Aruba: One Happy Island

They say to go some place you've never been before once a year, so thats just what I'll do.

We saw the coast of Venezuela at one point!

This year? The beautiful island of Aruba! SCSU offers an annual trip to the senior class for a reduced price. It was awesome because there were about 50 SCSU students that attended, so we made tons of friends and got to travel with people we otherwise would have never had the opportunity to get to know.

Our group of friends -most of us met there even though we all go to Southern!

Aruba was beautiful. I've never been anywhere tropical before, so I was thrilled to escape the melodramatic weather of Connecticut. Since it was technically our summer already, we decided that if Summer wouldn't come to us, we'd go to it. It was 80 + degrees every day with a cooling ocean breeze. We stayed at the Marriot Renaissance Ocean Suites right on the water. The Marriot had their own little private island for their guests to enjoy. They had water taxis every 15 minutes that took us over to the island free of cost!

On our way to the private island

The water was crystal clear!

One of my favorite parts was all of the animals 

Highlights of the trip included snorkeling over a sunken ship. The snorkeling excursion was a half-day booze cruise on a pirate ship! The crew was hysterical. I had to stay in the shade with the old people most of the time because I was getting very sunburnt. While snorkeling I dove down and picked up a starfish! The ship also had a rope swing where we all swung out into the ocean. It was so much fun! Later that night everyone went out the Kukoo Kanuku bus, but I had to stay back in the hotel because I literally had sun poisoning -go figure. 

See, I'm already pretty burnt, and had to wear a towel around my shoulders

I also really loved Señor Frogs, a local hotspot for the young people in Aruba. It was a lot of fun, especially since we had such a large group of people.

There were iguanas everywhere. I thought they were SO cool but I was the only one who seemed to think so.

Overall, Aruba was beautiful and I'm so grateful for the opportunity! Another pin to add to the map :)