Roatan, Honduras Travel Blog

Time to jump again. Chasing bottom time in Roatan Honduras. I’ve never explored Central America, so this is a first. This adventure opens another corner on the planet for me. The Third world and its peoples forever will hold my admiration – Honduras fights corruption, poverty, economic collapse and a brain-drain. Not an easy path for a normal citizen there, with 5% employment – jobs are gold.

Jumping to Roatan from Florida is just a short travel event. Only 2 hours out of Miami. Unfortunately, I’m preoccupied as I depart, leaving my carry-on bag at the terminal. It has all my cloths. Crap, I’ve never done that before!!! 1000 flights and airports – never once. My bag never catches up with me here in Roatan, so my 11 day holiday is spent in Gift-shop rash guards and board shorts. Another lesson, I guess. How many do I need?

My home for this adventure is a luxury resort. Anthony’s Key. A perfect divers holiday. A bungalow over the Caribbean. Its doesn’t hold the Polynesian vibe that the South Pacific has, but it’s gorgeous just the same. My room is a stilt house, literally over the crashing waves. How did this come to me? Good fortuna.

Its March, and the weather and water are cold for me, Water Temp 77Fat depth, 80F at the surface, Air temp in the low 70’s. A surprise for sure. I layer-up for the dives. I need to rent a shortie to layer over my full 3m to keep warm. The Pacific is just over the slender land-mass of Central America here – and the cold Pacific waters push storms onto to this Caribbean Honduras island. Another month it will be warm every day, but the start of March still holds down the temperatures.

Anthony’s resort fills your day with options of Dolphin encounters, Horse-back riding, Sloths, an on-site Museum, Spa services, Zip-lines and tons more. My room not located on mainland Roatan island, but on a separate tiny Key. I take a dozen short 30-second boat transfers each day to and from my room. Transferring on their Water Taxi to the dinning and diving centers on the ‘mainland’ of Roatan. It’s a wonderful arrangement. Not a inconvenience at all, and adds to the tropical ambiance.

The resort adds a night of entertainment on the tiny Anthony’s Key. Music, and BBQ, with authentic local dancing. A first rate show. I love it.

I manage only 15 dives here. Mostly that was due to my choices. Skipping a number of opportunities for night dives, and the one shore-dive that’s available here. Even so, I learn the waters of Roatan and explored the island. Several great wrecks and reef ‘cuts’ are the highlight of the diving. The coral was best on the South-side, but each dive always offers another experience. The dives are simple and easy, it allows me to just run on autopilot. Plenty of boats at Anthony’s, each with a dive guide. Normally 3-dives per/day. Eat, dive, eat – repeat.

The best photo’s I manage are of a Seahorse and a Ghost Pipefish. Good, difficult Macro shots. Still working to improve on these with every shot.

Roatan offers a more local option then Anthony’s Resort in the town on ‘West End’. I spend an afternoon walking the main street of ‘West End’. Lined with Hotels, Restaurants and dive shops – along a bay side street is an idyllic relaxed diver vibe. This town more typical of my type of travel and adventure’s – maybe I’ll stay and dive from here if I ever return. Try ‘West End Divers’ - they have Black water dives!

Filling a no-dive day is easy. I visit a small local ‘zoo’ and zip-line center. Holding a Sloth is interesting and brings big smiles, having Capuchin monkeys or Macaw birds climb on your head brings me closer to Central American land mammals. It’s a wonderful and worthy afternoon. The zip-line experience includes 10 lines, hopping from platform to platform. The day fly’s by.

One of best parts of Anthony’s is meeting the other divers. Only American at this hotel during my stay. Sharing travel stories over breakfast; it helps distract me when traveling solo. No-one is solo here, I’m a curiosity to the other dive groups and get adopted. All part of my journey.

Today is Corona test day. It’s required to travel home to Florida. Test as you leave the States, Test as you enter. Test again just to be careful. My brain was damaged before they tested me … now its full-punctured. But you gota love the little microscope logo’s on the lab results 😊

I tour some of the poorer, struggling corners of the island – watching children hitting soccer balls with sticks around polluted mud pools. No cruise ships for a year means no money. No school for a year. No online learning option. Just survival as all poor 3ed world nations fight to survive. Heartbreaking – lost education is rarely recovered in places like this – a lost generation. My hotel is 60% occupancy, so maybe that’s a good sign for the coming summer. Let’s all hope they get back to school and regain their economic momentum in 2021.