What happened during Corona?
Beginning of 2020 Rian Apartments had to close, due to travel restrictions. Every now and then I was able to welcome some courageous guests who were willing and daring enough to make the trip. And they were all very happy they did. Even though we had a very strict lockdown for the first period, life was quite pleasant and almost normal on our sunny island. Jus some impressions to show you how lucky we are to live here.
SPRING IS HERE!
Oh! How I love spring on the island. And especially in my garden.
Yes! We do have spring on Curaçao. Everything is in bloom, the fruit trees work hard to let the new sweet surprises of this climate grow.
Strolling through my garden and terrace, I find multiple gorgeous flowers praising the Caribbean spring time.
Even the palm trees and the agave are celebrating 🙂
Wanna come by and enjoy spring in Curaçao too?
You’ll know where you have to go 🙂
In Memoriam
In the past 8 months I’ve been very quiet on the internet. Due to personal circumstances my joy in writing disappeared for some time. My beloved life partner Gio recently died of cancer. I’m so sad he’s not here with me anymore, but glad for him his fight is over. Not only I will miss him. Also our guests, who came to know and love him over the past 5 years, will find something/someone is missing with their next visit.
Still, holidays should be happy times! And that is what I have always tried to accomplish for my guests and will continue to do. My smile survived! The pool is inviting, the terrace surrounding it always willing to be the designated BBQ spot for fun evenings and the lovely dog ladies still need their attention and cuddles!
I am happy for having known a beautiful person like Gio and more, having spent 5 wonderful loving years with him. I am happy for all of you who got to spend holidays at Rian Apartments when Gio was around. We all have known a very special person!
Sunset stroll
Rian Apartments resides in beautiful, tranquil, Julianadorp. Close to Willemstad and close to the road to the rural part of Curaçao; Band’abou and Westpoint.
Only a 5 minute walk from our apartments we have a beautiful nature reserve, the estates of the ‘landhouses’ “Groot St. Michiel” and “Wechi”. If you like to hike, this is the place to be.
Yesterday’s hike took us to the top of the “Julianadorp Mountain”. A relatively short walk, 20 minutes, with a breathtaking view. Of course we took our dogs with us, our 2 lovely pups Lola and Pom and their best friend Floortje. 🙂
Once at the top we made our way to the look out point to St. Michiels Baai (St. Michael’s Bay) and sat down on the strategically placed bench there to watch the sun set. Our dogs went half way down hill to do some digging and investigating as we awaited the overwhelming beauty soon to happen.
The sun sets real fast on Curaçao. Once it starts descending it’s gone within 15 minutes. A blink of the eye can make you miss the grand finale.
Even after living for 17 years on this beautiful island, the sunsets can still make me gasp!
On our way back to the downhill trail we enjoyed a last view on Willemstad. When you look closely you can spot the famous Julianabridge way in the back.
Walking downhill :
Sunshine, home improvement, part 2
Following our previous post from July, we meanwhile made progress with our remodeling. It was a way bigger job than we anticipated, but finally the end was in sight. Still some finishing touches to the countertop, a wooden floor in the kitchen and a nice new layer of paint on the walls.
The result is beautiful! We are so happy 🙂
There is still a lot to do. We’ll take that on next month. For now the living area is suitable for guests. In October we’ll move on to the furniture (pallet wood couch/bed) and a system to really separate the kitchen from the optional extra bedroom. When this is done we can offer either an apartment with 1 bedroom and a large living with open kitchen, or turn this into an apartment with 2 bedrooms with smaller living/kitchen area. We’ll keep you posted!
For now the living area looks like this: 
By the way: The terrace has undergone a make over as well. New fence, new table and renovated chairs (from our previous post) We’re quite happy with the results so far.
Sunshine, home improvement, part 1
2nd July. All apartments empty. The perfect time to start innovating.
Well……..actually to start the demolishing part 🙂
Sunshine really needs a new kitchen. And with that a new look. And since there are no guests we can make all the noise we want to, so we started removing the old kitchen and bar.
Quite a job, especially the concrete bar. But it was all done within a few days and before our new guests (in the next door studio) arrived. From now on we can only make noise when our guests are at the beach.
In planning the new countertop, we found an obstructing water supply pipe. We don’t want that in sight, so Gio started to dig in the wall to lower the angle ……….. Oops!
Well…………we’ll find a solution for that later
On to the next part, flooring. Removing the concrete bar left a ditch in the tile floor. No possibility to get the same tiles, so we’re inventive. The new kitchen is going to get a beautiful home made wooden flooring. So get the pallet wood in and start to mosaic! Lola, helpful as ever, is thinking along with us 🙂
Meanwhile, we’re into our 2nd week of remodeling. The new refrigerator and stove have arrived, so we can start the measurements for the new to build concrete kitchen.
This is an enormous job! Floors and wall are not level so there’s a lot of measuring to do and adjustments to be made. Gio has started building the mold . This will take at least the rest of this week.
Hopefully we can start pouring concrete in the course of the next week.
Meanwhile, I have the fun part of the job. Buying stuff. 🙂 Like I said, we got a new refrigerator and stove. I also found beautiful new curtains to complete the new look and I started refurbishing the chairs. From old and worn yellow/orange seats to new neat grey ones. A first for me, but I am quite happy with the result. 1 down, 3 to go!
Next week, like I mentioned, we hope to start the concrete part of the job.
WILL KEEP YOU POSTED!
TripAdvisor
Yes! You can also find us on TripAdvisor now. Especially valuable because of the reviews people post here. Furthermore, TripAdvisor is currently the most popular holiday site, so many more people can find us on the internet 🙂
Only our studio Caribbean Breeze can be rented through TripAdvisor, but reviews can be posted concerning all our apartments/studios. Check it out by clicking the link above.
Since our last post Gio made a new bed for Caribbean Breeze, using only pallet wood, just like he did for the kitchen.
We already welcomed a lot of guests to this lovely, cozy studio and only received enthusiastic reactions.
Hope to welcome you someday!
Rain, at last……….
After months and months of drought we finally had some nice showers. Perfectly timed at night and early morning, not to bother our guests who want to enjoy warmth and sunshine and try to escape the rain in their own country 🙂
Meanwhile the clouds are gone and we have been without the water from heaven for some days again, but the results of those few fertile moments are stunning. A short walk through my garden gives breathtaking images and I would like to share them with you.
