By Ty Sawyer

updated 5:18 p.m. ET Oct. 10, 2006

I have three days before the kids join me in Curacao for Kids Sea Camp, and I’m in a decadent mood. I wasn’t in a decadent mood when I arrived – I was ready to explore. But as soon as I checked in at the Hotel Kura Hulanda, whose 65 restored buildings sit right in the middle of the Punda side of historic Willemstad, I had a thought that seldom passes through my discovery-seeking brain: I’d like to be pampered. Heck, I might even like to just stay at the resort, linger in the pool, check out the café, have a drink, read … maybe even daydream. I know – that’s heresy!

I’m not really sure what kind of slacker has taken over my body and given the boot to my restless, adventurous soul, but the imposter is currently well-entrenched. I’ve explored jungles, rainforests and barrier reefs, but I’ve never stayed in a World Heritage living museum – and that’s what Willemstad is.

I may have to re-evaluate.

So I muster some energy and walk a few steps from my lovingly renovated room  to the Village Square, around which the Kura Hulanda complex is built. Essentially, the hotel comprises an eight-block walled village within the center of commerce and activity of Willemstad. There’s a News Café, shops, galleries, a museum, three restaurants, two pools and tranquil gardens that should help me focus on my newfound life of quiet contemplation, reflection and gentlemanly ease without breaching the envelope of the outer world. I settle at a table under the wide canopy of a flamboyant tree just as the great sidereal shift of day passes over the rooftops, transforming the sky’s blue hue to deep ginger to the silky twinge of twilight that heralds the appearance of the first sprinkling of stars. Somewhere in the middle of this spectacle a drink has arrived. As have people.

I strike up a conversation with a couple, Martin and Siobhan, on their second honeymoon. Turns out we all once lives within blocks of each other in London. Like me, they’ve yet to leave Kura Hulanda to see the island’s other charms. “It’s like a fairy tale here,” says Siobhan.

They ask what brings me to Curacao and I, stealing an ideal from the late 18^th century that seems to fit the surroundings, tell them I was drawn here by gentlemanly leisure and poetic ease. For a moment, conversation stops.

“Congratulations, then,” replies Siobhan. “Join us for dinner?”

We jaunt off to the famous Astrolab Observatory Restaurant and dine alfresco in the Indian Marble Garden. Between the cured gravlax, pumpkin cream soup and grilled reef lobster with vanilla butter sauce, we start to feel expansive and happily continue to take advantage of the sommelier’s wine recommendations. My last memory of the evening is falling asleep next to a card that says “Sweet Dreams” that had been placed on my pillow. The next morning when I awake, I hope that I’m in my own room.

The Morning Reckoning
Sitting up in bed, I catch a glimpse of my dive gear brooding in the corner and in an obviously plaintive mood, the zipper untouched since my arrival. As I stare, I realize the “poetic ease” gig is up, so I grab the bag and head off to visit my friends Nolo and Monica Ambrosi at PADI 5-Star Ocean Encounters dive center.

Ty Sawyer / Sport Diver

Like me, they’re taking advantage of the quiet before the blitz of kids Sea Camp, of which they are a primary sponsor. They both decide to join me on the dive boat, and we go to one of my favorite critter dives, Small Wall. Here, in a sand patch a few fin kicks from the boat, the divemaster unearths a stark-white mantis shrimp that peers up at us from its perfectly round hole. I kick down to what is, literally, a small wall and settle in for a bit of slow-motion exploration. Curacao’s reefs practically writhe with life, especially the little stuff, so it’s best to take it slow. Me, I hardly move. It seems every time I pause, I notice a movement that turns into a whitespotted moray, a banded goby, a juvenile spotted drum or a Pederson cleaner shrimp bobbing in the curly twists of a corkscrew anemone. By the end of the dive I’ve probably covered a grand total of about 35 feet.

Between dives the boat heads over to Caracas Bay so we can explore Fort Beekenburg. The fort once protected the bay from such riffraff as 18^th-century pirates, as well as from the French and the English. On the other side of the bay, the famous Tugboat sits in 20 feet of water, but after the break, we head off to Beacon Point.

Christian, one of Nolo and Monica’s two sons, loves to tell a story to divers about the “Beaconese Indians” who once flourished on Curacao. By the end of the sotry half the boat believes such people once lived on Curacao and gave this site its moniker, and I’m sure the notation has been duly entered in logbooks around the world (and now it’s in the pages of a dive magazine). Beyond the stories, though, Beacon Point has some nice patches of pillar coral as well as a collection of large orange elephant sponges that decorate the nearby drop-off. Purple trains of creole wrasse course over the reef here, and the site is a favorite for great barracudas and tornadoes of jacks. Dolphins often zip in to give divers a quick thrill.

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