Aruba

I am ready for my next vacation! The past few years have been filled with some crazy, scary, adventurous, romantic, exotic and weird vacations! Most have been spent with my partner in crime Claudia and sadly those are the romantic ones too! Claud and I went to Aruba a few summers ago and literally had candle lit dinners at sunset every night being serenaded by violins!

I will NEVER forget the first night we got there... We landed around 11pm, hopped into a cab and headed to our hotel. Immediately upon arrival, we jumped in the shower, threw on our little "Scottsdale Short" dresses and stilettos and set out to find a place to party. We ran across the street to where we were told the buses picked up, to take us down town... A 'bus like' car pulled up and like a couple nerds we ran to it.. Right before we could get in, some guy grabbed us, and said... "Oh Lady's, this is NOT a taxi, or a bus, this is a group of locals trying to take advantage of you". That nice man explained to us how to spot a real taxi and left us. So about 10 minutes later no real taxi or buses had driven by and we were overly anxious. A pick up truck pulls by, we hop in and head to Carlos and Charlies for some drinks. Needless to say, this pick up.. also not a taxi... By the graces of God we made it to Carlos and Charlies and met a few very weird locals.

We ordered yard sticks which were filled with the strongest drinks I've ever had. Claudia of course, demands extra shots in hers! About 2 yard sticks later, i am on stage dancing with the DJ.. pleading with him to play "walk it out" bu DJ Unk. The guys could barely speak English, so I am "walking it out" for him, hoping to break the language barrier. On the flip side, Claudia a.k.a ms. "I need extra shots, i can barely taste the alcohol" is having trouble standing in the corner. Apparently, we drank to much, and a security guard called us a cab :) This cab was a benzo.. not a pick up! We found out later that Natalie Halloway was last seen at Carlos and Charlies.. so I guess security was really cautious with American girls.

The next day, we woke up.. staggered down to the beach and recovered on the most beautiful island I've ever seen. The ocean was only as high as your ankles for hundreds of yards so you could just lay in the ocean to tan. The water was as warm as a bath, and the sand was pure white! As much fun as Claudia and I had.. we both agreed that we HAVE to take the boys we fall in love with there someday. After that first night, we didn't do much drinking. Our mornings and afternoons were spent at the beach laying out and reading the shoppoholic books. We were ballers on a budget so we ate top ramen for breakfast and lunch then every night we splurged on an amazing dinner. The restaurants there set out tables on the sand with white linens, and live music. We made sunset dinner reservations every night. The musicians loved me, and insisted on playing songs all night with "Misty" in it... I ate it up of course :)

For our big excursion, we planned a day of sailing. As we waited on the docks for our boat, we became friends with a guy named "Manny", to our luck - turns out he was our ships bartender! We sailed all day, we snorkeled to a sunken German ship "Atilla", and drank, and drank, and drank... The ship was called Mi Dushi which meant My sweetheart. The day on Mi Dushi was one of the best days of my life! When we finally got back to shore, Claudia and I stumbled off the boat and both face planted into the sand. We Slept/Blacked out for an hour or so, then woke up after nigh fall. When we woke up, still slightly drunk and happy, we realized that we had missed the last bus back to our side of the island. We began our 5 mile journey back home in our flip flops, laughing the entire way.

This was me and Claudias first vacation together and definatly not our last!