Honduras ~ Roatan

If you're interested in ways to help preserve coral reefs and ocean ecosystems, you can Donate to the Project AWARE Foundation, the dive industry's leading nonprofit environmental organization that works to conserve underwater environments through education, advocacy and action... and you don't even have to be a diver to contribute or take action! If you're a shark lover like me, you may even be interested in adopting a shark.

Welcome to my page on our Roatan, Honduras vacation! It was a whirlwind of fun and gorgeous, sunny tropical skies every day... not a single a rain shower. We stayed at a terrific dive resort called Anthony's Key on Roatan, the largest of Honduras's Bay Islands that also include Utila, Guanaja, and numerous satellite islands. What a gorgeous part of the Caribbean! Here's a map of Honduras where you can see the Bay Islands including Roatan off the north coast. Roatan has an interesting and complicated history. Christopher Columbus first ran into the Bay Islands on his fourth voyage to America in 1502. They were later claimed by Great Britain, Spain, and the Dutch United Provinces. Britain finally took control in 1643 and, with the exception of a one-month period of Spanish dominance in 1780, held onto them as a Crown colony, dependent on Jamaica. In 1860, in the aftermath of the William Walker filibustering affair, the British crown recognized Honduran sovereignty and ceded possession of them. The department of Islas de la Bahía was officially incorporated into the nation on March 14th, 1872... in case you were wondering. I can honestly say the coral reefs around Roatan were the healthiest I'd ever seen besides Belize and Bora Bora. We'd been curious about Honduras since it's a place not many tourists go to, and figured Roatan island was the next logical step since we wanted to dive a lot.

I got in 8 dives and my sweetie got in 9... I slept in one day! He he he! That's what we love best, the water... and there was so much underwater life to see there in such a beautiful, unspoiled ecosystem. And I'm glad we got to spend time there before all the big cruise ships and tourist wreckage comes in to spoil it. We were thinking the same thing about Belize when we were there... still pretty quiet, unpopulated, and clean. And from my experience as a traveler and aquanaut, fewer tourists means much more sea life presence and a better experience altogether. The resort was rustic and perfect with beautiful jungle in and around the grounds and boardwalks. The whole experience left us feeling like we would be idiots not to come back and see this place again! Here's my video of our vacation.

The diving was my favorite part of the trip, especially the shark dive! That was a very rewarding, fantastic experience made sweeter by the fact that last time I tried to do this, I couldn't because I was recovering from being sick. The dive itself was gorgeous just like the other dives we did, but we sat on the ocean floor 70 feet down the whole time to observe and shoot the shark frenzy. The sharks were gray sharks, and they were up to nine feet long... and very gorgeous! I love sharks and being among these sharks, as with the black-tipped reef sharks in Bora Bora, feels peaceful, awe-inspiring, and amazing. When in the company of these exquisite predators, I always get the feeling I've lived the best life it's possible to live. I got a lot of good still shots and you can see my video here. They got within a couple of feet of my head a few times... what a rush! I wanted to hug one but no can do. They are wild. I respect that. Not that I'm in the habit of hugging sharks anyway. Oh wait, I did once already in Belize! He he he! They move with such graceful fluidity, almost as if they are giant cobras with fins and a tail. We saw anywhere from 15-18 adult sharks there and they all looked really healthy. One had a fisherman's hook lodged in its jaw but from what I saw, that didn't seem to affect the quality of its life too much. Hey, wait... maybe it was just a facial piercing. You never know, right?

It pains me to know that 100 million of these heroically beautiful animals are being slaughtered each year. But there are things we can do to help. Concerned about shark conservation? You can even adopt a shark. Sharks have inhabited the world's oceans for over 400 million years and at the rate they're disappearing, sharks could easily become extinct within our lifetime. As sharks play a vital role in maintaining healthy ocean ecosystems, this would have disastrous consequences for all ocean ecosystems and for us as a species.

We also got a DVD of the dive... here's part of it where you can see us divers. Kneeling that long on the sand and coral fragments, I got a few cuts on my knees. It's nice to know I was bleeding in the midst of 18 big circling sharks. Who needs recreational drugs when life is this exciting, right? We also got to swim, yes swim, with dolphins. As cute and fun as they were, I have to admit swimming with them was a little bit scarier than I thought it would be. Don't get me wrong, it was fabulous, but more than once a dolphin would come up to me with its mouth open and then it would start snapping at me alittle. Lurking underneath their bubbly, playful exterior is a wild animal and it's easy to forget that... that is, until you meet them face to face in the water and witness how powerful they are... and imagine how effortlessly they could kill you. I thought they were going to eat my camera. I just remained still and didn't encourage it. They were really just curious and as they're used to having humans throw fish into their mouths all day, they probably thought I was going to feed them my rectangular, plastic, silver 'fish' with all the buttons on the outside. We were really glad we got to do it, though. They are magnificent underwater and so fast! You can see my dolphin video here.

There is so much beauty and nature to see on Roatan that I feel like we only saw a fraction of it. We saw quite a bit, though, and being a diver means you see the natural world in a way most people never get to. The snorkeling was excellent, too, expecially with so much warm, shallow water and coastline. Also, with visibility easily at 80-100 feet, diving and snorkeling on Roatan is a clear, colorful banquet of eye-candy... corals, crustaceans, fish, sponges, eels, nudibranchs, eagle rays (if you're lucky) and sea turtles. We saw one (here) with a big ramora on its back. We even saw a sharp-nosed eel slithering in and out of a giant coral cluster which was a nice little treat! Here's my Roatan dive video. We also did a zip line tour of the rain forest on Roatan and that was a great time... lots of laughs and thankfully, not too many bugs. To my surprise I didn't see any spiders at all. We got to see the rain forest from higher up and wow! What a mysterious place, a treasure trove of botanical diversity. The trees were draped from top to bottom with vines in many cases and then there were vines enveloping the vines to create lovely, green curtains of vegetation. I didn't get to shoot any photos from the zip line itself for a few obvious reasons ...like the fact that we had to wear these big, thick, leather gloves so our hands wouldn't catch fire from the friction.

We stayed the first few days of our vacation in a hillside bungalow nestled in tropical forest which felt very sexy. Open the windows and there were palms and other pretty plants that wanted to pop in. We saw several big iguanas in the trees around there and also an agouti like the one in Playa del Carmen. We spent the last days on the key (on the water) in an overwater bungalow in front of a lovely canopy of mangroves that lined the perimeter of the island. The mangroves had these big, cage-like aerial root systems and expansive arms of foliage... perfect for bird watching or just listening as the bird calls that filled the air were so pretty. The whole place was covered in a variety of palms, hibiscus (even some I'd never seen before), bougainvillia, and tropical hardwoods divided up by a network of white sand pathways. Just lovely. If you leaned over our deck and boardwalk railings you could see thousands of teeny fish everywhere, bigger fish hunting them, and sea urchins. The bungalow itself was rustic but possessed of a familiar cuteness. Always the original thinker and romantic goofball, my sweetie proposed to me on the front deck one night after an island fiesta and fire show on April fool's day. What an imaginative way to begin our engagement... and I'm all about that! Enjoy the photos.