Curaçao Drinking in Curaçao

In order to skip the dangerous Venezuela, we found the cheapest flight to Guyana would go via the Dutch island of Curaçao. We decided to spend a few days there to do a few dives and drink the famous liqueur. We also discovered that the main town, Willemstad, is a UNESCO world heritage site!

We didn't get any diving photos, so here's one of a beach instead

The dives here were great - we were collected by the guys that run Scubaçao (unfortunately not pronounced Scuba-Cow) and driven around to the dive sites. It made a nice change to be able to just walk off the beach and dive straight away without having to take a boat. The visibility was amazing, around 30m, and there was plenty of healthy coral, lots of different fish and even some turtles. The best site was probably the one called 'Tugboat' - named after a tug that sunk there when a ship dropped an anchor on it. It is now home to several schools of fish and was fascinating to swim around.

The colourful waterfront in Willemstad

When we weren't diving, we walked around the old city, which was founded in 1634. It spent much of its life as a slave trading port, and there are a couple of good museums dedicated to that awful subject today. The slave trade, the proximity to Spanish-speaking Venezuela, its status as part of the Netherlands and today's tourism has led to an interesting mix of cultures. The local language, Papiamentu, is a combination of Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and English and we found it strange to be able to pick up words of it here and there.

The Queen Emma floating bridge across Willemstad harbour

Willemstad is now home to a unique floating bridge across the harbour entrance, which swings open when a ship needs to pass. Often, those ships are cruise ships, and the island is full of people supping cocktails made from the local blue curaçao liqueur. From our experience, it's used to make rather sickly blue-green cocktails that pack quite a punch.

Cocktails!

We're now recovering from our hangovers and flying back to the mainland, to Guyana.