Posted 07 November 2013 - 05:10 PM
My Trip Report:
I've now been back home a couple of days and can't stop thinking about what a great trip this was. When we arrived there was someone from Media Luna waiting for us. He let us know we had a few minutes till the shuttle left so many of us headed to the bar to "hydrate". The shuttle ride to the hotel was interesting with some nice views from the tops of the hills over the island and surrounding beaches.
When we arrived to the hotel, check in couldn't be easier. Give your name and off you went to the room. The rooms are bungalow style, very spacious with large comfortable beds, cranking AC, flat screen tv, and nice wrap around deck with hammocks. The oceanfront view was definitely worth it for me! The main hotel lobby area was large, spacious, and had comfortable couches to surf the web using their wifi. Pool tables upstairs were good for some late night hanging out. The staff was always very friendly and attentive throughout the resort.
The cappuccino bar was great and I took advantage of it often. Nice out door deck bar for drinks. Bar closes around 11 so if you're a nite owl bring a couple of bottles from the duty free at the airport, came in handy! (Kamala if you're reading this, it was water I swear I was drinking till1am!) There seemed to be decks hidden throughout the resort many of which were empty so it was easy to find your own private sunbathing spot with a great view.
The onsite dive shop operation was great. They always went out of their way to accommodate requests and solve problems. They were very friendly. Always finding a way to get me fresh DIN tanks no matter if I was on the boat or doing shore dives. There was always plenty of room in the large gear locker for everybody's stuff. The staff did a quick work of changing out tanks between dives.
Visiting the kids at the orphanage was great! A determined team of divers went to the supermarket filled up over a half a dozen carts and were out in under 45 minutes. I can't fill one shopping cart at home with groceries in an hour! the kids were great really happy to see tons of school supplies and fresh groceries for them. More about that above in an earlier post. It's great we get a chance to give back!
The diving itself was beautiful! The reefs were in really healthy condition with a lot of varying topography. the diving was very diverse from walls, to cracks, swim thrus, chimneys, coral garden plateaus, wrecks and drift dives. And the sea life was even more diverse. Seahorse on our first dive was a good indication of what the week had in store for us. Huge nurse sharks, and Caribbean Reef Sharks, Large Groupers, Octopus, Squid, big Porcupine fish, and a nice Burr Fish or two, Eels everywhere it seemed, huge lobsters and crabs to tiny nudibranchs and snails.
I did the lionfish workshop and after thoroughly killing a few coconuts underwater I was given the green light to hunt. Quite a few of those fish met their demise at the end of my spear! On one night the chef made a fantastic Lionfish Ceviche, yum!
The house reef was a great dive, by itself worth the trip to Roatan. I did the reef during the afternoon and a couple times at night too. I found chimneys that started down at around 75' going straight up to about 30' with beautiful coral lining the walls the whole way up. I found an octopus, a couple of squid that came in close to check out my lights and then disappeared in a cloud of ink. Some cute Burr fish near the house dock too. At night the wall gives an easy point of reference for navigation and at times we didn't go more than 20 or 30 feet without seeing another huge lobster or crab.
Then there was Barbeta Island tour, WOW! Talk about pristine coral reefs. I mean as untouched and in it's natural state as I've seen in this hemisphere for diving. Barrel sponges big enough to stuff an adult diver in. Bright colors with very little bleaching or coral rubble piles anywhere. Fish in schools large enough to make it so you were diving under shade. If you go to Roatan, you MUST do the island tour at least once! Morat Wall and Pigeon Cay were amazing!!
Having a steak and lobster dinner on the beach of a deserted island was a nice change of pace too. As isolated an island as it was, still some of man's trash finds it's way onto the shore. Divers being divers, a couple of people got together and in minutes had it looking immaculate again. Of course the island was tiny but the views were beautiful, you truly felt isolated and away from all civilization!
If you haven't been to Roatan, just go, don't think about it, just do it, you won't regret it. The island tour is magical and a must do! And like usual Kamala kept the whole show running smooth. This is definitely a trip I would do again!
Jose aka JesterDiver
"If you don't know Roatan, you better ask somebody"
P.S. Apparently Roatan is a hotspot for vacationing superheroes! Don't ask just go see for yourself!