All activities / Museums & Galleries / Oranjestad
Museums & Galleries in Oranjestad
Aruba's capital and cruise port, a compact town of pastel Dutch colonial facades, a historic fort and a waterfront tram line. Each winter its main boulevard hosts the closing Grand Parade of Aruba Carnival, the longest and largest carnival in the Dutch Caribbean.
Why here
The National Archaeological Museum Aruba is the place to understand who was on this island long before the Dutch, and it is one of the best-presented small museums in the Caribbean. Housed in the beautifully restored former dwellings of the Ecury family, a landmark of central Oranjestad, and reopened there in 2009, it holds a permanent collection of more than ten thousand Amerindian artefacts, the physical record of the Caquetio and earlier peoples who lived on Aruba for over four thousand years. The displays move through the Pre-Ceramic, Ceramic and historic periods in pottery, shell, stone, bone and glass, from stone tools and burial urns to the beadwork and trade goods that arrived with European contact. It is a national institution rather than a tourist attraction, free to enter, and it does the quiet work of setting Aruba's indigenous past inside the wider story of the Caribbean and the South American mainland just offshore. For a rainy afternoon or a break from the beach, it gives the flat, dry island a depth of time that the resort strip never hints at, and pairs naturally with a walk through the colonial streets and the fort around it.
Best months
The museum is open on weekdays, roughly 9 to 5, with free entry, and sits in the heart of walkable central Oranjestad. It works well any time of year and is a natural indoor stop on a hot or wet afternoon. Allow an hour or two, and combine it with the nearby Fort Zoutman and the colonial streets and waterfront of the capital.
Getting there & around
The National Archaeological Museum Aruba is on Schelpstraat in central Oranjestad, a short walk from the cruise terminal, the main shopping street and the free downtown tram, and about 10 minutes from Queen Beatrix International Airport. No car is needed; the museum and the surrounding colonial centre are easily done on foot.
Skill levels: beginner
Schools & guides (1)
National Archaeological Museum Aruba
OrganizerThe National Archaeological Museum Aruba, known as NAMA, sits in the restored former dwellings of the Ecury family on Schelpstraat in central Oranjestad and reopened there in 2009. Its permanent collection holds more than ten thousand Amerindian artefacts in pottery, shell, stone, bone and glass, tracing the island's Pre-Ceramic, Ceramic and historic periods from its first Caquetio inhabitants onward. Entry is free, and the displays set Aruba's indigenous past within the wider Caribbean story.