HM Aruba Part II - Are you renting a car?

OK Obviously this is my new obsession - I really want to get this HM booked! I feel like a car in Aruba would be nice, but not necessary. Thoughts?

Thanks!

Not needed. The island is pretty small. We rented a jeep for a day and drove around and went to things like the natural bridge and some beaches but I would not do it again-

you can take cabs anywhere that is far away and you really only stay one on side of the island-

---

Posted by hmpena

Most likely no. We'll probably just take a Jeep tour.

---

Us too.. We are going to get all muddy & dirty on the ATV terrain tour !!

We rented a jeep for $500 for the 15 days we were there. Definetly would do it again. Sure the island is small and a car/jeep is really NOT needed but we are total spur of the moment kinda people..when we got bored on the beach after a few hours,we'd hop in the car & be off exploring.
Lets do the math,we stayed at the Marriot so I'll just round off each taxi trip to $10 for arguments sake. Its more like $20 to airport and $14 to city(Oranjestad) plus cabs are a buck or 2 more on Sundays.
Ok..a typical day for us..
got up in the morning-went to city to shop/sightsee -$10
back to hotel -$10
out to dinner(lets say El Gaucho in city or if you're planning on going to Flying Fishbone its really $30) -$10
casino after dinner (yep,we're gamblers) -$10
back to hotel -$10

Thats $50 bucks in taxi fare alone in just one day(tip is always included already in fare,DON'T GET RIPPED OFF) plus I reeeeaally lowballed just to make it an 'average' fare since the Marriot is the farthest hotel on the strip and I don't know where all of you are staying. Some days we just drove around out of curiosity to see how the locals lived and went milling around to the other side of the island or to the smaller villages. We drove to other beaches and went to the ruins,fallen natural bridge,etc.
At night,there were times we didn't feel a vibe in a certain casino and went to another or there were nights we went to different places for drinks after dinner. For us it was totally worth it,it was my 14th trip to Aruba and we've always rented..they have great deals where you can get a car for $20 a day (usually a Toyota Echo). Its great to have freedom..PLEASE don't be glued to your hotel...get out there and explore!