Curacao Day 5: Pizza! Pizza!

Mike woke up early this morning and did a dive off the dock of our house about 7a. He wanted to see if he could catch sight of some big fish on the reef feeding in the early morning but he didn't quite make it early enough. I slept in. I was having none of that getting up early business. Our plan for the day was to drive to Westpunt on the other side of the island to visit Shete Boca park. We had to stop and get gas and mosquito spray on the way. We were having to almost bathe in mosquito spray every day. They were horrible at the house in the late afternoon and evening.

On the way to Westpunt, I pulled the car over so Mike could take a smoke break. We found a disgusting sight. It looked like someone had been burning goats and trash.

We did find some scenery that was a little better.

We arrived in Westpunt and began looking for a restaurant called Sol Food. We were headed down the wrong road (which we didn't yet know) and came upon an Austrian family who had gotten their Kia stuck in the flooded road. This area of the island had gotten lots of rain in the previous days and much of the roads were flooded. They were driving a small car and it was pretty obvious to me the car wouldn't have made it through the water. I have no idea what possessed them to try to drive through it. Mike helped push them out of the water but the car still wouldn't start. I flagged down a Dutch couple who had some jumper cables but we still weren't able to get the car started. The Austrian family had to walk back to their hotel. I'm pretty sure their rental car company was not happy to hear about this!

After that debacle, we turned around and finally found Sol Food. By now we were starving and thankful they had a spare table. I had a salad and then we split a pepperoni and mushroom pizza and had some tasty sangria. One of the pizza toppings was pickled garlic. It was fantastic. That was some of the best tasting pizza I've ever had.

The view from our table:

We met a Dutch couple while there who live on Curacao. They gave us lots of pointers about where to go and what to do on the island. Sunshine, the owner of Sol Food, is an American ex-pat whose been living on the island for several years. She also had some helpful advice. She has two fila brasileiro dogs which is the same unusual breed of dog my parents used to own. These dogs are originally from Brazil and are bred as guard dogs. I've never known anyone else who has had one so it was interesting that Sunshine owned two.

After the stuck car, the pizza, and the Curacao talk it was much too late to go to Shete Boca park so we just drove back to town and went to the casino for a bit. I actually won $50 on slots instead of losing money while Mike played roulette.

This little guy was hanging out on the back stairs when we got home.