This year Thanksgiving was a little different. We usually go up to Ohio to spend time with Aaron's family for the holidays for about a week. This year, we planned Aruba for the week following Thanksgiving. Aruba is a place Aaron has always wanted to go, so, I told him after he proposed I'd pay for us both to go to Aruba to celebrate and invite our friends and family. Back in June I found this wonderful Airbnb, which you will see more of in the following posts. The cheapest time to go was the week following Thanksgiving, so we booked it!
The day before Thanksgiving we drove up to Ohio and spent the evening playing cards with Aaron's grandma, his brother Brad, and his girlfriend Lauren. The next day we headed over to Grandma's house to see the rest of the family and celebrate the holiday. Below are photos of Aaron's niece and nephew who are Ray's, Aaron's youngest brother's, children.
It was so nice to see everyone and spend time with them. Friday, we relaxed and got prepared for our trip. Aaron and I were leaving a day earlier than everyone else. Saturday we got up early and drove to Cleveland to fly to Aruba!
I decided to splurge on this trip and booked first class!
The food was amazing!
Once we arrived in Aruba, we quickly noticed Aaron's suitcase was missing a wheel. After talking with American Airlines, we headed over to the Duty Free. We read multiple articles that alcohol is very expensive on the island, so using the Duty Free is a must! Then we took a taxi to our Airbnb. Taxi's only accept cash!
We got into our room and it was perfect! King size bed, sofa, wardrobe, and a small kitchen.
We both were starving so we walked down to the hotels and found a place to eat. It was about a 10-minute walk. We ended up at Malmok Bar & Grill. The server was very friendly and gave us some great recommendations. One thing she stressed on was to find places offering a 'catch of the day'. That's the best way to eat fresh and local fish!
Then we headed to the Noord Supermarket which is a 5 minute walk from the Airbnb so we could get some snacks for our room. The owner of the Airbnb lives on site and she has multiple cats she feeds who come around to socialize!
The next morning, we had some breakfast and relaxed in the pool.
We even saw an iguana!
For lunch Aaron and I walked to Hadicurari, a place our server at Malmok recommended.
We both got the Catch of the Day. Barracuda. It was delicious!!
After that we headed back to our Airbnb. To relax and wait for our friends and family to arrive!
You can find the Airbnb we booked by clicking this link: https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/24850532?guests=1&adults=1&s=67&unique_share_id=37b7f7fe-d0e9-412a-afd9-d6aaf204c53f
You can book rooms individually as well, but with so many people coming I booked the entire place. There were 6 rooms fitting 14 people in total. Each room had a small kitchen, bathroom, wardrobe, cooler, lawn chairs, and a pull-out couch. If we wanted, we could've had more people staying in each room, but I knew many of us wanted our own space. We had a large pool in the middle of all the rooms, a large table with an outdoor kitchen and table, and so many places for us all to gather at night and relax. Below is the larger room that Chris, Vanessa, Bub, and Jina split! The rest only had 1 bed.
Once everyone arrived and got settled, we went to pick up groceries for dinner. The boys cooked up chicken and everyone got to meet! They also got to meet our cat friend and iguana.
The next day started our adventure on the island. You'll have to check back for more posts of us on One Happy Island!
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