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Marriott Ocean Club Trip Report
Travel dates not disclosed
Sent in by: Kristin N McCarty
After reading the trip reports for months prior to my vacation, I am happy to be posting
my own here. The trip reports were a great source of information for me. I will break down
my trip in sections.
THE FLIGHT - Off to Aruba - we went. The "we" were myself, my husband, Drew, and
my parents - Albert and Patti. We left for Aruba on Saturday, October 9th flying out of
Pittsburgh International Airport via Delta Airlines at 7:15 a.m. We had a short layover in
Atlantic and we arrived in Aruba around 3:00 p.m. We had no problems in Customs going down
or for our return trip.
THE MARRIOTT - My husband I own a time share in Colorado, but traded this year for Aruba.
Our accommodations at Marriott's Aruba Ocean Club would not be available until Sunday, so
we stayed one night at Aruba Marriott Resort & Stellaris Casino. The hotel is very
nice and we were pleased with our accommodations, but mainly used the room just to sleep
our first night. Having been to Las Vegas, we knew the "gambling" scene a
little. Drew favors blackjack and did not care for the way the cards were shuffled in the
Marriott's casino, but all in all it was a nice casino. We then moved over to the Ocean
Club on Sunday. We were pleased with our room which included a livingroom, kitchen, 1
bedroom and 1 bathroom. Four people sharing one bathroom required some timing during the
week, but we managed. We also had a balcony with a nice side view of the ocean. (We were
unable to get an oceanfront view, but thought the view we had was nice enough.) We
never had any problem getting a hut at the beach or a chair/umbrella at the pool. We loved
the fact that the Marriott is the last hotel because the beach was larger and more
private. There are plenty of water activities that you can take advantage of. We rented
rafts one day and relaxed in the water. With the trade winds, it can sometimes get a
little rough at the beach due to sand blowing on you. We spent a good bit of time
poolside. Take advantage of the 2 for 1 drinks between 4-6 only at Waves (which is closer
to the hotel). Drinks are pretty costly, about $5-$6 for a frozen drink. The pool at the
ocean club was great! There are 4 waterfalls at the one end and we found a great spot
in the corner by one of the waterfalls which provided sun and shade and you also got the
cool refreshing mist of the waterfall. The hot tubs are located up a few steps in their
own private area and each hot tub is even private, very nice. You can take advantage of
the activities that the Marriott offers. My mother and I tried the Tae Bo class and we
both enjoyed it very much, very good instructor.
DINING EXPERIENCES - our favorite was our first - TUSCANY'S at the Marriott Resort &
Stellaris Casino. We were the 1st patrons of the evening since we were all hungry from a
day of travel. The food was absolutely wonderful and the service was great. Our waitress,
Marilou, was wonderful. I especially like that the MatriD (spelling?) also comes around to
see how your dining experience is. We ate at CARLOS & CHARLIES one evening and also
arrived there early in the evening. The mexican food was good and by the time we were
leaving, it was looking like a real party was about to kick in. I read many reports about EL GAUCHO'S
for steaks and we gave that a try. The steaks were great, but we found the restaurant to
be very noisy and the staff to not be very attentive. Our waitress wasn't very impressive
and we are not
sure if it is because maybe she didn't understand English very well, because she seemed to
be fine with the patrons who spoke Spanish. Go for the food for sure, not for the
atmosphere. We ate at DON CARLO'S which is located across from the Crystal Casino.
It looked good from the outside, a nice spot right by the water, but the food was very
average. My father and I both thought our dishes were fine, but my husband and my mother
did not care for theirs at all. They both had a red sauce and thought that the sauce
tasted salty. My husband did not finish his meal and told the waitress the problem and she
sent over a manager who said that it is not salt, but a wine that they put in the sauce.
He seemed like a nice enough guy, but he did not refund any money toward the entree. I
would not recommend this place. LA TRATTORIA EL FARO BLANCO - is the restaurant at the
California Lighthouse. My husband and I went here for lunch on our last day and thought
the service was good and we enjoyed our meal and the view is one of the best on the
island. WAVES, PAVILION and LA VISTA - all these were at our resort. We went to the La
Vista several times for breakfast and were pleased with both the service and the food. We
had lunch at Waves once and the Pavilion a few times. Since we had a kitchen, we ate
breakfast and lunch in a few times to save some money. There were so many other
restaurants that I read about in other trip reports that we did not have a chance to try.
All your meals will be
expensive, but I guess that is to be expected on an island where everything must be
shipped in.
FUN STUFF - We did some shopping in Oranjestad one day. Be aware shop-a-holics - all
stores close around 6:00 p.m. and they are not open on Sunday.
We rented a jeep from Franco's for one day to tour the other side of the island. Franco
will come to your hotel to pick you up, take you back to their place for the paperwork and
then they will pick-up the jeep the next day at your hotel. We started at the California
Lighthouse and made our way down the rocky "road" to see the waves crashing up
on the shoreline. Very different from the populated/hotel side of the island. We found our
way to the Alto
Vista Chapel and to the ruins and to the caves. We did not tour any of the
caves just a peek inside was enough for us. Although I read that entry into the caves is
free, there were people at each cave entrance and we only talked to the ones at the Tunnel
of Love Cave and they were going to charge, I think, $7 or $9 per person to go through the
cave. I read a disaster story about this cave on another trip report so we decided not to
go and visit the bats and other animals and went on our way. We drove through the Arikok National Park
which is inhabited with many wild goats. We made our way down to the Seroe Colorado
Lighthouse (which isn't much of a lighthouse) and passed Baby Beach
and Rodgers
Beach and through San Nicolas back to our hotel. We didn't have much time to
stop at Baby Beach
although originally I thought we might be able to snorkel here, but the day was getting
late and we had dinner reservations already made.
We took in the Hot Tickets
show which I read is now done on the island. The show was good although it started 1/2
hour late. The performers were great, giving it their all, but unfortunately not many
people were in attendance so the crowd wasn't exactly a live one.
Our snokeling outing was on the Blue Melody. I hadn't read about this before my trip to
Aruba having only read about the Mi Dushi and the Jolly Pirates. We were approached while on
the beach early in the week and decided to go ahead with a smaller boat for our outing.
The Blue Melody is owned by a husband and wife. We scheduled it for Thursday as most of
his days were booked. There were only 8 of us on the boat plus the wife (Miranda) and
another man (forget his name) who helped to sail the boat. We went to two different sites
and we arrived just as the larger boats, the Mi Dushi and the Jolly Pirates, were done so we had
the entire place to ourselves. We saw a lot of neat fish, an eel and at the second sight,
they gave us bread to feed to the fish which surrounded you. They served us their Blue
Melody special
drink, sandwiches made on great bread and we also had a kind-of garlic bread. Oh, the boat
sails from 3:30 to 6:30, so you get to the see the sunset on the way back. The boat leaves
from the dock right by the Marriott. All in all a very good trip, very nice people and I
would recommend this to anyone. My husband is certified to scuba dive and he did 2 dives -
one with Pelican and one with Red Sail Sports. He said both were good, but preferred Red
Sail Sports since they had more staff that went with you. He enjoyed diving the Antilla shipwreck.
We went to the Latin Caribbean Night at the Marriott. The backdrop was the most gorgeous
sunset I have ever seen. The dinner they served was very good. They also had a dance show
featuring the "Hot Moves" dance troupe which was fun and they got the crowd
involved. They also had a Limbo show - the Limbo Man spoke English, but you could barely
understand him. He also got the crowd involved, but we weren't too impressed with him. I
read things about Vincent the Limbo Man, but I know this wasn't him. The cost of this is
$27.00.
Our last night we spent on the Tattoo
Party Cruise (we opted for this instead of the Kukoo Kunuku bus).
The dinner was very average, but the rest of the night was very fun. Make sure that you
get to the pier early and take the 1st water taxi to the Tattoo so that you can eat and be
back on the 1st deck for the fun stuff. Some of the people who got to the Tattoo later
seemed to miss out on all the fun that was going on. They have you do a sing-a-long ...
girls vs. guys and then we did a kind-of scavenger hunt. During the weekdays,they serve
Italian and have a DJ, but on Friday and Saturday it is BBQ and a band. The band was good,
played mostly Caribbean music, so learn your salsa before you get there or you will be
left standing on the side. Cost is $49.00 and you buy $1 or $2 tokens for your drinks.
OTHER STUFF - we did go to a few of the casinos at the other hotels, and we liked the
casino at the Hyatt the best. We were there 2x and spent our last night there where my
hubby won some $ at Blackjack. They also had a live group playing music. The Hyatt is a
very nice hotel with black and white swans and many other birds around. The restaurant
there, Ruins Del Mar, looked very romantic, but we didn't have a chance to try the food.
SUM IT UP - Having been to the Hawaiian islands, we were all spoiled by the tropical look.
I knew that Aruba was more of a desert island. All in all I found the Aruba people to be
very nice and helpful (if they could speak English well) and I did like the island. I am
not sure if we would go on a return trip to this island, as there are other islands in the
Caribbean that we would like to visit. It was so nice to be far away and surrounded by
gorgeous beaches and blue, blue water. We did have rain a little while we were there, but
only for about 5 minutes, 2x's one day and about 1/2 the morning another day. Great thing
though - it actually clears up after the rain is over and does not remand overcast as it
does in Pittsburgh. Enjoy your trip. Any questions, feel free to e-mail me at kristin@access.hky.com.
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