Revisiting Memories from a Decade Ago - Boardwalk Bloggers Weekend in Aruba

As you might have heard, read or seen in recent days, Boardwalk Boutique Hotel was awarded two MICHELIN Keys in October 2025. A unique “win” for Aruba, as with Boardwalk’s two keys status, the island made the shortlist of 21 Caribbean islands in the world-renowned MICHELIN Guide 2025. And a very special milestone for the entire team at Boardwalk to receive this extremely rare recognition from such a high-standing institution as MICHELIN. If you’re not familiar with the MICHELIN Keys: it’s the same rating as the MICHELIN stars for restaurant, with the keys applying to the hotel industry. Boardwalk is one of only 572 hotels worldwide to receive the two MICHELIN Keys distinction, and the only hotel in Aruba to receive these special honors.

A first for everything

Since this festive milestone put Boardwalk on the map as the very first hotel in Aruba to receive MICHELIN Keys, it prompted a memory to yet another moment in time where our hotel celebrated a “first”. And we also thought it an appropriate moment to look back a bit and ask ourselves the question ‘how did we get here?’. So, this blog recounts the days in 2014, when for the first time in the history of the island, Boardwalk seized its regular hotel operations for one weekend and opened its doors exclusively for a group of carefully selected travel bloggers from four different continents.

Bloggers Weekend in Aruba

Who has active memories of the year 2014? Remember what you were doing? What was ‘trending’. Well, a new travel trend for sure was this novel idea of ‘blogging’ and ‘vlogging’: people like you and me starting their own online platform, a travel blog, and share their experiences and insights of any given destination, accommodation or activity on their travel itinerary. Somewhere on an island in Greece a hotel made headlines that year for hosting a unique ‘bloggers weekend’. It sparked an idea thousands of miles away, on the Caribbean island of Aruba. How about closing the entire hotel for a weekend for regular guests and exclusively give a curated group of international travel bloggers the opportunity to experience Aruba and our Boardwalk Hotel firsthand and write about it on their blog. And so, the idea became a reality.

Off the beaten path

Boardwalk has always been a strong advocate of island discovery: from the days in 2011 when the hotel resumed under new ownership of current hotel owners, the local twin sisters Kimberly and Stephanie Rooijakkers, the motto has been to explore Aruba and its hidden gems. In the early days we provided in-room treasure boxes with local experiences, authentic meals, tips for special moments in Aruba, curated by dozens of local experts and residents. With that island discovery front and center in the DNA of delivering unique guest experiences, we provided the selected bloggers with similar Treasure Boxes, rental cars, coolers, snorkel sets and stimulated them to venture out and discover their own tracks, off the beaten path.

International bloggers

The result of Boardwalk’s Blogger Weekend was stunning. A total of fifteen international travel bloggers found their way to Aruba. With the help and financial support from the Aruba Tourism Authority these bloggers were flown to Aruba from Chile, The Netherlands, United States of America, Canada, Colombia, Brazil and the United Kingdom. A Swedish blogger who resided in Aruba at the time was added to the international mix to reach her Scandinavian and worldwide audience.

Authentic experiences

And off they went – exploring the rugged backlands, snorkling in the ocean, foraging for seaweed with a local chef, SUP yoga in the ocean, paddling through mangroves, hanging with local fishermen, tasting local food, enjoying local music, hit the biking trails with a local guide, and the hiking trails inside Arikok National Park. There were cocktails, hammocks and barbecues, barefoot gatherings and all the unique features that still make up for Boardwalk’s barefoot luxury experience. There was the opportunity to spin the wheel of an authentic kaha di orgel and a meet and greet with the local artists who had been commissioned to capture Boardwalk’s rich history as a coconut palm plantation on canvas. Those artworks later made their way into our various casitas where they don the walls till this day.

Content that resonates

The Boardwalk Bloggers Weekend 2014 resulted in 15 personal travel blogs filled with authentic experiences in four different languages: Spanish, English, Dutch and Swedish. Of the fifteen international travel bloggers that participated in this 2014 initiative, twelve travel blogs are still very much active today. Meaning all these travel blogs are celebrating at least decades-long anniversaries and know how to remain relevant and produce content that resonates with engaged audiences. No small task in a world that since 2014 has changed so much in terms of blogging, vlogging and new platforms like TikTok, Snapchat and AI competing with more shoestring-style travel reporting. It’s a lot of work and dedication that is put into these travel blogs, with the intent to educate, entertain and inform visitors and travelers.

Making headlines

As mentioned early-on in this blog, Boardwalk was the first hotel in Aruba, and to our knowledge the only one till this day in 2025 to have ever hosted a total hotel take-over by a group of bloggers. And it made headlines. Local newspapers attended the welcome cocktail we had organized and dedicated pages of coverage to the Boardwalk Bloggers Weekend.

To our pleasant surprise the Boardwalk Bloggers Weekend is still relevant more than a decade later. Dutch blogger Maartje Diepstraten of well-read travel blog Bart’s Boekje published a new blog in October 2025 remembering one of her very first international trips for her then-new travel blog to Aruba, staying at Boardwalk for the bloggers weekend. In her own words:

Maartje quote

“It was one of the nicest trips I ever made. Boardwalk Hotel and the Aruba Tourism Authority really pioneered with this trip back then. That I was selected to fly all the way to Aruba was a dream come true. And till this day Boardwalk is and remains one of the most beautiful, best and nicest hotels we’ve ever visited.”

A decade of developments, the same at its core

Although some of the footage and stories that were created in 2014 may have gotten outdated in certain ways, such as our hotel name (we changed from Boardwalk Small Hotel to Boardwalk Boutique Hotel in 2019), details in our design, size and the fact we were still allowing children under 18 in 2014 and have since become exclusively adults-only, the overall experience at Boardwalk as well as on the island have remained the same.

Curious to see how much has changed from then to now?

Watch the recap video of Boardwalk’s Bloggers Weekend 2014 here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeVjA5wiEoY

Curious to see how much Aruba has remained the same from then to now?

Watch this beautiful short video, made by Laura Coolen of @whataboutherNL:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thHdmZOfH1Y&feature=youtu.be

Overview of all travel blogs & participants in Boardwalk’s Bloggers Weekend 2014:

Nikki Pepper – Oh The People You Meet (USA)

Ian Livingston – johnnyjet.com (USA)

Maartje Diepstraten – bartsboekje.com (NL)

Laura Coolen – whatabouther.nl (NL)

Ricardo Freire - www.viajenaviagem.com (BRA)

Rachel Brathen – YogaGirl (SW)

Noah Lederman – Somewhere or Burst (USA)