Everything's better down where it's wetter, take it from me!

First dive day on Roatan, today!  At the recommendation of Sandra & Al, we did some research on Coconut Tree Divers in West End.  Number one on Trip Advisor also counts for something, so we scheduled a 1-tank dive for this afternoon.  For those of you who have followed us on other trips, you know that Andrew has troubles equalizing during descent and, often, has weeks of ear issues after we dive.  We talked to our dive master (DM), Marco, about the issue in advance, and he promised to make it a smooth trip to the bottom. 

On the boat getting ready to go under.  Disregard the water drop on the camera.

True to his word, Marco (and Andrew) took their time on the way down.  He also stayed right with Andrew and offered tips to help him equalize, which doesn't usually happen.  We had a very small group - only four divers, plus Marco (the DM) and Sara who was certifying for her DM classification.   There was another group on our boat doing their open water certification, but they were with a different DM.  

The dive site was called "Bikini Bottom", and was relatively shallow (about 60 feet maximum) compared to Belize diving where we are often below 80 feet.  This portion of reef was huge - you often couldn't see from side to the other.  In addition to the beautiful coral and colorful fish that I don't know the names of, we also saw several parrot fish, a large spotted eagle ray, two turtles. 

Andrew working his way down the line

Dive selfie!

Turtle in the middle...look closely!

Here's some video of the turtle.  We also saw a big spotted eagle ray.  My apologies, as the video isn't very good.  I'm still learning how to use the GoPro properly and I inadvertently turned off the darn LCD screen about 3 minutes in to the dive.  After that, I never quite knew what I was filming, so I'm pretty happy I got anything at all!  Overall, it was a great dive!  We were down just a minute or two shy of an hour, which was just fine.  I was starting to get cold by about 40 minutes in, even though the water temp was about 80 degrees F.  Next time (which will be on Monday, by the way), I'll add a shorty over top of my dive skin!

After the dive, we were hungry so we headed off in search of food.  We found a little place by the beach.  Andrew ordered Lion Fish, which I think may be about the same as eating rat or gopher.  Lion Fish is a "pest" here in the Caribbean.  To keep the population down it's hunted and, typically, fed to other fish.  Apparently there's plenty, because this restaurant was serving it as fish & chips to the tourists.  I have to admit, it was actually pretty good.

Lion fish & chips

View from our dinner table

Right by our table was a hummingbird feeding two babies in a nest

We picked up more avocados and limes at one of the produce stands, and grabbed a taxi back to the house.   That's it for today...hasta manana!

Snorkel videos

Today was almost a repeat of yesterday.  The only variation was that we did take a taxi to the grocery store and did a load of laundry.  I am surprisingly tired, considering the only thing we did that could be construed as exercise was an hour in the kayak and some snorkeling.  Speaking of which...

Here's a video of a big parrot fish, and a turtle.

Tomorrow, we dive.   Stay tuned...

A whole lotta nothing...

...is what we accomplished today.  We had a short night, rudely interrupted by a large "thud" from somewhere in the house about 1:30 am.  We spent 15 minutes futilely trying to identify where the noise had come from.  Andrew solved the problem with earplugs.  I listened to the woodpecker hammer on the tree outside of our window.  When I finally got up to make coffee about 6 am, I discovered the pineapple we bought yesterday had leapt from the counter and rolled under a bar stool.  Mystery thud solved.  Now if only we could do something about the birds. 

When Andrew got up about 8:30, we geared up and trooped out to the reef.  Me in the kayak and Andrew with his flippers, snorkel & mask.  We weren't but a few minutes when I head "blurfffss flurpsss"come out of his snorkel and saw him take off in the opposite direction at top speed.  In case you are wondering, "top speed" while snorkeling is not very fast.  I meandered after him in the kayak until he surfaced to report that he had spied, and then tried to follow, a large ray.  Link to the video of the great chase is here, if you're so inclined.

It was a beautiful morning today - clear and calm.  However, with the cruise ships coming to Roatan on Tuesday, Wednesdays and Thursdays, it wasn't long before a couple of excursion boats showed up and off-loaded what seemed to be 100 people on to the reef.  It was comical to see all their heads bobbing around out there.  What a traffic jam!  Oh well, after more than an hour in the sun, we were finished, anyway.  

After protein shakes made with that sneaky pineapple, we settled in with our books for a few hours.  Ok, it was more than a few hours.  It was many, many hours.  In the middle of that, Andrew had a nap.  I wished for one, but it didn't happen.   I hope, in my next life, I am a napper.  I also hope for better hair, but that's another post.

Andrew getting some sun, pre-nap.

By about 4:30, it had cooled off enough to take a walk up the beach to see what we could see.  The "town" of Sandy Bay follows the beach and is comprised mostly of small, rustic homes where local folks reside.  There are also several ex-pat-owned homes, which are easy to distinguish by the size, general upkeep, and "fancy" car in the driveway (meaning it was manufactured post-Y2K and has all the tires inflated).  Otherwise, there isn't much to see.   The roads are sand, like in Caye Caulker.  The people are friendly.  Kids are plentiful and we can't help notice that they are often engaged in activities that would certainly initiate CPS reports at home:  swimming unsupervised in the ocean, building a sand castle in the middle of the road, making a fire in the corner of the yard.  Adults are always visible, but seem mostly unconcerned with what is happening.  Equally surprising, is that all children appear to have all their limbs, hair, and other necessary body parts.  They are lovely, social little creatures who wave and shout hello at everyone who passes.  They are not hitting each other with sticks or pushing each other under the waves or in to the fire.  Seems like it's working just fine.

   After our stroll, we played with the dogs and watched the sun set before making a simple dinner of fish and salad.  Just as Andrew finished up the day's dishes, we had our 3rd power outage of this trip.  We actually went more than 24-hours without one and I had, optimistically, just reset all the clocks.  I won't make that mistake again.  This one lasted only an hour and, with iPads to read on, the time goes by without much hardship.  Like the whole day...

Andrew with Mia & Zoe.

Perfection

Let's go to town...

It was calm and overcast this morning, so we decided to take the kayak out for a spin.  We didn't go terribly far.  Andrew does not really like, nor understand the point of, kayaking.  For some reason, his body does not want to hold him in an upright position.  Even with the snazzy backrest, he was practically laying down while we paddled.  He says it feels like perpetual crunches.  I am somewhat concerned he may have a physiological anomaly resulting in missing ab muscles but, based on the crunch analogy, can understand his aversion to this activity.  To his great credit, he was a good sport and we were out for the better part of an hour before breakfast.   

Andrew trying to figure out the GoPro

Morning rain - we got a little bit wet!

After our paddle and breakfast, we walked up to the road and hailed a taxi to West End.   West End is about 7 km up the road in an area more dedicated to tourism.  The cost is $2 each to take a taxi there from our VRBO.  WE has one main street and it is lined with a few small hotels, dive shops (the main attraction here in Roatan), gift shops, restaurants and bars.  Today it was filled with a fair number of cruise ship passengers doing kayak, diving, and fishing excursions.   

Our first mission was to then get a water taxi to West Bay, the most heavily touristed part of Roatan.  West Bay is where the larger resorts are found, and has the best beaches on Roatan.  The water taxi from West End to West Bay takes about 15 minutes (including a few stops along the way to on & off-load locals going to various jobs), and costs $3 per person.   Unless you are one of said locals.  They don't seem to pay.  Nor did the guy who ran out of gas and needed us to tow him back to shore. 

Water taxi heading to West Bay

I hope this wasn't one of the water taxis

Trying to avoid the crowds, we were in West Bay for one specific purpose - to talk to Julio.  Yesterday, our tour guide William told us that Julio did day trips to a place called Cayos Cochinos - a series of islands about 45 minutes from Roatan with good snorkeling.  We found Julio easily and discussed the trip.  We learned that the trip is an all-inclusive day (food, alcohol, boat trip & snorkel guide).  These are typically not our thing.  Mostly because we just don't drink enough to make the cost worth while.  At $150/person, we decided that we would much rather dive.  We thanked Julio for his time and info, and took the water taxi back to West End.  

Back in WE, we poked around in a few of the shops so that Andrew could get a magnet.  As well, we stopped in to Coconut Tree Dive Shop to arrange a dive.  We're all set to do a 1-tank dive on Friday afternoon.  If things go ok with Andrew's ears on that dive, we'll likely go another time or two.  We'll have to play it by ear (hee hee).  

West End Main Street.  Actually, the only street.

By this time the cruise ship traffic was noticeably picking up, but wanted to grab some lunch before we left town.  Our noses led us to a place that was grilling meat and baking fresh bread.  What more do you need?  Our served recommended we share the mixed grill plate, which included a large assortment of chicken, steak, ribs, chorizo and pork.   With two cocktails (beer for Andrew, margarita for me) and soft-serve ice cream for dessert, our total for lunch was $16 US, plus tip.  

Lunch was the caveman special

Last thing on the "to do" list for WE was to hit one of the produce stands.  This is one of my favorite activities on these trips.  We bought a pineapple, 4 limes, 4 avocados, 2 bananas and some potatoes for $6 US.  

Back "home", the sun was out and it was hot.  We grabbed our gear and swam out to the reef.  I can't tell you how lovely it is to be able to snorkel whenever the mood strikes, and for whatever length of time that suits.   It's very different than what we're used to from our Belize trips where it all has to be arranged in advance.  We saw a lot of fish, and even a couple of squid today, but the water was choppy (the wind comes up in the afternoon) so we only stayed out about 45 minutes.   No worries - there's lots of time left!

Snorkel

 

Touristas!

Our morning started out a little rocky with our second power outage.  Not really a big deal, except for the fact that today was the one day this whole trip that we had someplace to be at a designated time, and also because the water comes from a well that requires a pump.  This meant no showers - thank goodness we always travel with a good stash of Burt's Bees wipes!  After our sponge baths,  we were picked up by William, from Victor Boden Tours.  Because our VRBO is "out of town", we thought this would help us get the lay of the land early in our stay.  

First stop was Mayan Jungle Canopy for zip lines and monkeys.  We were geared up in harnesses and helmet (more about the helmets later), and followed our guide up, up, up a series of steps and steep paths to the first platform.  He gave us a minute to catch our breath, a very quick series of instructions (don't touch the zip line while you're moving, don't go until I say ready - ok?), and we were off.  The first platform is always a little tricky for me.  My brain doesn't really agree that my body should hurl itself off a platform into the tree canopy, even when it knows full-well that we're attached to a rope.  I also wonder a lot about the point of a helmet in such a scenario.  I do suspect that, if I am to plummet 100 feet (or more) to the jungle floor, a head injury may be the least of my concerns.  I expressed this sentiment to the guide who informed me that it was in case a tree branch falls on your head.  I am skeptical that has happened enough times to warrant a helmet but, in fairness, I descend from a long line of helmet-adverse people.  For me, helmet + heat + humidity = a very, very bad hair day, as is evidenced in subsequent photos.  On the upside, the lack of a shower is now moot. 

Whee! 

Rockin' the pointless helmets

After we finished the series of zip lines, we headed over to the Jungle portion of the site to see the monkeys.  I was very surprised when the guide opened the door to the first cage and had us follow him inside.  I was even more surprised when, almost instantaneously, a spider monkey was draped across my head.  Now, don't get me wrong, I like monkeys.  I think they are adorable.  When they are not touching me.  The thought of their yucky little monkey hands touching me causes me to conjure up all sorts of thoughts of soon-to-be illnesses I am surely contracting.  I do, after all, work in an infectious disease clinic so I am relatively well-versed in what can happen when you (or a monkey) doesn't have proper hand hygiene.  It's not pretty, I assure you. 

Andrew was in heaven.  He now wants a monkey.  Let's hope he forgets that by the time we get home.

Oh - and they wrap that creepy tail around your neck.  Just like a boa constrictor - another animal fave of mine.  

Threesome!

When we finally free ourselves of the monkeys (there were multiple cages, and many, many monkeys), we move on to birds.  Awesome.  I hate birds more than monkeys, for sure.  They have dead eyes and sharp beaks and claws.  And they are dirty and poop on everything.  Again with the disease worries, but bird flu got it's name somehow.   

Andrew loves birds.  He also loves monkeys and snakes, making him completely untrustworthy.  

I almost didn't go in to the bird cage.  Note to self, always go with your first instinct.  Within a moment of entering, this damn bird was on my head.  It stayed there a really, really long time.  

Seems to me that damn helmet may have been more useful in this potion of the tour, no?  

After we freed ourselves from the birds (including the small green parrot that tried to permanently attach itself to Andrew's Keen), we were led out of the zoo area and back to the parking lot.  I rushed to wash my hands before we were back in the van for the tour of the island.  

As we drove, we learned that Roatan is about 35 miles long, and varies in width up to about 3.5 miles across at the widest point.  The population is about 100,000 (they do a door-to-door census every other year) and is made up of a good mix of locals and ex-pats from Canada and the US.  The major industry used to be fishing, but is now tourism.  Roatan continues to export seafood products to the US & Canada (shrimp, grouper, snapper, etc.).   There is some agriculture (cattle, bananas, mangoes, citrus, sugar cane) but those products are all used on the island.   

We always ask about the cost of living when we travel.  William told us that a day laborer makes about $15/day.  Someone working in a hotel or restaurant would make about $500/month.  Rent in the areas where the locals live varies, up to about $200/month.  Those same houses could be purchased for about $20-30,000.  Obviously, the beachfront homes and condos are much more expensive, but William tells us they are "cheap" compared to other Caribbean islands.  We did see a few really lovely homes looking over the water for about $350,000.   Health care is free, but there is a second system of private facilities that you can upgrade to, if you have the money to do so.  Kids go to public (free) school for about 4-hours/day until about grade 6.  After that, families have to pay out of pocket for "high school".  University/college costs are not subsidized by the government, so a post-secondary is considered a luxury.  

The West Bay Beach - the largest public beach on Roatan & very full of tourists.  Much nicer sand and water than we have at our rental, so makes sense.  

View of the ocean from a road-side lookout.  

Beautiful! 

We spent about 4 hours driving all over the island.  Like most places in Latin America/Caribbean, areas range from brand new condo/resort developments, to 8x8 homes with only shutters for windows and rusty corrugated tin roofs.  Overall, the island is beautiful, however, and the people are very friendly.  At our request, William took us to a fish monger in one of the local shopping areas and we bought 5 pounds of jumbo shrimp and a large fillet of grouper for about $45 US.  All of the seafood here is flash-frozen upon catch, so we will be able to keep it frozen until we want to eat it.  

Last thing on the list was lunch.  William offered to take us to one of the fancy resorts but we asked him to please take us to someplace he would eat, instead.  We ended up at a little place very close to our VRBO.  A  very friendly woman in her 60's (I would guess) came out to and told us we could have rice, beans, and stewed chicken.  The only choices we were offered were between fried plantains or potato salad, and either fresh orange or tamarind juice.   It was all amazing, and cost us a whopping $14 US, plus a $2 tip.  When I asked the woman the name of her place so we could have a cab bring us back there, she looked confused.  William said it didn't have a name, but that we could ask any cabbie to take us to the car wash, which we hadn't noticed was attached to the kitchen.  Makes perfect sense.  What a great day! 

Stewed chicken, rice, beans and friend plantains - which are amazing with hot sauce and washed down with fresh tamarind juice!

Sunday is a day of rest

I often find it hard to differentiate Sunday from other days in Caribbean countries.  The day-to-day pace here is pretty darn slow, even during "rush-hour".  If you pay close attention, however, everyone slows to a turtle's pace on Sunday.  Oh, except for the birds.  They don't seem to be able to sleep past about 4:45 am, and they are positively gleeful about the fact that it will soon be morning.  Though enthusiastic, they are apparently not clever enough to know when morning ACTUALLY comes, because sunrise here in Sandy Bay was scheduled for 6:06 am today.  I know, because I checked. Because they either didn't see this info, or because they just don't care, they began peeping and chirping their little feathered heads off a good 90 minutes before dawn.  Andrew rolled over and put in ear plugs.  I read until it was light enough to make coffee without turning on the lights.  Then I sat out on the screen porch and read until Andrew rolled out close to 9 am.(!)

With nothing in the works today, we drank more coffee and had some breakfast (eggs, fruit & English muffins) on the porch.  We did our chores (made the bed, swept up the sand around the house, and washed dishes), before gathering up snorkel gear and heading for the reef.

The ocean here is shallow and warm - about 85F/30C.  It doesn't have that stunning blue color and white sand that we've seen in places like Jamaica and Aruba, but the temperature is perfect and the reef is only a short swim from shore (about 100 yards).   In contrast, when we're in Caye Caulker the reef is more than a mile out and you have to take a boat to get there.    Here in Sandy Bay we can walk out 50 yards, and not be in water above our waist.  Once you start swimming, the reef is quickly visible with loads of fish and coral formations.  We saw a huge parrot fish, several sea cucumbers, and some barracuda.  We found Spooky Channel, which is the dive site nearest to our VRBO.  On the other side of the Channel, the ocean floor drops from about 8 feet to about 100 feet with the reef wall stretching down.   As beautiful as this is, I find snorkeling frustrating.  Invariably, all the interesting things to see are nowhere near the surface and I constantly find myself  wanting to be down closer to the "action".  In addition, I quickly get motion sick bobbing around in the waves while snorkeling.  For these reasons, I prefer scuba.  

After about a half hour, I was queasy enough to swim back to shore.  Andrew stayed out another hour+ while I spotted for him; alternating between sitting on shore and lounging in the shallow water.  Al & Sandra have an inflatable, orange buoy that signals approaching boats there is a snorkeler or diver in the water.  Andrew had that attached to him so I easily could see where he was and that he was ok.   

Best seat in the world!   The faint white by the skyline is the reef.  

After Andrew finished snorkeling, we made lunch (tuna salad, veggies & fruit) and then did a whole-lot of nothing for the remainder of the afternoon.  We did talk about getting the kayak out, but the wind had come up.  We talked about trying to pick and husk a coconut, but were deterred when YouTube made it clear that a machete (which we forgot to pack) would be necessary.  We talked about walking up to the road to see what we could see, but never quite made it.  We did watch the lizards and a woodpecker out the window, and read.  All in all, a perfect Sunday afternoon.  

We did manage to rustle up a lovely guacamole for an afternoon snack.  Hey, it's good fats!  ;) 

Day 2 - Arrival in Roatan!

After a restless night, we were up at 5 am.  What is it about hotels that are antithetical to a good night's sleep?  We had a quick breakfast and then hustled off to the airport to sit in the Sky Lounge for a few hours (another first-class perk we were determined to take advantage of).  Flight was 3 hours this time, so we each watched a movie.  Andrew:  Gravity.  Me:  All is Lost.  Surprisingly good for a film with no dialogue.  

We arrived in Roatan about 1 pm, and were soon met by Al - the owner of the VRBO we rented.  Good news - he's Canadian!  We spent the short ride to the grocery store giving Andrew a hard time about the recent Olympic hockey games.   We rolled up in front of a modern-looking grocery store and Al gave us the 4-1-1 on what to buy there.  Pork and chicken are "very good", shrimp is "the best", avoid the beef because "it's not aged".  We laid in a supply of produce and meat to last us a couple of days.  Though Al tells us everyone here accepts US dollars, the local currency is the lempira.  20 lempira = 1 US dollar.  It was amazing to watch the register roll up to in the $1750 lempira range.  Not a dollar figure we're used to seeing at the grocery store.   I looked helplessly at the clerk who smiled and told me it was $84 and change.  Whew - that's better!  

After the store, it was a short ride to the VRBO.  Al & his wife Sandra live in a larger house next door.  They have two dogs - Mia and Zoe.  They gave us a tour of the house and left us to unpack.  Oh, how I love to unpack!  

Here's some photos of the house...

Main bedroom

There's a loft with a second bed. We'll sleep on the main floor - it's much cooler!  

View in to the living room/kitchen from the loft

Front of the house

View from the screened porch

Screened porch.  I foresee myself spending a lot of time here!  

Mia

Zoe

After we got unpacked we headed off for a walk down the beach...

On Al's advice, we stopped at a local place for an early dinner.  Note to self - learn some GD Spanish if we're going to continue to holiday in Latin America!  The family who owned the place didn't speak a word of English.  I recognized about every 4th word the woman said.  We managed to order what we hoped was some food and cocktails.  Drinks were out pretty quick - local beer for Andrew, something the woman called a "lee-mon-aid" for me.  I had no idea what that was going to be but it turned out to be a lovely lime & coconut (maybe Malibu??) slushy.  Score!   

True to island living, the food took quite a bit longer.  We could hear them chopping and chopping in the back, so we knew it was going to be good and fresh!  We thought we ordered mixed ceviche and two orders of grilled garlic shrimp.  What we got was mixed ceviche and one order of grilled garlic shrimp.  So close!  This turned out to be a happy accident, as the shrimp meal came with fried potatoes and salad and, with the ceviche, was plenty large enough to feed us both!  

Beautiful view while we waited for our food

After dinner, we wandered back to the house and decided to go for a swim.  Andrew snorkeled a bit and I hung out by the shore with Zoe.  Now the sun is down and we're in for the night.  We're pooped!  See you tomorrow...

Post script:  Just as I was pushing the button to publish this, the power went out.  We knew that this may happen from time to time, but Al said that it happened "far less frequently" than it had in the past.  Hmmm.  He also said that it typically lasted "an hour or two" and, at almost 2 hours (to the minute) the lights have reappeared.  Just in time for us to go to bed.  :)  

...and away we go!

It's time for our annual "escape from winter" trip.  This has been a tough winter in Minnesota.  Lots of snow; lots of cold.  Thank you, polar vortex.  Andrew hates winter and is teetering on the edge of some place bad.  Last night we had a honest-to-goodness blizzard with at least 10 inches of snow and high winds.  We spent the first part of our travel day digging a hole in the mega drift in our driveway so the car could pick us up for the airport.   

Andrew slogging through the waist-high drifts. 

Our driveway.  It was drifting back in as fast as we could snow-blower it out.  Excuse my finger in the corner.  I'm not great with my phone camera.  

Oh, well.  That's behind us now.  We had a car service pick us up and drive us (very slowly - roads were terrible) to the airport.  We breezed through check in, thanks to our Trusted Traveler status, and headed to the Sky Lounge to wait for our flight.   

Our itinerary is this:  we fly to Atlanta today, and spend the night.  Tomorrow morning, we fly from ATL to Roatan.  

We had about an hour flight delay out of MSP - residual lags from yesterday's storm.  There must have been a lot of flight cancelations last night, judging from the terse mood of many of the passengers & staff we observed.  We, on the other hand, were happy, happy, happy.  We had first-class tickets and were on our way to sunny skies and sandy beaches! 

Runways were a little dicey!  

Goodbye, frozen abyss.  

The flight was my favorite kind - uneventful.  We each had a couple of cocktails and reveled in the luxury of first class.  

My lunch - grilled chicken salad & squash soup.  Actually not bad, for airplane food!

Andrew's lunch - hot pastrami on a pretzel bun & squash soup.  I didn't tell him it was squash until after he ate it.  

Despite a late start, we made up time in the air and were only a few minutes past our initial arrival time in to ATL.  We collected bags and hopped the shuttle to our nearby hotel - The Holiday Inn Express.   I guess we can be anything we want tomorrow!  Andrew was thrilled to learn that there was a Five Guys burger place within walking distance.  We grabbed a quick bite to eat, and then called it a day.