I was in Aruba for a long weekend a few weeks ago, here’s a report.

Aruba background:

Aruba was a Dutch island, and although now independent it is still organized with The Netherlands (Dutch protectorate?). While there is a lot of Dutch being spoken, I’d say there is just as much Spanish due to the large number of Colombian and Venezuelan immigrants, and of course some local language created, too. The island is only 17 miles off the Venezuelan coast.

The official currency is the Aruba guilder (AWG), which is fixed (nonfloating) at 1.75AWG per USD. Still, USD is accepted everywhere, with no exception. Places even make change in USD (except coins), in fact no one ever even tried to make change with AWGs.

A basic map of the island can be seen here, at the Hyatt Aruba site:

http://aruba.hyatt.com/property/areaguide/maps/index.jhtml

I spent about equal time doing P4P and normal girl scenes.

Pay for play:

As reported, the pay scene is located in San Nicolas at the southern end of the island. The scene is centered on the main street of downtown. Coming from the North (e.g. hotels section, Oranjastad), the main street is found by taking a right (East) about a block past the police station, at the corner with the Valero gas station. There is a small sign noting the main street turn off – but I never saw it on my first two visits which were at night. After the right turn, follow the road until you see an obvious left turn – maybe it’s the third left?

The main street is a one lane one-way, five or six blocks long. The action consists of about 20 bars, most on the main street, the rest on the immediate blocks of the intersecting side streets in either direction. Each has four Colombian girls working, except maybe Prescotts bar which has more (eight?). The girls have small one room apartments on site, and this is where you go with the girl. In addition to the main street, there are parallel streets with one to the east (towards the ocean), and two or three to the west. While these streets don’t have the bar scene, there are a number of the girls apartment doors opening to the street. The girls work directly from their apartments (the doorways from the street) during non-bar hours (daytime). The bars are open from 5p until 3a (or maybe 4a or 5a?). During the bar hours the girls hand their room keys to the bartender, and they are logged when they take them back with each session. Thus, the house recovers its take from the girls the next day.

Girls come from Colombia on three month work visas. I didn’t meet any girls that had a different situation.

I visited San Nicolas on two nights and once during the day. My first night I visited every bar I could find, which was easy as they are all there in the 5-6 block and adjoining streets area. I was not at all impressed by the quality of the girls. I’m pretty picky - I basically visited each bar, checking out what must have been 80-90% of the girls in town, and didn’t see one I was excited about. There at the end, I met Tatiana. To give you an idea of how the girls rate, I guess I’d call her six, there were a handful of girls a little better, say 7s at best. I sessioned with one of them the following night, and another one the day after that.

Photos: Tatiana 01 02 03 04 05

As for pricing, I was consistently quoted 70AWG, and a few times the opening started at 100AWG (yes, they were quoting me in AWG but readily accepted USD). Sessions are 30 minutes. I inquired about going back to my hotel, but that was not going to happen as a girl would want a lot more money than I wanted to spend, the bar fine would be pretty steep I imagined, and the girls didn’t rate high enough where I’d be happy at repeated go arounds. In addition, I didn’t inquire about one-hour prices. 70AWG is about $40. Both nights I countered with $30 and it was accepted right away. One of the two didn’t allow photos, only one would do BBBJ. I believe you must purchase two chica drinks to session – this was my experience with Jennifer from Prescotts – each was $5 or $7.

In my day visit, on the way home from nearby Baby Beach, I found a pretty girl with not the greatest body, and I countered with $20 plus $5 tip for only a BBBJCIM. Sorry, I forgot my camera in the hotel that day.

I found San Nicolas (like the rest of the island) incredibly safe compared to what I might otherwise suspect. Even where it seems seedy, I don’t think it’s a problem. At day and night I would see tourists waking the street and meeting girls. There seems to be very little crime there.

Nonpro options:

All of the major nightlife is in the capital city of Oranjastad, which is about 10-15 minutes down the road from the hotel district. I rented a car, so I can’t provide info on taxi costs or availability. Once there, everything is within walking distance.

Carlos and Charlie’s is the main place I’d say. It’s very young. Next door is Bahia, which is not as busy except on Saturday night, where it was packed. Bahia has the full Direct TV package, too. About 1.5 blocks away is Mambo Jambo, which I was told would have many Colombian nonpros, but I never saw any attractive girls there in my four nights of visiting. Tantra is supposed to be the late night spot (after midnight, maybe starting as late a 2a) on the weekends, but it was closed for remodeling or licensing problems so I didn’t get to find out. The only notable place in the hotel district is Moomba’s (Moomba Beach?) which is between the Marriott and the Holiday Inn, and is really only highly popular for the Sunday night sunset time (and maybe Saturday?).

I stayed at the Hyatt (part of the Faster Free Nights promotion), which is quite nice. The rooms aren’t spectacular, but the property actually is super nice in that Hyatt resort way – great pool area, nice beach, cool gardens and landscaping, etc. If you are on the Regency Club floor, or have access to the lounge, they have a terrific breakfast buffet (like smoked salmon every morning, good juice, eggs, breakfast meats) and for the evening snack they actually put out a mini-buffet. The food on two of the nights was good enough that I made it my main meal after returning from snorkeling trips at the beach - I found myself spending the rest of the night partying or doing San Nicolas.

From the area around the Hyatt (e.g. any hotel) San Nicolas is about 15-25 minutes (guessing) past Oranjastad, call it about 30-40 minutes in total.

Other items:

Gambling
Aruba has numerous casinos. Although I do like to gamble, my time was short enough, and with good weather by day and pro and nonpro options at night I never found the time. I did notice that blackjack seems to have the same odds as Vegas except for dealer must stand on soft 17 (or do I have that reversed?). And I can’t remember if dealer takes his down card before the round or after all players play their hands.

Beaches
Aruba has great beaches. The west side (hotel area) is leeward, and where all the busy spots are. The surfing would be on the east side, but with no busy spots I figured renting a board would be difficult so I didn’t visit there. Arashi beach in the north (less than 5 minutes past the Marriott, the last hotel) is very pretty, and a little up the road is the lighthouse and views to the east. But the snorkeling and coral was poor – I wouldn’t go again for that. Baby Beach on the southern tip, about 10 minutes past San Nicholas was my favorite. There are actually three different beaches here: Rogers is the most crowded on a weekend, there is a nice little snorkel beach next to a fenced in cemetery, and Baby beach has a nice tidal lagoon perfect for families. If you snorkel out of one of two rocky entrances of the lagoon, there is better than average coral with good fish life. I’d compare it to Key Largo or Abacos, but clearly nothing like Cayman (diving) or Hawaii. There are wrecks all over the coast, but I didn’t dive. I was told by friends that the diving is not good at all, not even worth bringing my gear (given that I have numerous dive options throughout the year). The beaches around the hotels are very pretty, with super soft sand and very calm water. The place to kitesurf is the beach adjacent and to the north of the Marriott.

Summary:

I can’t say I love Aruba. It’s a nice long weekend getaway I guess, and since it was cheap (AA runs frequent specials from NYC or Miami; I had a hotel deal) I can’t say I was in total disappointed. But the girls were not up to my liking, and even if they were I much prefer TLNs, morning sex, and next day follow up options vs. on-site and timed sessions. And there was next to no Latina nonpro action, which I often prefer to p4p on some trips.

I did go the week after Easter, meaning I picked the worst weekend of the year for meeting a nonpro Latinas (ie. Colombianas). I hear that Colombian vacationers pack the hotel and Oranjastad areas during the week of Semana Santa - so who knows maybe I’d do a revisit given a late-in-the-year Easter, free hotel promo, and cheap AA fare.

I'll copy this to the Discus area for reference.

Thanks for the report. I've hit the ABC Islands a few times but never hobbied. Everytime I went I was with a chic. I think it's one of those places you don't go to hobby but while you are there you make the most of what's there. It's so quick, easy and cheap for those guys that live in the East Coast.

Thanks again.

I was in Aruba last August with my girlfriend so I definitely was not doing the P4P thing, but like you, we hit most of the bars so I did get a feel for the talent there. I did see several very cute girls that appeared to be available. One girl who worked in Mambo Jambo's, I belive it was (second floor, open air bar that faced the water/port area) was quite forward with me while my girlfriend took a walk to do some shopping while I stayed to drink. Would have done her if I had had the chance. Aruba is a great place to enjoy the beach and water for a relaxing long weekend, but I don't see me going back. As a side note and word of warning, we did a resort dive, where they teach you to scuba dive in a few hours and then take you out near an old sunken ship to dive just off the beach area. After basically watching a guy in our group drown, I do not recommend doing resort dives. Scary as hell let me tell you, especially since I was the first person to get to him. Too risky in my opinion especially if the group is too large. By the way, appreciate your last Brazil report. Just recently read it and I'm counting the days until my first trip there in November. By the way FLmonger, do you know why your videos on the site don't work? I've watched a few on the site but for some reason yours do not play.

augustart

August,

Did the guy die?

Hmmm, my vids work for others, and I'm able to view them from the site (vs. from my hard drive). But there are a few vids there I can't view.

You may need to be sure you have all three versions of players - Windows, Real and Quicktime.


Regarding scuba diving - it is a serious venture, with serious consequences coming with error (if you go below 10m. Take it seriously, do a real course (eg. PADI) if you're going to dive.

Don't know if this is true for everyone. I have a mac and I must download video's to my hard drive in order to view them. If I try to view them directly from the site I just get code on screen.

I also see a page full of code when I attempt to view one or two of them there. I remember they are of the rarer of the two application types represented.

Pete,
To my knowledge, he didn't but I thought he was dead or was going to die at the time. The guy, an American from North Carolina, sucked the tank bone dry while he was taking pics while on the bottom. We were only about 20 feet down. I was probably only 30 yards from him, but didn't know what the hell was happening until it was too late. In his panic, he forgot to drop his weight belt and tank and he tried to swim to the surface. Naturally he didn't make the surface. I froze initially and watched him struggle to get to the top. And then watched him fall like an anchor to the sea floor. By the time I got to him his eyes were rolled back in his head and he was not breathing any longer (naturally) since he had already filled his lungs with sea water. He looked dead. I started to take his belt and tank off when out of nowhere our dive master came in for the rescue. The guy saved his life no question about it. Where was the dive master when all of this occured? He was putting my girlfriend and the drowning guy's girlfriend back on the boat because they had had enough. My girlfriend and I were in Aruba for three more nights after that and he was still in the hospital when we left. But his girlfriend said he should recover. She gave me his cell number and I called him about a month later and left a message, but I never got a return call. As FLmonger stated, do the diving thing the right way and get certified. Resort dives are dangerous.

augustart

I echo the comments about getting certified before the vacation dive. I was a navy clearance diver. Safety was always first, and there was no three day "crash" course. Take your time, always dive with a buddy and remember that underwater you really do not want a roof over your head - they are unpredictable.

I had enough cold water dives that I really have not had the urge to get a civilian certification, but now that I travel to ABC 4 to 6 times a year on business and there is not much else to do during the day on a weekend I may just take it up again.