Friday, May 26, 1995 - Aruba

Roy surprised me with a belated birthday present of a nice T-shirt with a lot of Papiamento phrases on it. What a nice surprise! The wind finally dropped to about 20 knots and the sky was blue, so we set out in our Royaks to find Eddie's house. Sometimes the gusts were so strong that I felt as if I were going two feet backwards for every foot forward, but eventually we got into the shelter of a point where it was easy going. On the other side of the point, however, the wind was stronger than ever, since we lost the protection of the island and were exposed to the full force of the wind coming off the sea. We had to paddle through the smoke from the dump, which was gross, but didn't last very long. Then at last we saw a red roof in the distance that we thought was Eddie's house. Roy was soon on the beach in front of the house, but I was still struggling. I wasn't at all sure I'd make it, but eventually I did. There were two houses side-by-side, just as in the photos Eddie had shown us. They're very nice, modern, three-storey houses, but I can't say much for the location, between the dump and the desalinization plant. I certainly wouldn't want to put that much money into a house in that location, even though they do have a nice little beach and a good view of the ocean. We soon found out that we had the two houses reversed. Both Roy and I had thought that the white house was Eddie's and the beige house belonged to his friend, Tommy, but it turned out to be the other way around. Eddie and Tommy weren't there, but we met a very nice English couple, Kimba and Michael, and their three-year-old son, Noah, who are renting the lower level of Tommy's house. Kimba took us over to Eddie's house and we went up the outside stairs to the balcony. She didn't have the key, so we couldn't go inside, but we didn't really want to, anyway. We were thrilled to have found the house. Kimba invited us into her apartment, and we talked for a while. Her husband is a real sailor. They had a beautiful schooner that they sailed for several years. Unfortunately, they let someone else use it, and it sank. Now they've refurbished a hundred-foot fishing trawler, Tattoo, which they charter here on Aruba. It's used for evening cruises. We had seen the boat and also had read ads for it. Kimba and Michael showed us a lot of photos of their boats. They purchased Tattoo in Newport, Rhode Island, and refurbished her at Kelley's Boatyard in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, which is where they met Eddie. When we left, Kimba gave me a Tattoo T-shirt! Wow, two T-shirts in one day! This is my lucky day. She also gave us her phone number and invited us to phone any time. The trip back was a cinch. All we had to do was steer. It took us an hour-and-a-half to get back to the boat. Going had taken five hours. Roy has discovered English-language programs on the local TV channel 13 between nine and eleven p.m., so I've started taping them. Some of them are interesting. We watched one this evening (taped last night) that was about the history and culture of the Caribbean islands. There are also a couple of free English-language newspapers published here, so we're able to keep up with the news.