Nice blue, clear water. The sun was out and hot by the time we got to the beach.

Got back to the ship by 2pm, had lunch and pegged out on one of the sun decks. We were leaving at 330 to start the voyage back to Fort Lauderdale by Tuesday morning. Well, at about 320 they started calling for 3 people to contact the main desk urgently. This generally means they havent returned to the ship. It was the first time it had happened on this voyage. The captain came on at 340 and said that he would wait till 4pm but that we would then leave as he would not jeopardize the arrival back in Florida. Well….. one man was delivered by golf cart a few minutes later. He looked like he’d had too many rum punches!!! But the other two didnt arrive. It got to 4pm and the port agent arrived to pick up their passports from the ship and then we saw 2 people running through the port area towards the ship…… The port agent went and got them in his golf cart. The captain came back on and told everyone they were only just going to make it and said we should all give them a welcome back, so the open decks were crammed with people giving these two latecomers very sarcastic cheers. They absolutely slunk aboard!!!! How embarrassing LOL.

Very nice dinner tonight and an excellent show.