Sightseeing in Curacao

We have had the opportunity to do some sightseeing while here on Curacao. We spent a couple of days in Willemstad, the capital, and then rented a car for the day and drove to the west end of the island to check out the villa where we are going to spend Christmas with Rob and hopefully the Perry's.

A bit of history first. Curacao was 'discovered' by the Spaniards in 1499 and taken over by the Dutch in 1634. It was well established as a slave trading post in the 17th and 18th centuries. Fort Amsterdam was built in 1635 and Willemstad, a city walled on 3 sides, built up north of the fort. Curacao is a rich cultural mixture of Dutch, Spanish and West-African. The local language, Papiamentu, is one of the best developed Creole languages in the Caribbean. The architecture of the island also blends European style with Caribbean exuberance and climatic needs.

We did a walking tour of the city's historical buildings. The main part of Willemstad is called the Punda which is Papiamentu for the Point. The other side of St. Anna Bay is Otrobanda or 'other side'. The majority of the buildings were erected in the 17 and 1800's. The outside construction is stucco painted in vibrant colours with white trim and red tile roofs.

There are two markets in the Punda. The Central Market which was just stalls of merchandise whenever we were there. No produce or fish etc. The floating market, which from the street just looks like regular market stalls, consists of boats which come up from Venezuela on a daily basis with fresh fruit and veggies.

The Floating Market from the Waterside

The Floating Market from the Streetside

The day we rented the car we headed out to West Punt the western end of the island. Driving through the country side was reminiscent of Southern Ontario as far as vegetation goes until you saw the big 'clumps' of tall cacti. Definitely an arid landscape which is green right now because of the rainy season. We left the main road and headed for Santa Martha where the villa is situated.

Shortly after leaving the main road, at Jan Kok, I noticed a large area of shallow water and almost at the same time Griff noticed a sign that said Flamingo Observation Area. We stopped the car and walked back to the observation platform. Sure enough there were flamingos in the distance - very pink with long necks and legs and the curved beaks that made them good as crochet mallets in ‘Alice in Wonderland’. After taking a few pictures we continued on our way to Soto. We noticed a small sign at an intersection that said Santa Martha Bay and Sunset Waters Resort which was what we were looking for. Off we went down what was indicated on the map as a secondary road. The fellow at the car rental place had warned us that the road we would be on was very steep and twisty. Twisty it was, but no worse than some of the back roads in the mountains and definitely not as steep.

Finally we arrived at the resort. We asked at the resort’s office were we could find ‘Lucy’s Place’, the place we will be staying at. They told us where it was and off exploring we went. The beach area was closed due to damage from the storm (Omar) that we had experienced a couple of days previously. There was little sand on the beach and a lot of coral debris washed on shore and up over the road. We talked with a fellow in the dive shop and he said they hadn’t had a storm with such damage for over 20 years. Here’s hoping it’s at least another 20 years until the next one.

We could see ‘Lucy’s Place’ on the cliff overlooking the lagoon/bay and the place we could anchor the boat below. We stopped at the villa on our way back. It has an average sized yard and a patio overlooking the bay. The area was fenced and the gate locked so we could not look any closer.

Just before returning to Soto we passed the Landshuis St. Martha. This is an old plantation house and land that is now a ‘museum’. There are a lot of these sites throughout the island. They have all been restored to show what life was like when they were built 300 years ago. Unlike plantations in the other parts of the Caribbean these were not primarily for sugar cane, but were basically mixed farming and stations for the slave trade. Now the one at St. Martha is a sheltered workshop for the mentally handicapped. They work the farm and build and restore wooden furniture and baskets.

From there we headed back to Spanish Waters passing a small wind farm along the eastern coast of the island.

The day before we left the island, when we went to Customs and Immigration to check out, we did a little more exploring of Willemstad. We went to the Mikve Israel-Emanuel Synagogue and the Kura Hulanda Area. The synagogue has the record of the Jewish community on the island. The congregation has been here since 1675 and the synagogue, built in 1730, is the oldest in the western hemisphere. The Kura Hulanda Area is located in the Otrobanda. A kura originally was a residential area with a house in the middle surrounded by outbuildings and a wall. The Kura Hulanda is now a museum, hotel and little shops and cafes. The museum is dedicated to the history of the slave trade and African art and culture. Because of time restraints we could not spend as much time here as we would have liked. We plan on returning in December and maybe then we can do a more complete blog on the history of slavery on the island.