Roatan!

We’ve made it to our first island, and I have been having a great time. The first day was a long trip on the ferry on which Emma threw up, but other than that, the trip was pretty fun. We even saw a shipwreck near Roatan. Then we headed to our hotel, a place called Fosters, which was a cheap (sort of) place with air conditioning, cold water, and pretty good Wi-Fi at it’s restaurant. Even better, it was right next to a beautiful beach.

We went to a snorkeling reserve later that day and it was amazing. The reef actually extended onto land, so there was some amazing black coral right on the edge. The coral sort of leveled out into a forest of spikes, where a real forest of beach trees was growing. There was also a ton of iguanas sunbathing. It was really cool.

We did our final open water diving tests in Roatan, but we spent most of our time just pleasure diving. Our first two dives were fun, and I saw a sea turtle in the distance. We saw about three giant lobsters and a bunch of fish. Apparently, my sister saw a lion fish. It is a pity we don’t have underwater cameras. Fortunately, our resident artist (Emma) drew a picture of the marine life:

We also did some diving exercises, like taking our regulators out of our mouths and working on buoyancy control. However, our next two dives were the best. We went to a great reef called Overheat Reef where there were tons of flounders, which alone were great. We also saw little shrimp-crab things, and a lobster or two. The whole place was amazing. The next reef, Fish Den, was even better. Dad pointed out a moray eel, and later Emma pointed out a baby sea turtle that was right under us. I followed it as close as I could, and probably could have reached out and touched it. However, I followed it under our depth limit, and had to come back up. It was really cool. Later we saw a fully grown turtle in the distance. I loved it. Oh yes, and we also got certified on that dive!

Yesterday Mom decided we were going to see a dolphin show at west bay. We hiked half the way there, and then some locals dismissed the idea as crazy, and told us we could just hire a taxi for four dollars. We did just that, went to the place were the dolphin show was supposed to be held, and found out that it was only on weekends. Oh well. We went into the Honduras/Roatan museum that was nearby anyway, and that was pretty cool. Then we went into a laboratory where there was a bunch of displays up about marine life, and I though that was worth the walk. The displays were very interesting. Apparently corals belong to the same Phylum as jellyfish and sea anemones! After that we went to the botanical gardens near there, and that was very pretty as well. After that we hired a taxi halfway, and then a water taxi the rest of the way to our hotel. I felt it was actually worth the trip, and we are going back on the weekend to see the dolphin show, and an iguana farm too.

Today we went scuba diving again, but it wasn’t that great today. The reefs seemed to be very similar, and we got separated from the group on both dives. We saw a giant crab the size of my chest though, and a nocturnal  eel.

Overall, I have been having a great time on Roatan, and I hope we go to some even better places to scuba dive. The only bad thing about this place is that I am being eaten alive by sand fleas. Other than that, it’s great! Thanks for reading!

-Bjorn