Roatan, in Full

We woke up early enough to watch the ship approach, round, and dock at Roatan. There have been obvious changes since I visited in January 2010, namely that they’re expanding the port to accommodate a second ship. Well, anyway, that was the most visible change at the moment. Later, we passed an entire second port that CAN hold two ships. So, as opposed to nine years ago when the island could only hold one ship at a time, it can now hold three. And it did. There were two Carnival ships at the newer port, in addition to our Liberty of the Seas.

We had breakfast delivered, and then got ready to go meet our tour guide.

Another big change since last time is that they’ve built white kiosks for the guides to find people to hire them. Before, once you got out of the port’s gates, you were just bodily swarmed by people wanting to give you a ride. This time, there was still the yelling and trying to get attention, but it was a lot more comfortable not to be physically approached!

We found our guide, and walked up the road a bit to where her car was parked. On the way, we stopped in a storefront to purchase a water and Sprite, as they’d told us we couldn’t bring food or drinks off of the ship. Turns out we could have; no one checked. But it’s good to put as much money into the local economy, so I’m glad we had the opportunity.

Our tour guide was Nola, who grew up on Roatan. She is probably a bit older than James and me, not much, with sons who are 29 and 21. She described a childhood on an island that had no development, no electricity, and, she said, they were “wild,” sleeping with chickens. Then at some point, a head honcho of Century 21 visited and started developing the land. She said that now, they rely on tourism as, in the past, they could live off of what they farmed. Now, because so much of the island is privately-owned, there’s no room to farm and they need people to visit.

The wild Roatan sounded idyllic, so I asked her if she was sad that that way of life was gone. She deftly dodged the question, saying that when she was younger, “We didn’t know anything about how life was. We had no television, no internets. We didn’t know about what was going on anywhere else.”

Our first stop was a small animal “park.” It was really just a few habitats in someone’s back yard, and it was jammed packed with people. We were excited about seeing and holding a sloth, but the line was clearly more than half an hour. We went to see the capuchin monkeys first, instead.

The monkeys were high-spirited and very interactive. People were emptying their water bottles or letting the monkeys drink out of them because those monkeys were either really thirsty (one was licking the spilled water off of a 2x4 path) or just curious… sticking their hands down in the wider-mouthed bottles to see if there was any treasure hiding inside.

The monkeys jumped onto and off of Mal’s head, and onto James’s shoulder. One climbed onto my back. They have good grips, but not claws, so even when they’d jump off, it wasn’t painful. One girl complained that they “pulled” her hair, but the monkey had actually wrapped his tail around her ponytail and used it to swing a bit. The habitat was full of hanging braids of rope, so it made sense.

At one point, a monkey was on my back for some time, then someone said it was getting into my backpack. Momentarily, he hopped away, climbing to the top of the habitat, well out of reach, with his treasure: a pink floral drawstring pouch.

Everyone laughed and the keeper asked, “What is that?” I said, “Well, actually, it’s a menstrual cup.” He said, “He’ll drop it eventually.” I assured him, “That’s okay; I don’t need it at the moment.”

He gave it the college try to open the bag and spill out the contents, but I have it knotted. Eventually, after he’d dragged it through the water, he got bored and dropped it. But we laughed so much. I made sure my zippers were zipped AND tucked after that.

I got a few pictures and videos of the monkeys, up close and personal. When they’d see the camera lens pointed at them, they’d reach out for it. I have a wind muffler on the top of the mic, and they tried to eat that, and tried to open the pop-up flash to see if there was anything interesting in there. They’re pretty clever. We could have stayed in there all day, but other people were waiting.

We tried to get into the sloth line again, this time much shorter. But just as it was about to be our turn, Mal started getting weepy and ready to leave. I walked him over to the macaws, and we got right in. But while the keeper was explaining what was going to happen, Malcom just almost lost it so we had to go. 

Still, James was right that the monkey interaction was worth the price of admission.

Our next stop was at the boat dock for a mangrove tour. This was the best way to see the way the people on the water actually live. I mean, yeah, there were plenty of makeshift bars and rich people homes, but also actual homes, churches, and even public schools right over the water.

The water taxi took us through a couple of bays and into the mangroves, trails hollowed out by pirates looking for a place to hide. Some of the island towns of Roatan are reachable only by boat, and those children have to take personal boats or water taxis to get to school.

May 1 is actually their Labor Day holiday, so we got to see many children out riding bikes, swimming, playing, and accompanying parents on errands. Whenever I saw kids swimming, I almost never saw adults with them. This is one of the things I always find wistful about visiting places like this. I’d love for our neighborhood to be the kind of place where all the kids could go down to the lake together unsupervised. The one grown-up I did see had a baby on her hip and was wading a bit into the sea, carelessly trailing her sarong into the water as she waited for a boat to beach.

Roatan is about 36 miles long, but only 3 miles wide, so, our tour guide explained, you can’t get lost. There is one main road that runs the length of the island, and it is politically split in two, governed by two mayors. It seems like the mayors are very wealthy (we passed the home of one), so I guess that’s just a global thing.

Nola also showed us a bus stop along the main road, and said that the bus comes by every three hours, because gas is expensive and they want it to be full when it runs. It doesn’t have a schedule, though. On our drive back to the port, I saw a woman wearing her baby, laid out relaxing, waiting. That’s one way to raise patient kids!I haven’t done that very well. 

Because Mal was telling Nola that after he turned 5, he wasn’t going to have any more birthdays, we got into a conversation about adult children. I told her that I think Mal’s not wanting to get older was due to the fact that D is about ready to move out, and Mal doesn’t ever want to. Nola said he should move to Roatan, where everyone lives with their parents. She said it’s too hard to have so many single households, so you just stay with your parents, then if you get married, you live with whichever set of parents has more room.

I was grateful to her for sharing things about her home life and family. She said that electricity here is a dollar per kilowatt hour, so they have to reserve it. For this reason, at night, they turn off everything but fans. This includes the refrigerator. After it’s dark and not so hot, they unplug the fridge until morning.

I’m guessing all of the foreigners, Americans and Canadians, and there’s even a big Czech village with a second one on the way, do not live that way.

I asked her if the influx of foreigners drives up prices for everyone else, and she said that everything’s always been expensive because it has to come on barges from the mainland. She said that they have to go over to Honduras if they need major medical procedures, even if they’d rather not. She said it’s very unsafe over there, while Roatan is peaceful. She said if we ever hear of any murders on Roatan, we can rest assured that it was someone who had wronged someone on the mainland, then tried to escape to Roatan, and had been followed and found.

Nola pointed out that since Roatan’s an island, it’s difficult to get away with crime. The only way to get away is by boat, and so people are easily apprehended. She took great pride in showing us the uncomfortable conditions of their island jail, which has cells purposefully tiny and without windows, where prisoners sleep on the floor, and if there is more than one person in the cell, they have to take turns lying down. She also said that they’re not given food, but that prisoners rely on family to bring them meals. She said if they’re lucky, people with no family can talk cellmates into sharing. Nola said that this discourages crime and recidivism.

We returned to the ship without going to West End. I’ve seen it, but it was deserted as our guide took us before the ship tours got there. Nola assured us that the beach would be packed, but that she would be more than happy to take us over there if we wanted. Since it’s basically a resort, we declined. James and I would happily have eaten at a local restaurant, but I didn’t figure they’d have anything for Mal (D would have loved the adventure) so we got back on board and had lunch in the Windjammer.

After lunch, we had a nice relaxing afternoon in the room. We wound down, watched the last people run the dock at 4:35, and found the unmooring process fascinating. Then it was time for dinner. James got there a little late as he was having some tech issues he needed to finish up, and Mal and I left a little early as they did the fun staff recognition/performance… but it was loud. And loud means Mal is OUT.

James had the tomato and goat cheese pastry, vegetable korma, and creme brulee. I had coconut shrimp, korma, and then James brought my pavlova to the room since I missed the dessert course. Mal’s dinner surprise was a Slinky.

Mal had been thinking about playing in the splash pad, but it seemed to be closed after about 6 PM. Instead, we played in the room and went to sleep very early. James and I were probably asleep by 8 PM, and Mal was ready to turn off the television and go to sleep by 9, which is early for him! All of this sun and fun is wearing us all out. I could have slept another two hours or more this morning.

Fortunately, we’re at a port we weren’t planning to visit, so we’ve had a lazy day on board, but more on that next post…