Scribblings from Roatan

Eight years of blogs in the life of an Ex-Pat in Paradise

There is a misconception that it takes a long time to make big decisions, I have come to believe that we make our choices instantly, then spend a lot of time deliberating and adjusting truths until we can justify then. Giving up a good job and comfortable lifestyle under these parameters becomes a question of, how are we going to explain it to friends and family. Doing a thing is always easier than explaining why we did it, as every two year old knows.

I took a job with Pratt and Whitney Canada in Longueil Quebec at the ripe old age of 19 to get some spending money while I contemplated what to do with my life. At 42, with a gold watch eminent in my future, I still wanted more. I think what I really wanted was some amount of control. I had started to view the trappings of success as just that, a trap where I had too little control of my time.

Sue and I had toyed with the idea of an early retirement for years, perhaps a B&B on the coast or a dude ranch somewhere. Then in ‘85 a winter vacation in Cancun changed the destination of that dream dramatically, when I took a quick familiarization dive with a guy selling Scuba courses from the beech. Those 30 minutes underwater set changes in motion that would alter everything I thought I knew. I returned to Mexico a year later as a certified diver. Two years after that I was an instructor and running a weekend dive club. Our early retirement dream had shifted to the Caribbean with warm clear water and sandy beeches. In ‘98 when my wife Sue’s bank decided to “down size” it’s Montreal operation, the really big wheels were placed into motion.

We thought at that time that we were well traveled. We had been to Europe, seen a lot of the US and Canada. We had vacationed in Mexico, The Dutch Antilles, Bahamas, Honduras and Cuba. A bit of research showed us that Honduras was a destination that was open to foreign investment and still affordable. In the fall of ‘98, we returned to Roatan looking for property. I had arranged to view a small resort on Utila, but we quickly realized that Utila was simply far too small for us to live on.

The next day we were back on Roatan and the first place we saw was Trish’s Wish, a Dorm style operation with some long term tenants. It was not our ideal of a business. We looked at several other properties on Roatan then spent the next day snorkeling and comparing notes. We left the island a little disappointed in what we had seen, but after a few weeks of mulling it over we started to form a plan of remodeling the cheapest property we had seen, into something mid-range that was not being offered on the island. The location was great and the price was doable, just barely doable, but doable.

The only thing left was to sell off everything we owned, say good by to friends and family and get packing. Sounds easy, but took three months to actually get done. Real-estate visits, Consulate visits, yard sales, packing, it seemed to never end. Then one day in the fall of ’99 the container arrived, the last of our cars was sold and the house keys were handed off to the agent. The next few weeks were a blur of packing traveling and adjusting to island life, no longer as a tourist, but as an active participant.

Roatan Update #1 September 1999

Hi All,

I can't believe its been a month already. Sue and I are adapting well. Some of the business end of things are frustrating. We have been approved by the town committee to stay on the water system, but no sign of the phone lines we applied for. We are considering a fixed satellite phone which is a bit pricey to put in, but is only $1.00 per minute anywhere in North America. It will pay for itself over time, Hondutel charges $4.00/minute. It will also work all the time!!

The new signs are up and looking good. Gardening takes on a more macho edge with 3 ½" tarantulas lurking under the fallen leaves. I use gardening gloves now that I beat with a rock before putting on. Raking stirs up everything from Salamanders to big blue crabs. This is definitely a healthily eco-system.

We finished painting #1 & 2 and have moved up a floor. We needed one more sheet of sheetrock to finish off a bedroom downstairs so we bought 17 sheets and sheet rocked, plastered and painted most of our apartment, (color, Salmon Suede). Looks good.

Our container should arrive on the island this or next Friday, I'm not sure if we're happy or panicked over having to deal with moving it and unpacking. Getting our computer and our own microwave will be a huge bonus. The microwave in our apartment has Spanish buttons. Life can be entertaining, we have no idea what "papas al horno" means.

We don't work all the time, we get up early and drink coffee on the deck watching birds and critters for a few hours every day. We're even getting good at making breakfast since its just so pleasant up here in the morning. There is even a lizard or two that eat all the bugs that knocked themselves silly on the deck light the night before. Some Hummingbirds also stop by and the view of the ocean is stunning. Sue picked up a new hammock to hang out in and by 4Pm most days we're finished our chores and settling in to watch the sun set. Once #3 & 4 are finished we can take some time off to snorkel and dive before we get busy.

The rainy season started about 10 days back and brought in some cooler weather. One of our banana trees got knocked down (60 bananas just ripened today) but no signs of damage here on the island aside from some new pot holes. Mostly, the rain comes down real hard for about 20 minutes then everything clears up. We hear mixed reports from the mainland, I suspect that the same stuff gets damaged every year and always has. It sounds like its being pushed in the news to get financial aid.

That's all for now, its been great hearing from you. We'll keep you posted.

Sue, Mike & George (The cat)

October 1999


Hi Everyone!

I can't believe its been a month already. Sue and I are adapting well. Some of the business end of things are frustrating. We have been approved by the town committee to stay on the water system, but no sign of the phone lines we applied for. We are considering a fixed satellite phone which is a bit pricey to put in, but is only $.90 per minute anywhere in the world. It will pay for itself over time, Hondutel charges $4.00/minute. It will also work all the time! The new signs arrived, are up, and looking good. Gardening takes on a more macho edge with 3 1/2 " tarantulas lurking under the fallen leaves. I use gardening gloves now that I beat with a rock before putting on. Raking stirs up everything from salamanders to big blue crabs. This is definitely a healthy eco-system.

We finished painting #1 & 2 and have moved up a floor, we needed one more sheet of gyprock to finish off a bedroom downstairs so we bought 17 sheets and gyprocked, plastered and painted most of our apartment, salmon suede. Looks good. Our container should arrive on the island this or next Friday. I'm not sure if we're happy or panicked over having to deal with moving it and unpacking. Getting our computer and our own microwave will be a huge bonus. The microwave in our apartment has Spanish buttons. Life can be entertaining, we have no idea what "papas al horno" means.

We don't work all the time, we get up early and drink coffee on the deck watching birds and critters for a few hours every day. We're even getting good at making breakfast since its just so pleasant up here in the morning, there is even a lizard or two that eat all the bus that knocked themselves silly on the deck light the nigh before. Some hummingbirds also stop by and the view of the ocean is stunning.

Sue picked up a new hammock to hand out in and by 4PM most days we're finished our chores and settling in to watch the sun set. Once #3 & 4 are finished we can take some time off to snorkel and dive, before we get busy.
The rainy season started about 10 days back and brought in some cooler weather. One of our banana trees got knocked down (60 bananas are ripening well on our deck) but so signs of damage her on the island aside from some new pot holes. Mostly, the rain comes down real hard for about 20 minutes then everything clears p. We hear mixed reports from the mainland, I suspect that the same stuff gets damaged every year and always has, it sounds like its being pushed in the news to get financial aid.



Noverber 1999

Roatan Update Volume #3 November

Hi Everyone!

Its been an awfully long time since Sue and I were able to sit and type at home. Our Computer actually arrived last Thursday, but we wanted to ensure that it still worked before investing money in the UPS power regulator and we couldn't' risk using it without. The rain kept the Airport closed most of the week and when the first unit arrived last night it fried when I plugged it in. We exchanged it this morning after a bit of an ordeal with our new Jeep and picked up a Volt meter at the same time to make sure that all the wiring here was working. Everything seems to be fine now.

After our first few weeks of heat and sun, the rainy season started. It has rained now for four weeks! Some times hard, sometimes just an annoying drizzle. Everything is saturated with dampness. We do the laundry downstairs and hang our clothes under the deck roof, and then finish drying them on the back of chairs in the dining room. Needless to say we have put off painting the outside of the building. At this point all the rooms are Painted, spruced up, and ready for guests. The only exception being Sues massage room, which has been occupied by a Belgium Divemaster since we moved in. We want to turf him but there is a bunch of back rent due. We'll give him another week. There are two rooms rented out for the whole month, and people coming down next week. We should be full through new years now, and hopefully our web site (www.mariposa-lodge.com) will get us some attention. Its nice to see some money rolling in our direction for a change. We will also be running an add in "Dive Training" next month under Scuba Travel.

We have avoided hiring anyone yet and the stream of people looking for work has dwindled down. One guy actually followed Sue home from the bus one day claiming that he had painted the place the last time. When Sue pointed to one of the Gables that was unpainted, He looked at her and explained that it was too high! Our rule of thumb now is that anyone claiming to have worked here in the past is automatically disqualified.

We have met some nice folks along the way. People like to talk here, and saying hola to someone in the street usually involves a ten or fifteen minute chat. I'm learning to be a bit more guarded in my thoughts. When I mentioned to Willis that we wanted to do something with the back yard, he showed up the next day with a truck load of palm trees. He is still trying to sell me face rock for a patio, a cement block business and 3 acres of land in Sandy Bay. He's a pretty nice guy and we find his enthusiasm refreshing. Oh yea, I bought the Jeep from him. A Black '79 US Postal Jeep, with Right hand steering and slide back doors. It took about an hour to start this morning because of the dampness, and when it did, it immediately busted the fan belt. Oh well. You get what you pay for.

Believe it or not, we haven't been diving yet. When it was sunny, we were too busy. Now its just plain miserable outside. Soon though, very soon!

Our container finally arrived last Thursday morning. In the continuing saga of anything that could go wrong did with the shipment. As I stood on the dock with Willis, the big diesel dock crane threw a bearing. We had to wait until they finished loading fuel to turn the ship around, so that they could use the ship cranes. When we got it on the ground and opened it up it looked like everything had been tossed in from about thirty feet away when it was repacked in Porto Cortez, and the floor was wet from some holes in the doors. In the end, there were two or three broken dishes, and everything else was fine. It took 10 days to get from Canada, and five weeks to make the last 40 miles.

We don't get very much news here at all. There is a weekly paper called "Honduras This Week" which is basically a translation of the major stories of the week in the Honduras. We have heard that some roads have washed out on the mainland, and the major airports keep closing down because of a lack of equipment to handle the water. Here on the island, there are frequent power outages, patchy telecommunications and potholes in the road, which by island standards is business as usual. West End looks like it's filled with drunken sailors if you watch everyone weave down the street avoiding puddles.

About E-Mail:
The Hondutell server is on the Mainland. Phone communication to the mainland is via radio wave from Coxen Hole ( Toxic Hole to the locals or sometimes just "The Hole" ). When its raining or windy, it goes down. The internet Cafe here in West End has to rely on phone lines through the trees to Coxen Hole and is seldom able to make the connection. We rely on Paridise Computers in Coxen Hole, but pay fifteen US dollars an hour. Communication has easily been our largest expense here. We do apologize but we can't respond to all the incoming notes the way we used to and any file over 2K gets deleted upon arrival. Once, If, When we do get our own phone line we should be able to connect for about two dollars an hour and will connect when the lines are up without having to spend the hour traveling each way just to find out.

Coxen Hole is our closest commercial center. It is difficult to describe but I can begin by discounting charm, quaint and clean as usable words. It does however have character. There are two paved streets, lined with businesses, banks and shops. Everything from fish and vegetables to fresh cookies and an assortment of fresh cooked meats can be purchased from street vendors. There is an almost constant sound of car horns. I find it quite entertaining. A block or so back, at first glance is absolute squallier. There is ankle deep mud in the streets, chickens. pigs and up to a foot of standing water under nearly every home. I am stunned that anyone could survive let alone thrive. Yet they do. The children go off to school in clean uniforms every morning and there is a constant bustle of housecleaning. I have lost track of my narrow misses with soapy water being thrown from windows and doors. This is what they know, and how they have always lived. They are family people, and seem content.

We are finding some aspects of our life here very frustrating. It seems to take forever to get the simplest of tasks done. We are also very caught up in the malaise that comes with four weeks of rain, disbelieving that we will ever see the sun again or ever feel dry. On the positive side, the electronic toys are all up and running, the new Satellite phone is installed, and the apartment is quite comfortable, and starting to feel like home. Business is starting to come in, and bit by bit we are making headway. We have found sources for quality food now and between the new phone and our Tampa address, we should be able to mail order anything we could possibly want.

George (the cat) has actually foraged into the yard a few times. It was quite funny to watch her walk past and ignore a stone crab as if it wasn't there. Completely beyond her scope, and she just wasn't going to deal with it. She has also come to some kind of truce with Dino, the cat that came with the place. Dino sucks. No really! She loves to grab a piece of skin and gum you. Its very weird.

December 1999

Roatan Update Volume #4 December

The weather lifted and so did our spirits. Actually Dan Dixon brought down the sun for his vacation. It came out his first morning here, and didn't go away until he left. I'm thinking of starting a "follow Dan on vacation club" .

Sue and I did get some great diving in last week, and plan to get out again tomorrow. Business has actually been good, although the rates aren't where we want them yet. Guess I shouldn't be expecting to see huge profits in the first month of business, but we're doing better than breaking even, and that's a start. There are some changes going into our web page, and an ad in the next issue of Dive Training that we hope will attract a more profitable clientele. Sue has also negotiated a pretty neat dive package with Ray at Sueno del Mar, and we were approached by Tills Diving today about setting up something for groups. Tills has a smaller dive boat that could be used exclusively by a group of 6 - 8

There seems to be a never ending list of chores to do here. Last night a plastic coupling snapped under our kitchen sink around 1:00 in the morning. Thankfully I was able to shut off the valve at the sink pretty quickly when the spray woke me up, and mop up the water before it headed downstairs. I built new clothes racks this week, cut out some sign boards which Sue will paint, and I'm starting to put some lockable boxes together for each of the rooms. It's still to iffy to paint outside, But I managed to do some tile work at our entrance, which cleaned that area up quite nicely. We will also be cleaning and painting unit 5 this week, which will become the massage center.

Sue and I went to the mainland to shop last week. Not a bad ferry ride, we saw Hard to Kill on the way over and a Jackie Chan movie on the way back. While there were not many bargains, we were able to get a couple of toasters and coffee makers for the units that were missing them, for about the same cost as they would be back in Canada. Our Dive master candidates from Tennessee on the second floor were thrilled at the prospect of real toast! It is surprising what you can find for sale here, wash boards are quite common from the wooden type to some pretty sophisticated tin jobs. You can also buy treadle sewing machines. These are the same high tech machines you would find at Sears but sitting on a table with a leather strap to the treadle instead of a motor. Pretty cool, sew and exercise all at once.

The trick to harvesting Coconuts, is patience. You just wait around till one falls out of the tree then pick it up. Bananas on the other hand, I have not mastered yet. The first bunch a few weeks ago I picked off the ground when the tree fell over. This weeks batch posed a greater challenge. So I'm on top of the extension ladder with my trustee machete, the stalk of bananas in my left hand as I swing with my right. Now it could be that the machete swing put me off balance a bit, and I am truly amazed at the resiliency of a tree that could bare such a weight. Then I remember that the last bunch of 30 or so bananas was quite heavy also. This bunch has closer to a hundred, and I'm doing everything I can to stop it and me from hitting the ground too hard as I run down the ladder with it. I think next time I'll try having Sue stand down below and catch them.

I have revised my theory on dessert recently. As most of you know I am apposed to the use of vegetables in dessert. Vegetables are for dinner. In order to further define what should and shouldn't be made into a dessert I have now come to realize that only those items that would be acceptable in ice-cream can count as dessert. Tomatoes for example are a fruit but could not be put into in ice-cream. Co-co Beans are vegetables, though they are rarely served as a main dish, but yes, do get put into ice-cream. Therefore, carrots, squash, pumpkin and lima beans should never be served as dessert.

Thanks to Sue's Mom and Ethel (of La Maison Desaulnier), we have some seeds sprouting on the front deck. Tomatoes, Peppers, Broccoli, Cauliflower and Peas are all doing fine in their first few days. We'll transplant them into bins up on the widows walk in a week or two when they are ready. They will be away from bugs and critters up there and should do very well. Two out of the three Banana trees I planted out back are sprouting new growth as well so we should have a real nice sitting area out there soon.

The local folk are very religious so there isn't much pre-holiday glitz around. There is a parade for the kids on the 21st , but that's one of the few signs of the festive season at all. Looks like the plans are jelling though, for the big Millennium night. If things workout we should hit the water at 11:30 and be half way through the dive at midnight.

Happy holidays to everyone in the frozen north.
Mike

News years 1999

Roatan Update #5

One last update before the end of the millennium.

Best wishes from Sue and I to everyone for the coming new year, and best of luck on the start of the next millennium.

Westend was once a haven for hippy backpackers traveling around this part of the world on a couple of bucks a day. That stigma is a hard thing to shake off. We still get people coming up looking for a clean room with an ocean view for five bucks a night. We are polite when we send them off. You can still get accommodations for that price, but they are the "bring your own hammock" kind. You basically get a shared roof and not much more.

Business here can be entertaining, and frustrating. We still don't have a phone line. When we stopped by Hondutell last to ask, we were offered the opportunity to help pay for the clerks operation. Since hospitalization is free, I guess were back at the bottom of the list! We did finally receive our papers for the building. Our corporation papers were rejected though, because we aren't Honduran. Our lawyer has had to go back with a rit explaining that since they approved us to buy the business, it doesn't make any since to not let us run it legitimately. My guess is that the local officials make way less money from legitimate businesses. It is surprising how many people there are that have been working here for years with no working papers, and how many businesses have no official status. The accounts even have two rates to reflect the way things are.

Sue and I went trecking out back the other day and discovered some new trails and a stream just up the hill from us. Along the way we found a source for plants that we will go back for one morning soon. We picked some limes, a coconut, and stripped a 15 foot piece of fallen bamboo that will become a few curtain rods. Sue did her best to reenact those great quicksand screens from the old Tarzan movies. She wasn't very impressed at all to step into knee deep mud at the edge of the stream twice in a row.

When the rains ended, they left a small lake in the low lying land kitty corner from our property. We suddenly had egrets and herons living next door. The tree frogs also went nuts for a few nights so I suspect that pond is full of tadpoles by now. We have also ended up with an agouti family that probably got flooded out, and are now running around our place. An agouti for those of you don't know, looks about the size and shape of a beaver without the tail, has big round ears, and it hops like a bunny when excited.

A herd of chickens passes through a couple times a day foraging for food, and a bat has moved into our bodega so in all, we're pretty used to wildlife around us. We were both a little surprised however, when the cow and her calves wandered through and started eating our neighbors hibiscus bush. We'd never seen a cow at this end of the island. Betsy and the boys hung around for three or four days before they headed home. I guess they overheard the discussions about finders-keepers, and bar-b-q!

The vegetables are coming along. Sue moved the sun flowers down to the back garden in between two banana trees we planted last month. The cows ate the tops off my little banana trees but we think they will grow back. The Peas and cucumbers have been transplanted into a huge bin on the back deck, along with some romaine lettuce. The tomatoes and cauliflower are still a bit small to move. Sue also started some herbs last week that are just popping up now. We had some trouble finding good earth at first, but I built a wire mesh screen with folding legs that fits into the wheel barrow and it turns out that our soil is pretty good once you get the gravel and rock out.

Byron and Berty invited Sue, me and our other neighbors Chad and Jena from Vancouver to dinner on Christmas Eve. That is the big day here. Byron is our Mexican Neighbor. He's been pretty helpful and seems to know everyone on the island. Things get pretty much back to normal on the 25th though there was a lot of church stuff going on. Sue and I did the deep wreck dive Christmas morning, and while the sea's were the roughest we have been out in here, the dive was spectacular. I guess we're starting to acclimatize, we put on long pants and sweaters when the temperature drops to 80 degrees in the evening.

Happy Holidays

January 2000

Roatan Update #6

Happy Millennium everyone,

Sue and I got to bring in the New Year 2000 under water with some new friends. The evening actually started with a Bar-B-Q at our Mexican neighbor’s house, accompanied by our Vancouver Neighbors, Chad and Jena. Then at 11 PM, Sue and I headed to the boat, while the rest of the group headed to the bars. We met up with our party at Ocean Divers, Geared up and headed out to a site called Octopus Garden, cheered on by everyone at the Twisted Toucan Bar next door. The dive was great, and when we returned to shore, we were as surprised as everyone else that the sky wasn't falling. Actually, the dock was crawling with people trying to greet us. West End was definitely the place to be partying. We were running into people all the next day that hadn't made it home yet. January 2 was real quiet!

Tonight while I sat on the roof in my shorts eating dinner, and watching the sun set, I was treated to a wonderful bat show. Thirty or more bats, swooping around taking nectar from the flowers of our teak tree with an unbelievable orange sky for a backdrop, truly dazzling. Pace of life is the biggest change that has happened to me here. Talking to people on the street, evening walks. When we see a neat critter or bug we stop and enjoy it. There's just no need to rush.

Sometime just before New Years, we were talking to people down the beech when the next thing I know, I have a job. Just when I was starting to get the hang of being retired. Poof, its all over. As it turns out Sueno Del Mar was loosing Doug, their long term Dive master, and was getting desperate for a good replacement. So there I was, coerced into diving three or four times a day. The first two weeks were actually quite taxing as I followed Doug on three orientation dives a day, then came back to do chores here in the evening. Fortunately all the checkouts during that period were early morning flights, so I was able to help Sue out a bit before the first dive of the day. last week they hired Ricardo, who will do the lions share of the diving and I'll back him up by leading ten or so dives a week and do some teaching in my spare time.

Life as a Caribbean Dive Master is pretty sweet, although I didn't have to worry about keeping my toe nails trimmed when I had a desk job. I get to share knowledge and experiences of diving, the reef and it's inhabitants, with people from all over the world. We have been very lucky lately with seeing turtles and spotted eagle rays on just about every dive, there are a couple of nurse sharks hanging around that are always amazing to encounter and we frequently see flying fish and dolphins from the boat. I finished leading a group last Sunday and we were heading back to the dock when we spotted some tuna jumping offshore. George turned the boat out towards them and as we got closer a tall fin surfaced. Without hesitation, everyone hit the water with masks and fins. I could see him the first moment I put my head underwater. I looked back and signaled the others, turned back into the water and a thirty five foot long whale shark was swimming straight into my face. I petted his head, and stroked him as he passed just inches underneath me and towards the rest of the group. I'm pretty sure that the screams of delight could be heard back on shore. what a rush!!

Mark down January 13th in your calendars. Our first hot showers in four months. What a luxury!! Renovations and upgrades do continue here. We just bought four Malipino kitchen chairs for the downstairs units. We would have bought new tables too, but the wood was too wet, the chairs were already built, and finished, for under thirty dollars each. The wood shop is a collection of cobbled together benches and stationary tools under a tin roof, with a dirt floor and no walls. I'm embarrassed by the quality of workmanship these guys do. I'm lost without a level cement floor, and at least two power tools per square foot.

We flew to the mainland with my visiting parents this week for an overnight trip to Copan, an ancient Mayan ruin in the mountains near Guatemala. Despite an opportunistic and corrupt traffic cop on the trip up, the drive was spectacular. Winding hillside roads and picturesque villages left many memorable impressions. The Copan site was larger than I had expected but fortunately we had a private guide, since the tour folks had already moved on, and we had a very detailed, and personalized tour.

February 2000

Roatan Update 7 February 2000

What to say about February. I developed an ear problem during a dive on the wreck at 115 feet and came back nauseas and dizzy. After throwing up a few times, everything settled down and I felt well enough to go back out on the second dive, but I ended up sitting on the boat and letting someone else lead, so I got to spend a very pleasant hour puking away quite merrily all by myself. I gave up after that, and took the afternoon off.

Home wasn't actually better than the boat, I'm pretty sure it was spinning even more and I had to aim better inside the house. Around supper time Sue started getting tired of all this and we decided to get in touch with the Dive Alert Network. Sue talked to the on call physician for about 30 minutes and was left with "pack a bag and passport, we'll get back to you". Fortunately when they called back we were directed to the hyper baric center at Anthony's Key ten minutes away. (though Sue was disappointed about missing out on a Miami trip)

They treated us very well, I got a bunch on fluids and some anti-amidic then they brought me home by ambulance, and sent the paramedics over twice the next day to check up on both of us. The final diagnosis was middle ear barotrauma, and after passing some tests, I was back diving again a week later.

Of course this wasn't my only dive incident last month. We get a lot of people in diving on weekends from the mainland. Peace Corps, American Military and several other groups come to Roatan to chill out. One young guy came over without his certification card, we let him on the bout with a warning that he would likely be given a quick test to make sure he was competent. We don't actually test them if they look comfortable, but with this warning we all headed off over the wall. Eight minutes into the dive sixty five feet down, my regulator stops giving me air. I'm a trained professional, so I run a check list in my mind, I've got ten divers, that don't want there dive spoiled, and another dive master at the rear of the group. Now I'm out of air, so I turn back, and this new guy is right behind me. I give him the out of air sign, and he, expecting a test, hands me his spare regulator. I signal john to take over the lead, take one last breath, give my buddy an OK, and start a controlled ascent for the surface. This left my new buddy a little confused, since he had no idea I was actually out of air, and we all had a good laugh back on the boat.

Sue's friend Laura spent a week with us relaxing and seeing the sights. I couldn't convince her to try Scuba, but we did get her out snorkeling and sea kayaking. The group in this week however, hasn't completely dried off all week. I've had lots of fun setting up some special dives for them. Its been a bit of a joggling act, getting the rooms cleaned and doing the dives, but we somehow manage. Thank goodness it hasn't rained for a while and the laundry is drying in a couple hours.

We meet a lot of new people here every week. We are starting to get bookings from our Web page and other advertising, but the majority of our customers are still walk-ins. For the most part we are meeting incredibly interesting folks, who have spent anywhere from a few months to a few years wandering around Central America. Oddly enough these are folks about the same age as Sue and I, with much of the same passions. Go figure.

We often joke about the islanders week grasp of common sense. Unfortunately the school systems aren't well funded, and the parents don't put much emphasis on learning. A couple weeks ago, the bartender at Sueno del Mar brought down some calculators claiming they didn't work. Dave tested them out and they seemed to work fine. When Dave pushed the point and tried to figure out what was wrong, it turns out that it was only at night that they were defective. It was with great patience that Dave had to explain why this was a common problem with solar powered products.

The new linens finally arrived this month, and do make quite a difference in appearance. Now everything is white and matches. Of course getting them out of customs took nearly a week, two trips to French Harbor and three to Coxen Hole. I got to play charades with the broker while we translated the manifest into Spanish. The biggest challenge was the difference between the pillow cases and the pillow protectors. And why would anyone need a spoon for tea and a separate spoon for soup?

March 2000

Roatan Update #8 April 2000

After last month's fun and games, I was glad to be back diving again. Being from Canada and not totally afraid of being cold, I get to lead the night dives. For some reason everyone else hates them. Since I enjoy them, I do them with enthusiasm, and I am starting to develop a following. I even have my boat captain, George doing the first half of the dive with the group. Part of what I do, is explain some of the incredibly weird behavior going on in the dark, so that everyone goes in with something to look forward to. They are never disappointed. The other thing I do is get everyone together in a sandy patch 45 minutes into the dive and turn all the lights off. Most nights you get to see some bioluminescence. On special nights with no moon, or ending the dive just before moonrise, the reef became alive with light, as if millions of fireflies had all started glowing in unison.

We finally broke down and bought a new fridge this month. It arrived within a couple of hours after buying it, carried by two fairly burly Hondurans, up the three flights of stairs, they grabbed the old one ad had it downstairs before I caught my breath. It is a white, Whirlpool 18 Cubic Foot with sliding shelves, and working vegetable drawers. No egg holder, though we did not notice until we tried to put the eggs away. It's a lot quieter than the old one and should save us a bunch of electricity. The little fridge from downstairs with the door that was falling off with the freezer that turned into a block of ice after a day, was picked up by a local church group, some one will fix it up and give it a good home.

It seams to be getting harder and harder to get chores done here, We may be slipping into the island lifestyle, or maybe we're just getting busier. I'm writing a monthly marine biology article for the island tourist paper. What to look for, what its doing and where to find it sort of stuff. Sue and I will also be helping to get some computers up and running at the grade school in Coxen Hole. I opened my big mouth yet again and may be helping put together a "west end hotel association". This stuff is gratis of course, on top of nearly full time jobs at the dive shop, and running the lodge. Oh well, working for a living was easier but retirement is more fun.

Sue and I went over to La Ceiba, on the mainland shopping this week. We are able to find most of the things there, which we really needed. I installed a hot water showerhead in the last apartment that needed one, and hung a new ceiling fan in one of the big rooms downstairs. We even found a toilet paper holder, oooh! Ceiba is a dock town that has been the shipping point for Dole pineapples and bananas of fifty years. It has stunning long white sand beaches, but no one ever bothered trying to develop tourism, so the beachfront is lined with wooden shacks and squalor.

It seems like a lot of our guests try out the local Aunty Belly's Jelly's. We usually end up with three quarters of a jar after every check out. Since we don't use them ourselves and hate throwing them away, we found a recipe for jam muffins. Now we have pineapple, mango and papaya muffins on a regular basis. As a bonus, the jar turns into a glass once all the jam is used up.

We have pretty much given up on internet access from here. The servers are incredibly slow, the phone lines unpredictable, and at fifteen US dollars an hour, just not worth it. Anyone that thinks the world wide web is connecting the world, must never have been out in it. This of course leaves me wondering about my two applications for phone lines. Its been close to six months now, and still no sign of them. According to local rumors, Hondutel is waiting until all the lines are sold before installing the new network. Apparently, surplus lines to meet future demand are a completely foreign concept to them. If its true, it explains many other problems, since few systems work well when run continuously at maximum capacity.

Our municipal folks have been working hard recently. They are insisting that all the restaurants have screens on their kitchen windows. Nice thought. Every restaurant in west end is outdoors. Very few have doors between the kitchen and the tables. Several kitchens don't even have walls. Rules are rules though, and the bureaucrats are going to do their job whether it makes sense or not. Perhaps they think that bugs are even less bright than they are.

April 2000

Roatan update 9

We're continuing to improve our banana harvesting skill's, which is good because there are two more bunches ready. First though, we need to harvest cashews. The cashew nut forms first after the flower. Then the fruit, about the size of a mandarin orange, grows between the branch and the nut. Unfortunately, the fruit ripens and falls to the ground where the warm island sun starts the fermentation process. All of Westend is starting to smell like a distillery. Separating the nut from the half fermented fruit is a simply a delight to several senses at once. Once they have been thoroughly washed and dried, our next step will be to roast and shuck the little buggers. I'll seek some local help for that part since the cooking vapors are essence of cyanide.

Due to an extremely upsetting set of circumstances I got to do some boat salvage work this month. Miss Alimeda, Sueno's big diesel dive boat, sank in about fifteen feet of water tied to a mooring. Everyone got off safely, and just about all the gear was recovered, before we even got the call. Common consensus at this time is that the bilge pump failed and when everyone moved to the back of the boat for the pre-dive briefing, the stern went under. I arrived with a truck load of rescue gear, rope, dive gear and flotation bags to find everything neatly stowed on the beach, and the makings of a beach party in progress. Unfortunately for Miss Alimeda, the surge broke her free of the mooring line and washed her up onto the iron shore, ripping off the bridge and tearing apart the bulk heads.

After seeing the customers off, the owner, Ray Lopez and I did an initial survey, and decided to strip off everything we could right away. With the aid of a diesel mechanic and a couple of Ray's construction guys, we managed the strip, then lift the eight cylinder cat engine up out of the hull, over the side, across several hundred feet of iron shore, a lagoon and four feet up into a waiting truck. Most of this took place at night, with waves crashing over us. You could barley stand up on the deck because of the diesel fuel and oil spilled everywhere. I did manage to fall head first into the bilge at one point, interesting experience. We all agreed the next morning that the task was completely impossible. Bringing the hull in the next day seemed relatively easy. Lots of levers, rope, rollers and a few bulky Honduran boys. Once on the beach, enough patch work was done to re-float her her back around to the Sueno property where she will get a full make over.

Our first big sale via the web site was to a teacher group from Las Vegas. They rented out the whole place for ten days before Easter. Sorry guys, the group was mostly, attractive young girls that spent the week running around in bikinis. Yup, life can get pretty tough here.

Easter, semena Santa, is the really big holiday in Latin America. Bigger than Christmas. The holidays begin with The Day of the Americas and run straight through to Easter Monday. The beaches were standing room only and lodging was worse. We were down on the main street Thursday night and whole families from the mainland were arriving with Mom, Pop, Grandma and half dozen kids, with no reservations! Undeterred, the partying went on until Monday noon, when everyone left. For two or three days there wasn't a tourist in site, everyone in town slept and cleaned.

The tourist business (Can't really call it industry) is challenging and a lot of fun. But it is also hard work. Some folks are just easier to be nice to than others. There are also friendships that develop, and emotional lows when friends leave town, but everyone returns to Roatan eventually. Unfortunately, with the end of the winter tourist season, a lot of people we know, have left the island for summer jobs that will earn them enough money to come back and work another season. Having worked for one company for more than half my life, meeting this transience work force has been quite a revelation.

About a month ago, Roatan turned away a cruse ship full of same sex partners. This caused quite a stir among tour operators and shop owners that relay on Cruse ship folks for income. This week I guess the curse ship line simply forgot to mention that their passengers were all women. I went to pick up thirty four divers, and managed to be on the dock when the first couple hundred ladies came down the gang plank for an excursion to Fantasy Beech. As I escorted my group through the waiting throng, of male latino taxi and bus drivers I could see the recognition and confusion starting to take place. Not exactly an enlightened forward thinking group of individuals. Our divers did very well, had a great day of adventure and were a pleasure to work with. One group even encountered some wild dolphins. Did I mention earlier how hard my life is?

May/ June 2000

Roatan Update #10

In Late April, Sueno's full time divemaster left for a one-week trial aboard the Bay Island Aggressor, leaving me running all the dives, again! Somewhere along the way, I decided that if I was divmastering full time, I would be able to get time off too, a minor point that was becoming a bit of a trend. So starting in May I have become the full time divemaster for Sueno del Mar. The experience has been quite incredible, though chores here at the lodge can pile up quickly. I still do some teaching and run two or three night dives a week as well. I never knew retirement would be so much work! I never knew working could be so much fun!

Doing fifty some odd dives a month since January, has been a revelation in several ways. The marine life seems to change every few days. Through the winter we saw Spotted Eagle Rays on just about every dive, now it is turtles. Six of them in one day last week. The fish life has also changed, with juveniles everywhere you look now. We are all awaiting the return of the Whale Sharks this summer, and keep an eye on the deep blue to see what swims by. A couple days ago I was with a photographer, who had dropped about thirty feet below me to get a shot. When he turned out towards the blue, a big old hammerhead was swimming right towards him, I saw the gray streak as it left, and Ron became a very close dive buddy, never wandering off again.

Sue ran off and left me while she partied in Montreal for two weeks. The lodge was empty the first week so things went along quite merrily. John and Dave, friends from Sueno's decided to take care of me, which seemed to mostly consist of me buying them beer. We shared several late evenings and by weeks end I had been introduced SOCIALLY to all the "working girls" in town, and several quirky tourists, including two flight attendants that tried to teach us pole dancing. Apparently this is something they do in Texas? Nice people, a little frightening, but nice.

The second week the lodge was full, leaving me working full time, and doing my darndest to be a charming host. This group was from G.A.P, the "Great Adventure People" and was a very good business deal for us. G.A.P. runs tours through Roatan a few times a month and loved the place despite sporadic electricity and being robbed. Dive all day with bikini models (oops, I wasn't supposed to mention Kylea and Roberta )and party with a house full of young woman all evening. Its a tough job this thing I do, I still can't believe I make a living doing it.

Fortunately Sue came home to save me from all this drudgery, and to make sure I was eating properly. Her luggage arrived the next day, which was a bonus given that she had five large heavy bags of plumbing bits, hardware and strong boxes, and the guy that delivered them brought them up all the stairs. Yahoo!! It was sort of like Christmas here while we unpacked the goodies. New videos, business cards, pamphlets and six jars of Craft Crunchy peanut butter and several other items unavailable on the island. You know you are in an uncivilized country when you can't buy Craft Crunchy peanut butter.

Sue's mother Doreen also arrived for a visit, and is slowly adapting and acclimatizing. So far she has had to adapt to cars without seatbelts, dogs and cats in restaurants, nine passenger busses with twenty people in them and heat. She is taking it all in stride like an experienced traveler. Though I must say that she wasn't very enthusiastic when we found her a four inch long tarantula to look at? Next stop, Coxen Hole.

On the business front, we have finally received our incorporation papers. This process actually started some time last summer, but was held up in the municipal court due to a procedural error on the part of our lawyer. Picking up the papers involved a ride to the municipal registry with our lawyer, two of his associates and Sue and I in a Volkswagen Beetle, good thing Sue and I are small. With these papers in hand we can now apply for Honduran residency, which we are no longer certain has any value at all. It will help formalize our business dealings however, and we will only have to check in with immigration once a year instead of every month. So sometime in the next few months, we will be off to Tegucigalpa, to present ourselves, to swear or be sworn at or whatever.

July 2000

Roatan Update #11

Hello again, hope that summer is going well up there, not too hot or dry, I sure know what that can be like!

The tourist business has been good the last few weeks. June was completely dead so with Sue's mom here we stayed empty for a few weeks. We reopened in July with another houseful of GAP people, and then had a family in from the UK on the ground floor for two weeks. They were a delight to have and wonderful to dive with. August is looking sporadic here at the lodge but tourism is on the rise. From about Easter on, there was re-construction going on at the airport so the big planes were being directed to Ceba where passengers were re-loaded on to smaller planes and the possibility of getting you're luggage through within a couple of days was extremely slim. Add to this disaster, Roatan Electric Company was down to a single generator for the whole island, providing was little as six hours of juice a day. Rumor had it that they bought a new caterpillar generator, then let it get repossessed a month later. Things do seem to be back to normal today, whatever the heck normal is! We even have some new air competition going on, Cayman Air is now flying Roatan - Miami return for $ 350.

Sue's shiatsu business has done well since she returned. She is focusing on the cruise ship market now and if things work out, we may be upgrading part of the facility to a spa. Massage, Hot Tubs, and various other treatments out in the gardens.

With business down through most of June, we did a bit of reorganizing at the dive shop. On top of organizing and running all the dives I now run the dive operations which involves keeping the boys busy, crises management, counseling and running the dives. In my spare time I also assist with inventory control in the shop. Unfortunately with the lobster season just beginning, the repair business has gone nuts. These guys sit around for months then realize a few days before they leave port that everything needs servicing. Oh well, I guess we all procrastinate to some extent. There really isn't ever a dull moment on the dock, tomorrow I have to organize for one of our boats to tow a submarine out to West End Wall, how many people can add that sort of thing to their resume?

The more I dive the more at home I feel underwater. Laugh if you must but you do develop a repore with the fish. There is a moray eel at the bow of our wreck site that swims up into my mask and lets me pet him, ignoring the other divers. There are a few big groupers around that will swim within inches, and follow us around on dives. I can even find a few gobies or Peterson shrimp to provide manicures every morning. Every day I discover a sea critter or behavior that I have never seen before. The sergeant majors and yellow gobies are all mating now and neck crabs, juvenile trunk fish, and pipe fish are everywhere. There is even a sea hoarse in residence out at Mandy's Eel Garden. August is also whale shark month here. We are seeing evidence of them and hearing about spottings but we haven't found one our selves yet.
August 2000

Roatan Update #12

Day in the life..

August 10th

I open the shop at 7:30 in the morning, the night guard Manuel is usually waiting to hand over his weaponry, A 9mm Davis handgun a 22mm Lugar and the Magnum flashlight, he takes his machete home with him. By 8:15 my boat captain hasn't arrived so I pull George out of repairs to set up the boat, fortunately it looks like a quiet day. No signs of our tank guy but there are sixty five tanks ready to go, no worries.

At 8:30 there are still no customers and no one signed up for the day, I organize a fun dive for staff divers Sue, Joni and Hanna and we head to Lighthouse for a limit stretching deep dive. Nice nice dive, no customers, no worries, everything goes great.

As we approach the dock there are already people setting up for the 10:45 dive. Sue, with a raisin custard bun from the bakery across the street, and the Sea family who come down from Colorado a few times a year. They are ready to get wet. I see the back door to Ray's office open so I poop in to let him know we're low on gas for the boat. We buy the gas in a forty-five gallon drum and store it at the construction site down the beech. Fernand will need to pick up the empty barrel and drive up to Coxen hole to get it filled.

Four cruise ship passengers have arrived on a tight schedule, having had a terrible experience diving in Cozumel the day before. At 10:15 I find them coming up the dock from our gift shop, and corral them into the gear room. From zero to eleven divers, half of which require special treatment. We manage to get away from the dock on time and head for Half Moon Bay Wall.

I've already spoken to the Sea's so they know to head off without me. The Cruse ship folks have let me know that this is their third dive ever, so their briefing is as detailed as can be. They all have trouble on the surface. Additional weights and coaching are provided, and everyone starts the decent. I keep this crowd on the top edge of the wall and I can see my other divers bubbles off in the distance. Fifteen minutes into the dive I start getting low on air signs from the group so I turn back for the boat. They have seen a turtle and a spotted eagle ray. Everyone is ecstatic.

We're back on the dock by 12:10. The cruse ship crew has been scheduled for a special 12:30 dive and the regular 2:00 dive is pushed back to 2:30. After taking care of the boat and gear George and I run up to the restaurant for tipicos, Rice Beans and something with a bone (Staff Food) I get called downstairs to help a customer that wants to arrange a private dive for his family. I eat while we talk. I run back up to drop the plate off and get some water, George is ordering a second plate of food, he is finished it before I get back down to the boat. I couldn't be eighteen again!

Having sized up my special customers, we head for The Bite, a shallow dive with lots of fish sheltered from the currents. No decent problems this time. All four follow along as we glide through coral canyons. In a sandy area near the fringing reef I spot a Sting Ray feeding on algae, we stop to watch, the group is delighted.

By 2:15 we're back at the dock, George and I are prepping for the next dive while this group is still breaking down gear. I get away to the front just before the boat leaves and just in time to say goodbye to my new special friends. They are ecstatic and tip accordingly. Wonderful people. The group on the 2:30 boat understands, having witnessed the days activities.

We head out for Herbie's Fantasy by 2:30, but see a boat already there as we get out of the channel, Turtle Crossing and Blue Channel are already taken also, so back to the Bite. No worries, this crowd missed it last dive. The dive goes great, the Sea's look relaxed at being back in the water so we push the dive time out to seventy minutes while we play with Conch and Blennies in ten feet of water.

George and I clean up the boat and gear a little more slowly than usual. We're down to twenty-four full tanks now and the boat barely has an inch of gas left in the tank. Tomorrow I will need to start early. All three dives will be full and there is a night dive scheduled. Ray comes out to let me know the gas has arrived, and we discuss putting the Cozumel Divemaster on commission. This isn't the first group we've turned around after a bad Cozumel experience.

Things are never dull here. No mater how well you plan something unexpected will come along. At the end of the day it is the unexpected things that help make life interesting.

December 2000

Roatan Update #13

Seven weeks since I wrote last? Is time here really going by that fast? Could I be becoming Honduran? Well where do I begin. After the last update, I headed up to Canada for a quick visit and some business. Easily the most successful part of the trip, was setting up a new web site, with my big brother Neil. Neil has done a fabulous job, and I welcome you to check out the new site at www.mariposa-lodge.com . Any comments or suggestions will be much appreciated. One of the neat things we have done is set up a page for all the Roatan Updates so that I can get away with sending out one copy to the web master, and a reminder to everyone else.

Back to the trip, spent some quality time with my parents in Lake McKeller, beside which West End is a thriving city. A quick day in Toronto and then, fly to Montreal. It was great seeing everyone, One Montreal highlight was underwear shopping for Sue with Sue's Mother Doreen, we had slightly different opinions on the subject. After MTL. I spent a disastrous two day stop over in Miami, Prices on everything I was shopping for were considerably higher than expected. Add to that a phone call from Roatan that shifted my shopping priority from hot tub to washing machine (which still hasn't arrived) and end the trip off with having the rental car broken into. I knew life sucked in the real world, that's why we left.

Life and routine quickly returned to what I jokingly call normal upon my return. Chores had piled up and in-between dives all the new goodies got installed and a new addition was built to house the new washing machine. The old one had simply rotted from the ground up. We talked to one guy recently who takes his appliances apart every few months to clean and oil everything, sounds drastic but the air is pretty corrosive here!

Looks like my best recourse for the hot tub will be to build it in place with cement and then pick up a heater and pump on the main land. While everything I looked at in Miami was expensive, they were also made with a lot of pretty chrome or polyvinyl bits that I know wont stand up here. I've started drawing up plans for a concrete tub but I'm hoping to talk to a fiberglass guy before I commit.

With high season just around the corner, I have hired a divemaster to help get a few days off now and then. Bernadette is Dutch and slowly learning her way around the sites. I have also taken on Hanna (Canadian) and Sophie (France) as apprentices, divemasters in training. Schedules have been a problem so far since they both work in the evenings, and I work during the day. Needless to say this is all creating more work for me now, but will pay off later.

Rainy season has certainly been mild compared to our first season here. Once the remnants of Keith went by things cleared up and the sun has been shining with temperatures in the mid ninety's during the day, cooling into the low eighty's at night with some late evening rain. Sure beats last years 28 day downpour. Of course we can tell we have started to acclimatize, now we wear polar fleece when the temperatures drop into the low eighties.

January 2001

Roatan Update #14

Roatan didn't get too much damage from hurricane Keith, but the winds did do some damage. One annoying bit for Sueño del Mar was to have a septic tank break open under the shop. The shop is on a dock over waist deep water and there is only a foot or so of clearance between the dock and the water. Not in any respect a nice place to work. I do feel for the guys working under there this week, especially since the washrooms are still being used! I knew without reservation however that I come from a land with different sensibilities when I saw one of the boys wading back under holding a couple loaves of French bread for lunch over his head.

Christmas Day the sky cleared up and the winds died down to a reasonable level. After a week of bussing customers up to Las Palmas on the other side of the island, it actually looked nice enough to dive here again. Our thirty-five foot dive boat was on Ray's beach waiting to be launched after some motor work and new bottom coat. Resurrected, the twenty footer was available so we decided to go for it. We had five customers, a student, an instructor and two divemasters, but no dock crew. Somewhere along the way it was decided that Bernadette would lead the dive and I would handle the boat. Bad decision overall in retrospect, but so was waking up that morning. By the time the divers were surfacing I was pretty close to comatose from seasickness. Seas had picked up to six and ten foot swells. The next thing I remember after hearing the motor start is being thrown sideways. A lot of screaming and a thump as we hit reef some hundred feet from where we were tied. So much for resting on the way back! Fortunately we landed upright but the bow is facing land and waves are breaking over the stern. We lifted the motor right away and did a quick assessment. The waves are pushing us onto the fringing reef that is only two boat lengths wide. "Everyone start bailing, use anything you can" Heather and I get into the water to guide the boat straight letting the wave energy lift and push us in. Bernadette gets an emergency call out on the hand held radio, and by the time we are clear, Zodiacs are buzzing towards us from the sail boats moored inside the reef. The lighter we can get our boat the better off we'll be so we put all our passengers into the first two Zodiacs that arrive and tie the bow line onto a water taxi for a pull back to our dock. With all the excitement calmed down my stomach cramps return with a vengeance. Bernadette notices that my foot is also bleeding rather freely and that I can't move my right arm, and flags in the last Zodiac that has been hanging back. I knew then that I was alive. If I had died and gone to heaven, I wouldn't be bouncing back to shore in a ten foot Zodiac with Jim, who was sitting across from me stark naked, at least not in my imagination.

The foot is fine now and the cramps went away after a few hours. The arm is still giving me a hard time and the boat needed a new prop. Our customers thought it was a fine adventure overall and will have an unbeatable Christmas story to take home.

Picture this, Eagle Rays wants to get rid of their Coke machine. The Brick Oven up the hill behind our place wants a Coke machine. No problem. Barbara comes over with three not so burly boys, does a quick inspection and sends the boys off for a "truck". The two restaurants are about a quarter mile apart, but there is also a hundred feet or so of bumpy elevation. Next time I look out the three boys are heading off with the industrial refrigerator sized Coke machine perched atop a wheel barrow. Just when I though life couldn't get sillier.

April 2001

Roatan Update #15

Ok, no more stories about sinking boats. Thanks for all the notes, my shoulder is pretty much back to normal now. I spent the better part of a month using anti-inflammatorys and pain killers. Sue even arranged for a trip to the local Himalayan Health Center, where I was poked, massaged, acupunctured, set on fire and subjected to various other forms of medieval tortures until I swore that I was actually feeling better. I have a lot more sympathy for those poor witches in Salem now! Before a second session could be arranged, I found a bone specialist in Cieba, and hopped a ferry to the mainland. Dr Perez was wonderful. Despite the communication difficulty, by using some plastic shoulder models and a lot of hand signs he was able to diagnose the problem as Bursitis. A few days of industrial strength anti-inflammatorys, and some exercises and I was lifting and totting again.
Yahoo!

My Parents were here for most of February, which gave us an excuse to do some of the site seeing that we always recommend, but never find time for ourselves. They walked the beach and went swimming every day. We also hired a local bus guy for an island tour and went to the Archie's Iguana Farm, the bird park and walked around in Garabola Gardens.

Sue and I had planned to go away for a week together while they were here to watch the place, but it was not meant to be. I went off to New Orleans to attend a four day dive conference, while Sue braved a return to the frozen north, to attend her sister Sandra's wedding. Unfortunately we couldn't both go to both events. The dive conference gave me an opportunity to market the lodge directly to travel wholesalers, as well as time to attend business seminars and of course take care of some dive stuff. New Orleans was a wonderful venue and the French Quarter certainly lived up to its reputation as the party capital of America.

I recently had the opportunity to do some repairs and improvements at the Mariposa. Plumbing has never been my favorite type of work, but every thing rusts, wears or goes bad in a short period of time here. The bolts that hold the toilets to the floor for example all needed to be drilled out and replaced along with the toilet seals. Some of you have been living for decades with ever having to do this stuff. The Mariposa is only five years old! Electrical stuff on the other hand has always been easy for me, and I admit to being cocky enough to work on it without turning the power off. Tile is not a conductor unless it's damp. The average humidity on the island is about 90%! Never touch the power supply in bare feet on a tile floor, especially if you have been sweating! Lesson Learned.

Quality staff is a problem in any business. Our night watchman Calvin started coming to work later and later. He also has a day job as a plumber and electrician so we felt awkward about the whole situation. We knew he was sleeping in the hammock on the front porch downstairs at night, but that is normal for watchmen here. When we started finding him asleep when we came home from dinner we finally let him go. His replacement Victor is considerably older, probably in his fifty's. I get the impression from his calloused hands and wiry frame that Victor has spent his life swinging a machete. He does gardening for a friend during the day, and occasionally has his family up to visit in the evenings.

May 2001


Roatan Update #16

To experience the real Roatan, the part that lives and breaths beyond the reefs and beaches, one has only to sit in the central square of Coxen Hole for a while. Oranges are peeled for you and the tops sliced off for one limpira. Very tasty but the challenge is in eating out the pulp and juice from the top section so you can spit the seeds into it as you eat the bottom. Loud conversations in Spanish, English and something in-between called islander, take place all around you. There is often a sermon being given on a loud speaker, and more often than not a squabble taking place in another corner. Everything can and sometime is sold here from the usual trinkets to shoes, boiled corn to seasonal fruit and local baking. Prices vary based on your nationality. Everything must be negotiated. Panhandlers are here as well but you will get a good story for your dollar. Ever-present is also the noise of horns from taxies, whistles of police trying to sort out traffic and the boom, boom, boom of rolling car stereos.

I am taking a well-earned break from diving. (1100 dives in 13 months) The decision took place back at Christmas but like everything here, took a few months to get going. I was being drawn inexplicably into a more administrative roll and away from diving. Ray and I will still be working together in some capacity, but I needed some distance to figure out what I want to do. For now chores are keeping me pretty busy here at the lodge. I suspect that I will be back doing some part time dive mastering soon, but we are interested in creating a reef biology course for both snorkelers and divers that would be totally portable, fun and informative. Then market it all across the island, as well as at Sueño. Anyway, lots of planning to do. With time together again, Sue and I are learning and practicing Swedish massage, which will enhance her business potential and has a few side benefits for me.

My Strange behavior articles in the Lucky Limpura are gaining in notoriety, and I have even managed to wrestle editorial control away from the publisher. Anyone out there ever think that was a possibility for me? I thought I would run out of topics but the reef is constantly showing me something strange and wondrous, and admittedly many of the ideas came while answering questions or discussing behavior with other divers.

Speaking of strange behavior, yes George is still around. As near as we can tell she was about six or eight weeks old when Sue and I were married in June of '81, so sometime in May she will officially turn 20. I'm not sure if this warrants a letter from the Queen, chances are she has lost our address. George seems to have adapted well to the tropics though her senior diet cat food and litter is imported directly from Tampa. (She isn't spoiled) She goes nuts over fresh fish, which is on the menu here a couple times a week, but confines her activity to sleeping, napping and dozing when she isn't eating.

For those of you just entering summer, here are my favourite drinks to cool off with after a day of sun and surf. The first is a Banana Smoothie using 3 or 4 frozen apple-bananas (that's what we grow in the front yard) and about 1 1/2 cups of fresh orange juice. Blend until the chunks are gone then toss in 3 or 4 ice cubes. For a more decadent treat, try 4 or 5 frozen apple-bananas with 1 1/2 cups of milk a splash of vanilla and about a ¼ cup of chocolate syrup, throw in some ice cubes and whirl. Ummm. For conversion sake, my guess would be that 1 Chiquita banana would be equal to 2 or 3 apple-bananas but not as sweet.

I'm stealing this idea from Sue, who sent some info up to her nephew in Ottawa recently for a class project. I thought it would be interesting to share some local prices with you. A 20-foot long clear Honduran pine board 1x12 costs 155 Limps ($10US). They don't sell anything under 20 feet! Copan coffee goes for 36 Limps ($2.50US) a pound. Internet time on the island is still 225 Limps ($15 US) per hour while on the mainland it is 60 Limps ($4US) per hour. My driving license was 300 Limps ($20US) for 2 years. Eggs are 1 Limp ($.15US) each. Beer at most bars go for 15 Limps ($1US). A taxi from West End to Coxen Hole about 10 miles is 18 Limps ($1.20US) but the bus is only 10 Limps ($.65US) A Doctor visit runs between 100 to 300 Limps ($6 to $20US) A bag of Doritos sells for 18 Limps ($1.20US) but Pringles fetch a whopping 60 Limps ($4US). Bananas and limes are not available for sale in grocery stores. They grow on trees!

June 2001

Roatan Update #17

 
The lodge is doing well for itself we were full through April and May, then just when we thought things would slow down for a few months "Temptation Island" comes along. We have avoided being involved in long term rentals in the past, but Fox Network is here for five months with a film crew that don' t need any service, and are out 18 hours a day. If the rooms are full and things are quiet, Sue and I will take the opportunity to do a bit of traveling. These folks will be taking up 90 to 150 rooms which when the action starts will likely shift some economics here. There won't be much space for tourists through out the summer, so the dive shops and tour operators are in for some lean times. In the end, the show will be broadcast to twenty some odd countries, and will do a lot to promote Roatan. According to people in the know, when these guys left Belize last year prices went up three hundred percent.

(if sunshine and fish weren't enough to attract tourists, real live Playboy Bunnies and Chip and Dales should do the trick)

May was the month of firsts here at the lodge. Our first mail delivery came to the door on the 12th. To be fair we have received mail addressed to Mariposa Lodge, West End, Roatan before but it was necessary to track down Wanda Miller and have her sort through the pile for the people she didn't know. This time she brought it to the door. This is acceptance. ( the letter was mailed in January ) We have also been allowed to open an account with Credomatica. This was almost a years undertaking before we had what we thought was required, then a bunch of trips to the accountant, and some E-mails to our lawyer Gustavo, but finally, we can accept credit cards. We aren't talking anything high tech here, we have one of those sliding imprinters with a handful of three page slips. No phone line yet, so when we take a card it's off to Coxen Hole to get the approval the next day, but hey, it's a step.

The expanded massage business has also done very well. The new studio is in unit #3 with a large shiatsu room and a separate Therapeutic massage room. The addition of therapeutic massage has been very successful with the additional equipment paid for itself in the first month. Sue has been offering free massages to friends that are traveling in exchange for massage oil. I am apprenticing in Therapeutic Massage and have been gaining experience, practicing on some neighbours.

Sue has also kept herself busy with exercise classes, Yoga classes and Women 's Lunches. The exercise class happens in Sandy bay on Gail and Warren's beech. It is alternatively called the fountain of youth club or the sea goddesses, depending on who you talk to. It invariably ends with snorkelling and lunch. The Yoga Class was started by Patchy, at the Himalayan Health Center, but when Patchy got too weird, they left him and started holding sessions at various peoples houses.

In my spare time, I have built a router table and a table saw. We now have new window and door molding throughout the middle floor and our apartment. The common kitchen on the middle floor has been turned in to a common room and a small efficiency kitchen has been installed in unit 4. I have built small tables that fit over the propane bottles for the stoves that just happen to be a comfortable height for the five gallon water jugs, Sue is now finishing two new benches, and a third will be ready tomorrow. Then it's on to some new kitchen tables, and I'm drawing up plans for some comfortable chairs, something simple in Honduran mahogany with white cushions for each of the units.

August 2001

Roatan Update #18

Things have improved dramatically on the island in the two years that Sue and I have lived here. There is much more grocery selection, hardware and tools are coming down in price and the selection is improving. Some things however are still problematic. A computer glitch took three airplane trips, five ferries and countless buses and taxies to resolve over a three-week period. I have had main boards that didn't fit my tower, main boards that fit the tower but not the processor, and a new main board that fit everything perfectly, but just didn't work. I actually started to keep a journal of each obstacle I came across but found it all too silly even for me. Highlights would have to include sitting in the mall in Ceiba waiting for a part delivery, with a group of young Hondurans watching "Day of the Jackal" through a showroom window. Forget the plot, these guys thought Bruce Willis's hair changes for every scene was hysterical. Sometimes we miss the comedy when we pay too much attention. Another highlight would be riding the ferry back in particularly bad seas holding the rail on the upper deck soaked through with salt spray, but determined not to get seasick. I survived, many didn't. Life is never dull here in the tropics.

We often joke about not being able to get the things we really want here. It has often been stated that mainland Honduras will be perpetually trapped in the third world, while we on the island are striving towards fifth world. In Ted Simons book "Jupiter's Travels" he philosophizes on the living conditions in south and central America, by reminding us that for every family living in a square cement box without water or electricity, there is another dozen families that aspire to have it that good. I guess at the end of the day, no mater what your circumstances, it is human nature to want more and it is this aspiration towards something, anything, that makes us human, and the lack of hope, irregardless of our circumstances that creates impoverishment. In wandering the back streets of Ceiba and the poorer sections of the island I have come across people living in just about every circumstance imaginable and unimaginable, but there are smiles and hope in every face I meet.

The US Fourth of July caught us completely off guard this year, things had actually been a little slow. The first group through on Saturday was from project Habitat, on a break from building houses on the mainland. Two from the group loved the massage so much they booked hour and a half massages for Sunday, which already had an ambitious calendar and so it was that I was called into duty on Monday when eight Piece Corps volunteers booked back-to-back half hour massages. It was actually a really fun time since the groups hung around between sessions chatting and enjoying the view.

As business has developed in the Bay Islands, a clear need was recognized for a modernized land registration. A Spanish firm won the contract and started by taking aerial photographs to re map everything, and then had every property owner in to prove ownership and register each claim. Having new documents with lots of official looking stamps made it easy to register the Lodge once Sue found where to go, but we were a little fuzzy on our actual property boarders. With a new goal in mind Sue set off to find a surveyor and was introduced to a clerk at the municipal building who was keen to redraw our plan right there on the spot. Thinking that this sounded suspect by the standards we understood about surveying, we regrouped and decided to try a different avenue. Our lawyer recommended a guy that I had met by chance a few days earlier on the plane, so we hired him. His team showed up on the appointed day with some very impressive laser measuring stuff, tripods and just generally gave us the impression they might know how to use them. Three out of nine original stakes were located within minutes, waypoints were plotted and new stakes were installed from them. When Hernandez came by a few days later with the fresh drawing, the portion of our property that extends into the road and shared driveway was missing. His explanation was simple; he didn't want to create a conflict! Wouldn't it be easier for everyone if we just let that bit go? The corrected drawing is back now and will be registered soon.

I avoid writing about guests as a rule, though there are an awful lot of stories stored up for publication sometime in the future! However, there we re two Finnish girls recently that kept us quite entertained. I found these two sitting on the doorstep on one of our returns from Ceiba. It was late in the afternoon and they were flipping through a tourist guide looking for somewhere to stay. They were looking a little pathetic so I broke the rules and offered them a room at a reduced rate. They stayed a week, took dive lessons and had massages. Unfortunately they let some island boys know where they were staying, which kept Victor, our night watchman, busy shooing people away at three in the morning, that stopped in to say hi. They dropped a bottle of red wine in the white bedroom one night leaving an interesting spray pattern floor to ceiling and they seemingly lost a battle with a watermelon their last morning in the kitchen. All the while Sue kept smacking me. Oh well if my life was easy anybody could live it.

"Temptation Island" is in full production, the British and German versions are complete and The Scandinavian version filming has begun. We had never heard of the show before these guys showed up, and when we finally did see it on cable, we were still left wondering what all the fuss was. A British contestant apparently cheated with a temptress on the first night but I don' t know if that means he won or lost. The German crew wrapped up last week with more nakedness but less cheating. Go figure. The girls from The Scandinavians are leaving puddles of drooling men everywhere they go. I'll keep you posted as events develop.

October 2001

Roatan Update #19

The most recent cold front has dropped temperatures into the mid-seventies, which after months in the mid to upper nineties is quite a shock. We are wearing polar fleece and hunkering down with hot chocolate. If only we had a fireplace to curl up in front of. Back in August we signed up with the local cable provider so that when the rainy season came along we would at the very least be able to track major storms on CNN and veg out in front of HBO. Well the cable guy shot his girl friends husband back in September. He is in jail on the mainland, nobody has cable anymore.

The first I heard of hurricane Iris was when a guest asked why everyone along the beach were pulling their boats up out of the water. It didn't take long to get some information and find out we were to expect one hundred and fifty mile an hour winds that evening. I spent the day boarding everything up and bringing all the outdoor furniture in. I made a quick run into Coxen Hole to return movies and was surprised by the near pandemonium going on. There was a run on dry goods at the grocery store and no milk or bottled water to be found anywhere. When a couple of large trucks went by with all the parrots and toucans from Tropical Treasures Bird Park in cages everyone suddenly stopped as if the days activities were in preparation for this parade. Apprehension continued to grow as the rain got heavier and the wind stronger. The power went off around two in the afternoon so with everything tucked in I laid down for a nap with the cat. We were awakened to a sudden silence at dusk that was far more ominous than the turmoil of thunder, rain and wind all day. Iris's eye had past us by, very close, moving at twenty five miles per hour. It was already hitting the mainland of Guatemala and Belize while much of Roatan was still preparing. It was so amazingly nice the next day that a tangible frenzy was underway at the dive shops to get open and to get divers back into the water.

Land speculation is heating up. An article this summer by TJ Lynch indicated that prices may triple in the next few years. Land speculators are everywhere now and guess what; their buying is pushing prices up! Since writing the restaurant guide that we have handed around with our advertising in it, two new island restaurants have opened up in West End and one more is about to at Posada Arco Iris. There are also two new gift shops and several hotels are undertaking expansion. New buildings and business are blossoming all over the island including a movie theater in French Harbor that is planning its own shuttle service. Business at the Mariposa continues to be brisk, with young Europeans traveling through, but staying longer than they had planned. One couple booked in for two nights and stayed fourteen.

I have in past updates complained about how quickly things wear out when you live so close to the ocean. I now routinely replace all the seals in the toilets every six months and assume anything electronic is disposable, since its lifespan will be limited to about 10% of what I would expect. I was caught off guard recently by corrosion in my main electrical panel. I'm not sure why I was surprised, since I have had to replace weak breakers in the past, and after all, the box is outside with little protection from the elements The death toll on equipment since moving to Roatan includes 2 refrigerators, 2 Weed Eaters, 2 Microwaves, 3 coffee makers, 1 electric drill, 1 washing machine, a computer and numerous ceiling and floor fans. Warm salty air may be good for me, but it's sure hard on the stuff I live with.

Our local water commission is out of money again. It turns out that 45% of subscribers have stopped paying their monthly water bill. When asked, the committee didn't actually have records of who is paying and who isn't. They were also unaware of average usage, average operating expenses or any other useful numbers. West End's drinking water comes from three wells behind the Mariposa and one in Mangrove Bite. The only expenses involved in producing water for the town is electricity to run the pumps. The committee feels the best resolution to their problem would be to purchase another well. They aren't sure how much that would cost but if we all contribute... Think I'll put in my own well while they sort this out, things may get a little dry soon. "Stay at the Mariposa Lodge, we have running water" Humm?

January 2002

Roatan Update #20

Happy New Year.
There is a love hate relationship between the backpacking community and the business community. When tourism is down we all lower our prices to accommodate. When tourism is up prices go up and the same backpackers that helped us survive the slump are treated like plague victims. Following the normal autumn business slump, and with a fair degree of uncertainty over the 2002 season, a price war broke out among dive operators with course prices dropping from three hundred down to ninety nine dollars and diving as low as ten dollars a dive. Fortunately for us, people seem to travel with a finite amount of available money, and what they saved on diving they were willing to invest in better accommodations, so from sometime back in early-December the Mariposa has been filled to capacity, and bookings are rolling in fast. We cleaned out the old massage room that we have been using for storage, and it has sold every night since we opened it. Plans are now formulating for four additional units!

The November elections went very smoothly. As was predicted, the Flore's government was ousted by the Monduro party in a whooping landslide. Locally the island government officials were all able to keep their seats. Interestingly enough, the transaction doesn't take place until January 26th. Before the election the main street was being grated about once a week, whether it needed it or not. Since the election, despite torrential rains and washouts, there doesn't seem to be any money left for maintenance. Could be a coincidence.

We are still plagued by technology problems here at the lodge. The latest computer has stopped recognizing the printer, the floppy drive and the com port we use to connect it to the satellite phone. Hewlett Packard hasn't been very helpful so far. Our digital camera was small enough to send north with a customer, and has since been replaced by Kodak. Likewise, the original motherboard from the PC we brought down with us went out OK. Unfortunately 1st Main waited to process the credit card until the board was finished, by which point the card had been stolen and canceled. The new card is in the mail, but it will probably take a few weeks, and therefore a few weeks before the board will even ship from the factory. In the meantime we trudge faithfully off to the Hondusoft café in Coxen Hole every couple days to check our E-mail.

The same weird weather that dropped snow on the southern US dipped down in this direction with a couple of northerly blow ups, and dropped nighttime temperatures into the lower seventies. Jeans, sweatshirts and wool socks replaced the normal West End fashions, and micro-bikinis were found on only the hardiest of northern tourists.

Toyota ran a special on trucks before Christmas. We had a few party invitations at the far reaches of the island so we signed up for two days in order to run some chores, and get in two nights of feasting and revelries. We ended up with a two-seat pickup with fairly bald tires. Not a big problem on the main paved road, but not well suited to getting up our driveway. The first evening we headed off with friends behind us to a retirement community on Palmetto Bay, a nice American style community with cultivated gardens, nice beach, decent roads and street lights. The other fork in the road careens down the side of the mountain into the remote fishing community of Crawfish Rock. The Crawfish Rock folks were quite helpful. They had no trouble finding someone that could give us directions back to Matt and Margo's, though I suspect is was less of a language problem than it was a matter of laughing too hard to speak. We did get turned around and despite the bald tires and axle deep ruts made it back up the hill. Life is full of little challenges.

Christmas on the beach celebration has had its share of difficulties over the years. Last year there was a tropical storm blowing, the year before that the stage collapsed when all the kids rushed up to meet Santa. This year everything was going well until the MC mentioned how wonderful it was that the rains had held off. Little Zeekey had just started his electric piano solo center stage when the skies opened up, it took two big guys to drag him away from the limelight and the potentially electrifying performance. John, Sue and I huddled under an umbrella while the entire population of West End tried to get into the Coconut Tree convenience store to stay dry.

There is a new Argentinean restaurant in town and a new international chef running the kitchen down at Luna Beach. There are rumors that a new Bar/Movie house is opening soon across from Roatan Rentals. Unfortunately the Papagayo's restaurant has closed down, as has the infamous Twisted Toucan bar. We won't miss the Twisted or their all night parties. Bill and Aaron have started construction on a second Loafers location on the beach across from Posada Arco Iris. I suspect permits might be a problem since their primary location has been temporarily closed for creating a public disturbance. The Raegae Bar was raided recently and closed down when some illicit products were found. For those of us keeping track that's all the bars in town closed down at the height of tourist season. There hasn't been this much desperation amongst the drinkers in town since the beer boat sank on its way to Roatan just before the Christmas of '99.

April 2002

Roatan Update #21

Roatan Update
There are some aspects of island life that will never cease to amaze, entertain or stun me. I have learned to be guarded to the extent of paranoia when conversing with islanders. Telling a neighbor that you like her plants can result in the plant being dug up and delivered to you. I haven't yet told anyone I like their kids! It is easy to get the wrong impression of islanders as a tourist, when everyone you meet is trying to hustle you for money, and the scent of "cruise ship money" seems to bring out the worst in a small handful of visible people.

As in any community there are a few folks that indulge a little more than they should. There are a couple guys here that have been indulging for a few too many years. One morning recently I woke up to the familiar sounds of a machete chopping. My neighbor Deloris had hired two guys to chop her lawn. The guys that are good can trim a lawn like a putting green, the local boys tend to use a downward chop removing the root and tilling the first few inches of topsoil. By the time I finished breakfast and a few coffees these old boys were finishing up their third break and getting back into it. Since the sun was now on Deloris's lawn, one of them had started chopping the shady slope at the side of my driveway. On my way out I stopped him and suggested that he would be better off chopping on Deloris's property. Seeing a confused look cross his face, I pointed out the property markers and the visible line between the short grass on my side and the knee deep grass on her side. "Just chop where the grass is long" I try. "I don't want my driveway chopped". "how much you gonna pay me?" Slowly and with practiced patience I try again" I'm not going to pay you to not chop my grass, You are being paid to work over there!" He turns and starts to sulk off to another break then calls out "could you bring me back a bottle of rum from town?" Can't fault the guy for lack of initiative!

I'm back underwater again from time to time. I am doing part time divemastering for the Inn of Last Resort. I am also their massage guy. Working for a resort is a lot different than what I had been doing at Sueño del Mar. Big diesel boats, towels handed to you after the dive, dock hands to haul tanks and they feed me like a sacrificial pig. They even bring pizza down to the dock to tide us over during night dives! Spending quality time with Gobies, Rays and turtles is what it is all about though, and getting back underwater for me is like a warm and wonderful homecoming.

Having to drag dive gear or the massage table around led to the purchase of a car. We now have a fire engine red Suzuki Samurai. It has two comfortable seats, four mismatched tires, and the roof leaks when it rains, but its solid and runs well. Choice of island cars is limited so our criteria was something with a solid frame, running condition, and most importantly, it had to have the proper paperwork. I looked at a lot of stuff that is in-country with expired permits or no registration. Ours has been properly transferred to us which means I own a folder full of transfer documents and titles dating back to the date of manufacture. We decided that it would look sharp with Mariposa Lodge on the doors, so I got a price for the job, then bought a can of spray paint and started making a template. One full day of masking and spraying, one day of removing over-spray and a day of highlighting the letters, all for a savings of about fifty dollars. Its not like I have anything useful to do with my time!

I seldom carry more Limps than I need. I am a natural sucker for a good con and have "Lent" small amounts of money to half the island at this point. Lend and give seem to mean the same thing here. I actually got conned by a little kid selling his mothers coconut buns the other day. "how much I ask" "ten Limpira" says the kid. I smile and offer him ten limps for two, about twice the going rate. As he takes my ten limp note he looks up pitifully " I'm powerful hungry, could you buy me one too?" I walk away chuckling at myself, with one dinner roll, for slightly more money than a loaf of bread.

I found two fluff balls living under Rolando's house one night while arranging a taxi for a guest checking out at 5:00 AM. I took Sue up the next day to check them out and after some negotiation through Rolando's sister Esmerelda we have become the very proud owners of a pure-bread "Roatanian" puppy. Cindy is now nine weeks old and is getting bigger every day.

September 2002

Roatan Update #22

Roatan Update
It has been a while since my last update. Busy, busy, busy and lack of computers has been the major contributing factors, life does remain interesting though. The lodge has been filled to capacity for several months now, and the massage business continues to grow. In between all the hustle we have made a few home improvements. By adding a ten by twenty deck between the two small decks on the top floor we have gained considerable living space on the windward side of the building. Not as nice a view as the ocean side, but getting out of the sun and into some cool breeze on a hot afternoon can be very pleasant. I built new deck tables and replaced all the deck chairs downstairs. Of course power tools can only be done when our customers are out playing but quiet time usually finds us with paintbrushes in our hands.

All in all we have had a really good season. Our success this year was made all the more delightful by having a long string of really great customers from all over the world. A lot of our business is still walk-in. Roatan is such a relaxed island that after traveling through Guatemala, San Salvador and Main-land Honduras travelers that find us, often stay with us for the duration of their vacation. Of course it helps that the ferry ride over is often brutal, so they are afraid to leave. After ten days or so we usually let folks know that it is only a few dollars more to fly back to the Ceiba. It also helps that dive prices are the lower than anywhere else in the Caribbean and full four day dive certifications can be done for around a hundred and fifty dollars.

On July 25th my drivers license expired. I had made a few attempts to get it renewed but was met with manyana or proximo every time I went in. After going in everyday, sometimes twice, for the first few days, I slowed down to every other day, and then once a week. On Thursday this week they told me the transito guy was in town but try again at nine on Friday. At nine on Friday the Transito guy apologized, checked out our paperwork and asked us to come back at two. With no plans for the afternoon, we showed up at one thirty and settled in on a hard wooden bench with our books. Three hours later we paid our eighteen dollars and were renewed until our birth dates in 2004.

Cindy continues to grow. She is definitely too cute for her own good and gets away with murder. Her two best friends are a pot bellied pig up the hill, and a hundred pound black lab that she romps through the fields with. Being a little home body, her friends tend to show up at our door looking for her, then off they go. She is still puppy enough that life is lived full speed ahead until every ounce of energy is used, then she falls over and sleeps for a few hours.

Services on the island continue to improve. The new high speed Internet service at the Kings Café down the street has really made life easier. We pay a mere thirty dollars a month for five hours of quality access time. No more going all the way to Coxen Hole, and waiting in line to discover the server has crashed again. Eldon's grocery store in French Harbor has not only become the cheapest place to shop, but the large selection continues to grow. The new dolphins and dock extensions at the cruise ship landing are finally complete. This allows ships in excess of fifteen hundred passengers to dock comfortably. Unfortunately the new bridges along the waterfront through Flowers Bay have been at a standstill for almost a year, leaving a very bumpy ride for tour busses in that direction. The sewer upgrades through Coxen Hole are not finished either, so more tourists than ever are being exposed to what must seem the nastiest place they have ever been! One step forwards two steps back.

Sometimes I just like to complain about stuff. Some bright bulb at the World Bank decided that Roatan needed a new sewage treatment plant and in fairness it probably does. What they are building will be a state of the art, multi-million dollar facility near the airport, just uphill from Coxen Hole. Crap doesn't run uphill. At least not for free, no word yet on where the financing will come from to run this plant or who will cover the cost of repairs and maintenance. Sure looks like a huge smelly white elephant to me. Hope I'm not in town when the check valve goes! The construction of sewer lines in Coxen Hole has meant digging up all the streets, usually coordinated to shut down all the accesses at once, and then installing the access junctions. Once the junctions were in place they measured for the pipe, back filled the holes and waited. A chief complaint from the contractor is that the locals kept stealing the dirt if they left a hole open overnight, driving the cost of construction up!

Credit card acceptance is still not very widespread in Central America. Cash rules. There are some areas that don't even take travelers checks. The deal is that the banks hold funds on them for forty days once we deposit them. We are a bit more open to North American spending habits here on Roatan, at the Mariposa we take credit cards, travelers checks and even cash, and accept each equally. Recently some guests paid for a meal at Eagle Rays Restaurant and got hit with the 12% tax, a 4% handling fee and a 15% tip on top of a poorly added bill. They were a little surprised! Tourists are always surprised as well that restaurants seldom have change. In some cases of course they are being scammed into leaving a big tip, but in most cases, small businesses here simply don't have any operating capital and going to the bank can be a half day chore. To top that off the banks record the serial numbers of travelers checks and American 50 and 100 dollar bills when you deposit them and reserves the right to declare them void later! There's a nice business to be in.

October 2002

Roatan Update #23
Lili and Isadore missed us, turning north towards Mexico and on to the US. So far the rainy season has yet to dampen the garden. Guess we will be into it soon though. With the start of rainy season approaching tourism has slowed down a little. We are looking forward to some gardening and landscape improvements once it does start. For now though the September doldrums have us stuck in a dry perpetual ninety something degrees.

Cindy is loosing interest in her friend Mr. Piggy. Mr. Piggy's intentions towards our little puppy turned amorous, without so much as a dinner invitation. Mr. Piggy still wanders down here a couple of times a day but Cindy sometimes chooses to play hard to get, and lets Mr. Piggy squeal away at the gate in a perpetual state of confusion. Hopefully one of them will get over it before high season starts.

Anthony's Key Resort lost a boat last week when a drive shaft sheered and went through the hull. No injuries reported. Loosing a tri-engine Pro-48 won't be good for AKR, especially after their hard tourist season. Efforts are under way to raise the boat for repairs. West End Divers has changed locations. They have moved down the beach to the old Ocean Divers location at the old Sun Set Inn. Ocean Divers moved out because the rent was too high. They are now located beside Roatan Rental and have changed their name to Ocean Connections. Paul the owner of the old Salt & Pepper restaurant tried out being a sushi bar for a while. Paul didn't think sushi had anything to do with marinated raw fish, to the chagrin of his customers, so he is now running a British Pub with reputedly the best fish and chips on the island.

The Municipal guys have been checking out business for permits, paperwork and doing spot health inspections. They are also enforcing restaurant and bar employees to have health cards, which is a very good thing. At the same time Immigration is raising its monthly visa renewal from 30 limps to 300 limps per month. 400 limps per month for a work permit, which is non-renewable after 90 days. The intention is to keep transient workers transient, and free up relativity high paying jobs for Hondurans. One restaurant we know of came away unscathed with the exception of a fine for some past due spices. Someone pointed out that they weren't checking to see if restaurants had access to toilets or the availability of toilet paper. Do the McDonalds back home still have those signs suggesting that employees should wash their hands? I'm eating in tonight.

The battle between bar owners and residents continues in West End. The latest council request to the municipal office would have bars and restaurants closed by ten PM. In fairness it has been quieter lately, I suspect that bar staff are starting to get the hint. The last attempt at a big all night party at the Tikki Bar ended when the next-door neighbors lit a tire fire just a bit up-wind. It seams there is a common theory amongst drug crazed bar tenders that tourists love loud music, actually taxi drivers seem to share this view. In practice it works like this, start off at a moderate level, where people can carry on a conversation. As the night gets on turn up the music until people are driven out, then turn it up more in hopes of drawing them back to the party. When there is no-one left at all crank it up again in case the people down the beach at the next bar didn't know you were having a party. A side theory of mine is that drug crazed bar tenders can't get a date, when the risk of conversation is present, so its best to eliminate the possibility.

On the medical front, the new "Dr Polo Galindo Clinic" has opened up in Oak Ridge, inaugurated by President Ricardo Madoro. This is certainly good news for residents of the eastern end of the island, and the booming retirement villages out there. A local fruit seems to be making news in the scientific community. Roatanians have a long tradition of natural and holistic health cures. The "ugly Fruit" looks like a yellow potato with black spikes. It is used locally to cure just about everything, and is now being researched as a possible cancer cure in the US. We get it from a wonderful women that sits outside Warren's grocery store, distilled into a product called "Nonnie Wine" It tastes completely foul but seems to help boost immunity response, taking the edge off colds and flues.

January 2003

Roatan Update #24

You know you're living in a small town when you know everybody's dogs name. Small town living means your mechanic drops off the car when he is finished working on it, then walks home. Island life means the bank hand delivers your statement, sometimes to the front seat of your car if they find it parked somewhere convenient. It also means discussing the weather. Arguing over the weather, and debating whether the weather was better last season or this. Rain at night is good for the bananas. Rain during the day is bad for tourists. Weather is the one safe unifying topic with no geo-political social-economic undertones. Gotta love it.

November brought the return of tourists to Roatan. Even the big resorts are on the upswing. While the lodge was quiet in October though, I was able to sneak away to the Inn of Last Resort and divemaster for a few weeks. This is less like work and more like being on vacation. Resort diving is easier than what I had done in the past. Big diesel boats with all the amenities and they fed me! Not just the lunch typico, real food! Thelma would have toast and fresh squeezed OJ waiting by the time I put my bike away. Bowls of fruit went out on the boat with us, ice tea was waiting when we got back. Pizza before the night dives. Imagine my ecstasy at having my two favorite things mashed together, free food and scuba diving.

December we began a renovation project to create a third apartment on the ground floor. The challenges were many including the removal of twelve feet of cement wall without disturbing the guests. Finding a dry spot to do the woodwork for the new kitchen. And just finding all the stuff we needed. Fortunately we keep spares of most things so a lot of stuff will get replaced when we find bargains. We did get stuck paying 4,000 limps for an under the counter fridge, about $200 US more than it should have cost. Oh well. The room is done and rented till after the holidays.

Life here keeps us busy and entertained. Friday I did some recovery dives on a sailboat that ran ashore near Gibson Bight on Thursday night. Bruce had the fifty-foot ketch out for a sunset sail, but the guests were late, then the seas pick up, then all the electronic navigation failed. Everyone got off OK but the boat was decimated on the iron shore. I've lost count of how many boats have gotten into trouble in the short time we have been here. My underwater search and recovery skills are getting far more of a workout than they should though.

It took a while to figure out the market, but the lodge is doing better than we expected and the massage business is turning into a huge cash cow. These things alone make the risk in coming here worthwhile but on top of that, real-estate values on the island are almost doubling every year. Roatan has changed in many ways since we arrived, development seems to be going on everywhere. Run down buildings are getting face-lifts, new three and four story commercial buildings are popping up all over, and flights in are becoming more frequent and cheaper. One sure sign things are going well on the island is the subtle transition to newer taxis. The 1970 Datsuns are giving way to new Corrolas and Maximas. As if that weren't enough, we have a spanking new white Mercedes Benz Garbage truck, complete with rear end loading and trash compacting, the dump is even getting a facelift and proper sorting area.

New restaurants are springing up everywhere. An Uruguayan grill has popped up to compete against the Argentinean grill that just couldn't keep up with demand. A new dessert bar should be opening soon and Fosters has re-opened their restaurant. A new Pizza Inn has opened next to the Bo-Jangals Chicken in Coxen Hole and is doing great business. There is even a new Espresso International in the Roatan Airport serving Cappachinos and Iced Frappachinos as well as a new ice-cream parlor next to the Credomatic Bank in town. Our favorite find is a new rotisserie chicken place in French Harbor. You can get a quarter chicken with salad and a soft drink for 50 limps or take out an entire chicken for 100 limps, around $6.00 US.

The holidays were so busy for us that we haven't taken much opportunity to eat out. We spent New Year's Eve icing the dog's nose that had swollen to the size of a tennis ball. The little beast goes like the energizer bunny playing all day long with whomever she can. Her latest pals Bravo and Prince both still have their puppy teeth though, so poor little Cindy has been looking a little ragged lately. She has also gotten into trouble when the three of them were caught barking and chasing away customers walking up towards the Brick Oven. They were all locked up for a few days and seem to have rehabilitated and given up their gang turf in favor of wrestling all day in our yard now.

March 2003

Roatan Update #25

Well, January sucked. Two, maybe three total days of sun in an entire month. While it wasn't exactly the "Don't stick your tongue to anything metal" cold that was happening up north, it was a very nasty seventy fiveish, which on a tropical island means polar fleece, long pants and huddling up with someone close. The older islanders claim it was how winter used to be on the island. I explained about older Inuit and ice flows to the older islanders. Humph! <BR.
Bad weather does several short term things for us. If folks can't get out and dive they buy more massages and the backpackers contemplating traveling in cold rainy weather stay longer with us where they are dry and comfortable. At some points along the way the ferry and airports were shut down, leaving guests stranded at both ends. We had a couple guys check out three mornings in a row.

February on the other hand is what Caribbean living is all about. Sun shine, beaches, hot days and cool evenings. Tourism returned with a such a vengeance that Sue and I have instituted a "day off" policy here at the lodge. We can't obviously sneak off together and leave the business unattended, so we take a day a week each with no massages, no room cleaning, no endless stream of laundry and absolutely no chores. Time to visit friends without having to hurry back or tour unexplored parts of island, if we weren't too busy reading in a hammock.

Our watchman Victor caused us a considerable amount of difficulty when he asked, in a note written by a mutual friend, for his accumulated Prestacionies. March 1st was the end of his second year with us and he needed the pension money for a family medical crisis. While we waited for our accountant to come up with a number, Victor helped out by asking the labor board. The labor boards numbers were about double what we had expected to pay based on our accountants numbers, so off I went to the labor board to straighten things out. I explained my case and showed the note to Miss Fern, who looked up after reading it and said "so you're firing him with out a reason!" It took me a minute to recover from this statement, and I had to check the note again before I carefully explained that I was not only not firing him with out cause, he was in fact still working for me. If I thought this sort of misguided logic would phase Miss Fern I was to be proven horrible wrong. Miss Fern's logic was unfailing: "you can't give someone prestacionies unless you're firing them, and you don't have any good reason to fire him." A sleepless night or two later, I signed and Victor thumbprinted the Labor Board agreement. Victor is now working for us on a one year fixed contract.

My parents were down here for most of March, which allowed us to get out and take some new photos for the web. (Watch for changes to the WEB site in the near future.) Coming from Canada in March forced them to slow down and acclimatize a little. There is a bit more than a hundred-degree temperature difference between Northern Ontario and the Bay Islands at this time of year. Flowers Bay, a less visited side of the island full of wonderful people, seems to have enchanted Dad while Mom got to watch the full moon rise from our back deck. No matter how hot it gets there is always the beach at the end of the street to cool off in. Cindy our dog has now figured out how to swim thanks to Mom and Dad. Our walks down to check e-mail now include a dip in Half Moon Bay and a run and roll on the beach, which has in turn lead to more sweeping up around here.

There is a mythology that we all fall victim to on occasion, that no matter how happy we are being where we are, there might be something nicer around the next corner. Thus on one brutally hot and sunny day recently we packed Mom and Dad into the back of the old Samurai and headed off to find Port Royal. Roatan has a long past of conflict between the Spaniards and the British Buccaneers and Port Royal was a temporary port town for the Buccaneers to lay in fresh water and provisions for their attacks on the Spanish armadas. Anyway, I thought it sounded romantic enough to warrant a three hour bumpy ride over hill and dale. At the bottom of the last washed out stretch of declination, we were afforded a magnificent view of the Caribbean, and the boathouse. No fortresses with cannonade, no swashbuckling pirates or buxom pirate women. There may well yet be buried treasure there, but we didn't think to bring any shovels. Maybe next time.

Roatan hosted its first International Triathlon competition this March. While a few serious Triathaletes came in to compete, the local participants were allowed to break up the swim/bike/run events into relay races. Our neighbor Donna wanted to do some swimming but was having a hard time finding a team. Donna is middle aged and not the lightest girl on the island. Regrettably she was turned down outright on appearance by several teams. It was with overwhelming joy that she found two other misfits the night before the event, who together managed to win the team event, with Donna herself claiming second overall in the swim event. Congratulations!


June 2003

Roatan Update #26

Easter week in Latin America is way bigger than Christmas! A reported eight thousand tourists visited the island for a weeklong celebration. The first inkling of what was to come this year was an announcement that the banks would close for the entire week. This put fifty or more people on the street Friday afternoon, waiting to get into the bank, where lineups are often more than an hour. While the impact to our business is minimal, there is the frustration of continually turning people away. Amongst the folks we tried to find homes for were a group of sixteen girls, and another group of twenty-one young people traveling without reservations. This years celebrations were watched over very closely by the municipal authorities, so while a good time was had by all, problems and noise were kept to a minimum.

Murphy's law prevailed last week at the Lodge. The shower drain started leaking in number 4, our expansion tank for the pump died and car starter wore out. The drain didn't look that difficult, rip up the floor, slap down new tiles and its done. Of course I ended up replacing a large section of drainpipe, and sub floor but that's par for the course. The expansion tank became an exercise in "while you're at it anyway" The replacement tank is 90 gallons in lieu of 18 and needless to say is several feet taller, a foot taller in fact than the old pump house. The new pump house is built and everything re-plumbed with nice new one-inch line. Now I did actually take out the starter solenoid and find a replacement in town, but when that didn't work we got Carlos to pick up the car. He found and installed a whole new starter and brought the car back a few hours later running much better than a fifteen year old island car has a right too. He also replaced the transfer case mount while he had the car. I like Carlos.

Our night watchman Victor was cutting a field a little too close to a friend when he took a back wing from a machete just above his left eye. I was driving home from the airport around sunset when a collectivo driver flagged me down going in the other direction. Victor poked his head through the window, showed me the gash and said he wouldn't make it to work. I told him that that was OK, just go to the hospital. The next day he explained what happened. The hospital put ten stitches in and gave him antibiotics. He said it didn't hurt much and his vision was alright. I gave him a bottle of Tylenol. Cindy's little brother Prince was also hit in the head with a machete while chasing off some kids stealing coconuts from Ronaldo's place up the hill. Prince is also doing just fine. Six stitches over the same eye as Victor, they made quite a pair sitting together out there.

A new chamber of tourism has been formed on Roatan, which the Mariposa Lodge is now an active member in. So far it looks like some very positive things are going to come out of it, but time will tell. The meetings are at least informative and uplifting. A new tourist police force has already been formed, and a committee established that will take our top concerns directly to President Monduro in the coming weeks. Part of the impetus for the organization is an explosion in cruise ship business that will more than double the number of ships docking here next fall. Not only does the island not have the infrastructure to handle them in terms of activities and transportation, but the roads and bridges are still not finished, and can't be until the sewer project is complete. Funds have already been made available to finish the trunk lines under the main road past the cruise ship dock so that paving can start later in the summer. Mayor Gerry Hinds has also committed to a beautification project that will include a total face lift for Coxen Hole once the road work is done. Unfortunately I think that means they will be painting everything during the worst part of the rainy season.

The airfare competition created by SOL air has made a huge dent in ticket prices. Sue and I have both been able to get short vacations in. Sue to Montreal to visit family, and I got away to Florida to do some shopping and relaxing on a $209 return ticket that included a weeks car rental. SOL is the new kid on the block and TACA is watching them closely and matching their rates. If SOL can stay in for the long haul, it will be great for the island. Both airlines fly direct from Miami once a week and daily into San Pedro. Getting here is getting easier.

August 2003

Roatan Update #27

Just when we thought we couldn't get busier, or take on any more projects a property fell into our laps that we simply couldn't resist. We have now opened three more rooms on the property next door. We were not planning to expand the business in that direction yet, but with the Middle East closed off to tourism, there is a huge market here just waiting to be served. We ended up gutting the building and completely rebuilding the bathroom and kitchen. With new sheetrock and paint inside and out, new appliances and furniture we had it ready to open in a mere three weeks. With some remaining touches to go we rented it out for two weeks with the understanding that we would need in to do some more work. They were delighted to come back from diving every day and find a new surprise as cabinet doors and mirrors were added. Now we'll just straighten up the yard and with our usual finesse, there will soon be a line up waiting to get in.

Our little red Samauri is plugging along just fine with a bit of a nudge here and there, but it is a fifteen-year-old island car. When a nice looking truck came along for the right price our interest was peaked. In most parts of the world, if you have a pink slip, you own the vehicle. Not so, here in the Honduras. You need two documents to register a vehicle, the original title, and the import paperwork proving all the duty was paid. We know a few people here that have had trucks repossessed after paying the supposed owner a lot of money. Skeptically, we checked a bit further and discovered that the truck had been sold to a car lot who sold it to someone else, who's wife had sold it to the lady who was selling it now. Humm, and nobody along the way had checked the paperwork or registered the truck? At that point all you can do is walk away. The Samauri leaks when it rains and its bumpy to ride in but its ours, registered and comes with half an inch of original paperwork.

On the political front, a multi-million dollar project to clean up the island's dump is nearing completion. Retaining walls and plastic membranes are in place to stop leaching, a control center is built and the fence is done. The road has been hard surfaced through Mud Hole, and Crawfish Rock, all the way through to Palmetto Bay. Now you might think that these citizens would be pretty happy to have a decent road. The new complaint being voiced is that while the new dump fence is functional, and everyone is glad we aren't leaching toxins out onto the reef any more, the frost fence just isn't very pretty. A planting campaign is expected to start in a few weeks. I'm just not convinced that planting a rose garden will change the dump from being what it is. Further beautification is taking place on Thicket road, the main entrance to Coxen Hole. A new cement fence now runs all the way out to the main road and they are starting the decorative cement work on the road, curbs and sidewalks. Additionally, negotiations are nearing completion to put a brand new road through from the cruise ship dock straight to the main road. Why all this fuss and bother? Between mid October and the end of the year, 48, 2000 passenger cruise ships are already scheduled to arrive. Up from the 4 to 6 a month that have been coming. With a conservative estimate of $100 per passenger being spent, the revenue potential for the island is staggering.

Monumental effort is going into the preparations for the influx. Mayor Jerry Hinds says he gets half a dozen people every day applying for permits to run snorkeling tours or open gift shops. Not many fresh ideas around so far. We did some brain storming and came up with a combination paint ball / safari hunt, we just need to find some emus and a few goats we can paint zebra stripes on.

We have now added cable TV to all the rooms, which was not all that hard beyond actually making the decision. Noise will always been a concern here so the remotes get handed over with warnings that any excess noise will lead to the termination of the service. So far no problems, except that guests are spending so much time in their rooms that getting the housekeeping done is taking a lot more planning!

Our dog Cindy has a new friend while we cat sit for friends that are off in Turkey for a month. Cindy tolerates the cat sneaking up and biting her as long as she gets to chase Simba around the house a few times. They do this for hours on end, so Cindy hasn't missed our romps on the beach too much, while all the construction goes on. Something you don't notice on a day to day basis, but there are a lot less cats in the neighborhood. Possibly due to the increasing number of dogs playing in our yard, but the result is an increase in chicken populations. I'm walking through the wake of a scurrying heard of chicks everywhere I go these days.

Roatan Update #28

With Fall comes rain. No one can remember a dryer summer, banana trees were falling half developed, fields were brown, more fires than anyone can remember, but hey, the tourists loved it. Deloris, Esmeralda, myself and several neighborhood kids sat up one evening watching the flames lick at the tree tops in the next valley, while hard winds blew right for us. The fire truck came and quickly doused the flames to the surprise of all. The next morning Deloris had her nephew rake her property clean but the little fire he lit to get rid of the burnables shot straight up the property line to the Mariposa and toasted the field next door. As you drive the length of Roatan you see burnt fields everywhere, most of them started by innocent iguana hunters, trying to smoke the little critters out of trees. Ah, island life!

The danger of living somewhere with pretty consistently nice weather is folks forget to plan for rain. People that build on low ground battle to keep the rivers off their property. Those that build on hill tops face horrific winds when all they wanted was a breeze. You would think that a government mega project would get it right. Nope. The new walls and cemented streets in Coxen Hole seem to lack adequate drainage for hard rain. Maybe we can sell gondola tours? OOPS!

The increased ship traffic is being handled so smoothly that you hardly notice the daily arrival of an extra couple thousand tourists. Hiccups did occur along the way of course. One group of 20 taxi drivers found a way to monopolize the dock entrance so they could nab the walk off passengers, and only got caught when one guy flew off a cliff racing back to the dock from West Bay for another fare. These guys get fifty US dollars a trip, in a land where doctors make twenty bucks a day. You can understand the incentive. There are also new security measures in place at the dock in anticipation of an international inspection scheduled for early December. Vendors are now required to be licensed, and have a security pass to get through the gates. To make this work, Mayor Jerry Hynds had to open up a freight yard at the other end of town, offering free food and activities to all the kids that generally pan handle on cruise ship day.

Poor little Cindy took ill this week, so we headed off to see Dr Dick. The car started thumping around Gibson bight, and then banged to a stop in Sandy Bay with a broken front u-joint. We caught a ride with Willis Campbell to Sunnyside, and walked in to see Dick. After the exam and a shot in the bum, we walked out to the road and got a ride back to West End with Submarine Karl, but by then the shot was kicking in. We made Pura Vida restaurant before she sat down and refused to budge. By the time I carried her up the hill to the lodge, and grabbed some tools it was starting to rain. By the time I got back to the car it was raining really hard and the ditch I had rolled the car off into was a bit more riverish. It only took a few minutes to remove four bolts, drop the drive shaft, Then with the front hubs locked I drove to the mechanics. Car and puppy are doing fine, I'm still trying to get dry.

There is a new French Restaurant in West End, at the old Tiki Bar location. Eddie Miller, West Ends top fisherman has finally opened a store to sell his fish, next door to Ray and Michelle. Diane of "Bite on the Beach" fame will be re-opening her "Garden of Eating" restaurant after a month off in a cooking school in Thailand. "The Twins Grocery Store" has moved across the street and Marco has moved his garage to a new location on the West Bay Road. Submarine Karl is back in town with a new two passenger sub capable of five thousand feet. He will be operating out of Half Moon Bay. West End Divers are in operation again, at the old Big Blue restaurant location. The Boulangerie is regrettably up for sale, which has meant sporadic French bread production and a general loss of weight to all concerned. Come January a one hundred seat Czech-theme micro-brewery and restaurant will open in Oak Ridge specializing in Roast Pig and Czech Breads. Mango Creek Fishing Lodge will also open around that time at the east end of the island. Beyond the normal fishing lodge activities, Terry has put together a one day program that will include a fly fishing lesson, lunch and a trip out on the flats.

The big topic for discussion around town is a US imposed Shrimp Embargo against several Central American countries. Apparently back in 1987 the US legislated mandatory use of Turtle Excluder Devices (TED) on all shrimp nets to minimize turtle drownings. The law includes countries exporting shrimp into the US such as Honduras. In May of 2000 Honduras lost its export certification, but enacted legislation to fine shrimp boats caught without TEDs This year three out of ten boats inspected by the US did not have TEDs so certification was withdrawn again. The US State Department does not seem to trust that local authorities are carrying out proper inspections! Honduran President Ricardo Monduro assured the fleet that the embargo would be resolved soon, so the fleet went fishing. There are 79 shrimp boats and 7 shrimp plants in the Bay Islands with an estimated 600,000 LBS of shrimp in cold storage and no income. The situation has raised tension between Islanders and Americans, which are being addressed in town hall meetings. In the meantime, shrimp is selling locally for $3.00 a pound.

February 2004

Roatan Update #29

Talk about your high-fluting social life! I was invited to attend a "Formal" dinner at Romeos in French Harbor, with the likes of Mayor Jerry Hynds, Governor Clinton Everett, Assistant Governor Evans McNab and more high powered business folks than you can shake a stick at. All in aid of the board of directors election for Canatour of which, Mariposa Lodge is a humble member. While the prime focus of Canatour has been getting the island ready for the cruise ship boom, the association is ultimately touching on every aspect of improving tourism, from the formation of Tourist police to community garbage cleanup projects, and health clinic improvements.

Speaking of name dropping, Tiger Woods was at Fantasy Island for a few weeks last summer despite the lack of golf courses, or perhaps because of! In July this year, heavy weight boxing champion Evander Hollifield will be here on a motivational tour speaking to underprivileged youth.

While doing some year end cleaning, we did a quick tabulation on Occupancy for the Lodge and found that American visitors make up nearly 30% of our guests. British guests equal 13% while Canadians make up 11%. The remainder of our list includes folk from, Holland, Switzerland, Honduras, Italy, Spain, Norway, Australia, France, Belgium, Mexico, Denmark, Argentina, Chili, Iceland, Finland, Israel, Sweden, Ireland, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Trinidad and China. Overall occupation for the year was well over 80%.

If business expansion is a reflection of tourist activities, then the outbreak of real-estate agencies is a very telling sign. Certainly the question asked most often is about land prices and laws. In answer to the first, Roatan is clearly still priced well below other Caribbean destinations. The second question is always harder. Yes, Foreigners can own property, including sea shore. The trick is in keeping it. Honduras is one of the most corrupt nations on the planet. If someone should decide to seize your land through the courts, and you don't happen to be here to contest, you loose by default. No valid claim necessary! Fences and property markers get moved all the time. Squatters have the right to settle anywhere they like, if you don't chase them off before they petition, you could end up holding the deed to a barrio. There is a very interesting standoff happening at the airport now, where a couple families have built inside airport property. The other fun trick is access. The agent sells you some ocean front acreage at the end of a long dirt road. Once the papers are signed a fence goes up across the road. The standard rule of buyer beware, does apply here though it seems to be ignored as quickly as many other rules we all grew up with. The most insidious neglect of course is when the lawyer fails to do a proper claim check, and you end up buying land from someone that didn't own it, sorry, no recourse available. Roatan is still a bargain, but not only do you have to do your homework, you have to keep a constant eye on your investment.

December was a hard month for Sue and I. It started to go bad when an insulator on our transformer was struck by lightening. We don't of course know when it happened, but after that whenever it rained it shorted out the line. In December, unfortunately it rained every day! RECO was actually pretty good about coming and switching us back on, so it was never out for long until a big northern blew in and took out some major power lines. That tied up our normal crew long enough for the town water system to run dry. (The town pumps are on our power line) this generated enough complaints to get an inspection team in, who actually found the source of the problem within a few minutes. Late on the thirtieth, the power problem was resolved, but now at the height of tourism, the town water reserve is empty. We are luckier than most, and found ways to keep water flowing at the Mariposa but seven days later, many business and homes were still only getting a trickle of water. While RECO certainly has some liability here, the water committee could have run the pumps by generator or at least kept them running when the power was on. I wouldn't want to be the guy that has to do the collection this month!

The death doom and destruction that was being predicted with the increase in cruise ship activity, seems to have been a bit pessimistic. While the startup had some shaky moments, things are actually going very smoothly. Where one ship a week caused pandemonium a year ago, we are now handling up to three ships a day with hardly any congestion or overcrowding. Road traffic is up considerably of course, and understandable since the island has grown from 47 taxies to just over 500 in the last 5 months. Litter is becoming a problem, but a public awareness campaign is underway to curb that. The only other complaint we're hearing locally is over public transportation. Virtually everything that moves becomes a tour mobile, so getting people to work on time and back home after a shift, has slipped down the priority list.

I'm not holding my breath on this one, but a new phone company called Telefonos del Norte is surveying the island to get a feel for our needs. In a Chamber of Commerce meeting they carefully explained their plan to install satellite stations that would connect to switching nodes handling up to one hundred lines per node. I suspect they were trying to determine if there was sufficient need for a thousand new lines. After some debate and speculation, we suggested that they should start with ten to thirty thousand lines and be prepared to expand. If their permits are approved, they could have the western end of the island operational within a few months. They certainly went away with dollar signs flashing in their eyes, but the key is getting permit approval, which means that the central government bureaucrats will have their hand in it, and that is never a good thing.

May 2004

Roatan Update #30

With the boom in tourism and some increased income coupled with some civic duties that have me out on the roads in the evening, it apparently became time to trade up from our trusty 89 Suzuki Samauri. Given that islanders religiously refrain from any type of preventative maintenance, I decided to check out the new car market. A quick trip to Cieba confirmed that there wasn’t much available there, so I hopped the bus to San Pedro Soula. Conveniently enough, most major dealerships are clustered in one central area. As with most items for sale in Honduras, you get what they have available. Trying to place an order for anything not on the lot is not an option. They will do it but you have to pay up front and wait upwards of six months! After a days shopping at the major players and a few unique suppliers such as Samsung and Daewoo, I flew back to Roatan armed with prices and options more confused than when I left home. In the sobering glow of the calculator though, one vehicle stood out well ahead of the others. Both in affordability and in its ability to meet our actual needs, the Moshida Ormega D-Cab became the right choice.

The Moshida is Korean made, has an 800cc engine four doors and a 1000lb payload in the bed. It took a few E-Mails to finalize the deal and the better part of a day to actually take delivery. I drove it from San Pedro to Island Shipping in Cieba and met it here at 10:00 the next morning with out a hitch. The small engine means more shifting on hills and flat out it won’t do much over 90k. With only 20 some odd miles of winding paved road this little truck does hold its own, it’s fun to drive and a snap to park.

Despite the fact that I have nothing to do with cruise ships, I managed to end up with the job of organizing a trade show junket to South Beach Miami. The Sea Trade convention is an annual event, where suppliers of everything from paper napkins to 20 ton anchors vie for the shipping industry’s attention. Roatan, with financial support from the Ministry of Tourism, gets a booth in amongst one hundred other countries hoping to be this year’s destination of choice. Its quite baffling to realize the size of the cruising industry. Teams of delegates and nearly ten thousand participants show up to sell. According to show delegates, Roatan is one of the few cruise ship destinations still attracting the attention of the big boys.

My parents came for their annual island visit at the end of March. The weather was great for the most part, but a stalled cold front brought in unusually hot temperatures and high humidity during their last week. This was their first experience being here during Semena Santa. Good friend Lynne Armistead also visited via the Norwegian Sun cruise ship for a day.

The "Week of the Saints" is a far bigger holiday in Latin America than Christmas. While increasing prices are slowing down mainland visitors to the island, we still managed to host some twenty thousand tourists during the week according to institute of tourism numbers. Assuming that we subtract ten thousand regular cruise ship day visitors and another three to five thousand filling up every available hotel, then the remaining five thousand must have slept on the beach. Or it could be that since everyone I’ve talked to feels that this year seemed a little slower than last year, that the minister’s numbers could be a little off.

I have declared the Mariposa to be a protected nesting site for chickens. This has meant putting up some chicken wire around the nests to keep the dogs and kids away from the eggs. With the eggs protected, we should get more chickens to fill up empty pots in the neighborhood! Well that’s my plan anyway. So far Harriett and Gertrude have both hatched chicks and come by for feed every day. Penelope and Skiddy Chick however are squabbling over the same nest, which at last count had twenty eggs in it. Penelope is sitting on nineteen while poor Skiddy has only managed to nab one to sit on. During the laying, each chicken came up and laid and egg a day then went off to feed. These two got real mixed up and used the same nest.

Speaking of chicks! Ok that was bad. The Victoria Secret folks spent two weeks at Palmetto Bay Resort at the east end of the island shooting their next catalogue. With his Temptation Island experience to draw on, Gary was able to keep a tight lid on the photo shoots. It wasn’t until the last day when some of the supermodels escaped to West End for some R&R that anyone knew what was up. Of course the video crew, make up people and body guards were a bit of a give away.

Lions Club has made it to Roatan. We formed a chapter in association with a club in La Ceiba. With some funding from the Swiss Government and a few other sources we should be able to start work on a school in Milton Bight next month as well as do some work at the Gravel Bay Orphanage. Should keep me out of trouble for a while.

August 2004

Roatan Update #31

In writing this update, it has been five full and busy years since we gave up working for a living. More precisely of course, we gave up on steady paychecks and being able to call in sick. The decision was not an easy one, and the outcome was never assured. Nonetheless, we have made a go of it. The Mariposa Lodge has allowed us to live out our dream of living in the tropics. The business has grown exponentially in these five years. Some days it almost seems like work. Other days, when breezes are up, and the hammocks are swaying gently, you remember how good it really is to be able to watch the sunset every night, to dive with whales and dolphins and to wake up listening to the sounds of nature every morning. There is no daily commute, shoes are optional and the dress code consists of shorts. (Sue does actually wear more)

The Lodge has in time become quite profitable. There was a period early on when we were not sure we would ever hit the break even point. Then there was the issue of adapting to the cultural norms of island life. It can still take two hours to make a bank deposit some days and it is seemingly impossible to do any government transaction with out being sent away at least twice. We have tested various methods of advertising but basically live by word of mouth. Word of mouth has kept the lodge full and has catapulted us into various publications like the Moon Travel Directory and Lonely Planet which says we are " Hands down the best deal in West End." Gotta like it. There are days when it almost seems like work, but complaining from a prone position in a hammock does not foster very much sympathy.

On the transportation front, Continental started flying to Roatan direct from Houston on June 12th. This will supplement the SOL Air and TACA flights flying here direct from Miami. Additionally US Air is considering direct flights from their hub in Charlottesville, and American is considering putting us on their schedule for early fall. There is some talk of US Eagle coming in to compete for the island hopping route from San Pedro, and Aero Mexico is discussing flights from Cancun Mexico. It seems that the Mexicans are interested in utilizing Cancun as the new hub for European travel, alleviating the stress that the homeland Security folks have put on international travel through Miami. The Galaxy has even bumped up its ferry service from Le Ceiba to twice a day.

The Lions Club had its official inauguration party in June. Held at the French Harbor Yacht Club, the event attracted several club presidents from the mainland, as well as political dignitaries from the island. Our inaugural project is a school that has already been started in Milton Bight. We will also help out our parent club in La Ceiba by building a security fence around their new eye clinic. The projects under review include everything from lending support to the Orphanages, to securing running water for the Coxen Hole Hospital and testing a lunch program to feed school children. There is really no end to the support that is required here, and its nice to be a part of something like this.

Roatan's reef is getting some well deserved attention from the international conservation community. There have been dozens of groups over the years counting fish and measuring growth rates here. This year, perhaps in light of the Jamaican reef being declared unrecoverable, the focus has shifted towards a less passive role. One group Cooperation International, has already run workshops on farming stag horn coral. Stag horn by itself is not endangered, but it does grow well here, and where it grows it creates protective nurseries for a lot of important species. To complement this project the Bay Islands Conservation Association, is looking at porous ceramic building blocks that can be placed in the sand flats that will also become a nursery. This will likely be financed via building permit applications.

The prime culprits in reef degeneration here on Roatan have been identified as poaching followed by sewage. While sewage issues are slowly being addressed, poaching is not. Culturally, Islanders have been fishing the reef for over two hundred years. The recent growth in poaching is a direct result of tourism, which has suddenly made it profitable. Even if poaching was made a priority for the police, there is no funding, equipment or common will available to police it. Additionally, the jurisdiction on the water falls under the Port Authority, while fishing comes under the Ministry of Agriculture. Regrettably, the only way to slow it down is to encourage tourists to cut back on sea food. While some fear that this will diminish the island experience. Many of us think that saving the reef is more important. I was always amused by divers that would run over to the Light House Restaurant for the all you can eat lobster lunch, and then be upset that they couldn't find any on the reef.

With a mere two hundred feet left to go, it actually feels like Coxen Hole Road will be open to business by the end of the month. Its been a year and a half since the project started to install sewage, water and underground services. In that time banks municipal offices and business along the street have at times been totally inaccessible. By the end of next week, the last stretch will be poured and the town will reopen with the surviving business issuing a huge sigh of relief. Flowers Bay Road will also receive a well deserved and long awaited hard surface of pavement. Roatan is an Island in flux today, as we adapt from a group of sleepy little fishing villages into a thriving tourist destination. Albert Einstein was attributed to saying once, that change, is the only true constant in the universe. Change is happening on Roatan. A lot of it good, some I could live without but all in the interest of serving people better. I'll leave you with this last quote from Pico Iyer:

As tourists we hope that the quaint anachronism we have discovered will always remain "Unspoiled" as fixed as a museum piece for our inspection. It is perilous, however, to assume that its inhabitants long for the same. Indeed, a kind of imperial arrogance underlies the assumption that the people of a developing world should be happier without the TV's and motorbikes we find so indispensable. If money does not buy happiness, neither does poverty

November 2004

Roatan Update #32

Telephones have arrived in West End! This is the biggest step forward in development that the island has taken since we arrived. There have been fifty phone lines in the village that have been traded back and forth amongst the growing population for the past dozen years. The newly formed Telefono Honduras has installed 1000 lines that will enable local business to not only speak to people with out leaving home, it also gives us fax, E-Mail and Internet access from our home. Imagine that, we're still reeling at the possibilities. One thing is certain. There will be a run on answering machines this week so we don't have to sit around answering the darn things. Beyond the business aspects of all this communication though is the ability to seriously beef up security. The next monster step will be getting street addresses.

Our new number is 011-504-403-8728, call us any time.

Telefono Honduras did a very professional installation. In and out in half an hour with out any mess. The Siemens group working for Hondutel by contract, took five and one half hours to do the installation and had to borrow my ladders, hammer and extension cords. We have lines from both companies, to hedge our chances of a working phone. I have little confidence in Hondutel's ability to manage the system once Siemens leaves the island.

The lodge is doing very well despite the slow down in the season. We decided this fall that we wouldn't offer discounts in hope of getting a break, one or two less rooms to clean a day or one less load of laundry, but no such luck. It's a bit embarrassing telling people that we are full when everyone else is complaining about not having any business. I'm especially amazed when I'm explaining to walk in business that I don't have any space, and they start trying to negotiate a better rate? Or the folks that insist that they only need one small bed, after I've explained that nothing is available.

I have been out of Canada for five years, and have now undergone the entirely pleasant task of renewing my passport. Arline de Milla of the Canadian Consulate office in Tegucigalpa was very helpful and armed with the correct documents I flew over and met with her. I could have sent the documents over but preferred to hand deliver them. The processing took about 20 minutes after which I met with Lorena Silva who is in charge of project development in Honduras. Lorena showed me a Canadian program involving small grants for projects that improve living conditions for underprivileged women and children.

Since Tegucigalpa has the reputation of being the murder and robbery capital of the world, I caught a bus up into the Valley of the Angels after my meeting with the consulate. The bus runs straight up the mountainside from Tegucigalpa for about forty minutes and arrives in a delightful centuries old village of craftsmen and artisans. Cultured gardens, clay tile adobe homes and cobblestone streets lined with gift shops and sidewalk cafes greet visitors to the hidden valley. This is one of the few places I've been in Honduras that truly felt old. Most towns and "cities" feel like works in progress The cost of escaping Honduras Capital, bus both ways, lunch, dinner and a corner room looking down the Valley, came to just over $20.00.

As a side note to this trip, when ever you get into public transportation in Central America, several street vendors will wander through hocking chips, sodas and souvenirs. On the Valley de Angeles bus a "nurse" came on and gave a dissertation on the benefits of penicillin as she passed out packets to the passengers. For a meager 10 Lempira (50¢) she claimed it would cure just about anything!

The forth annual West End fishing tournament took place the last weekend in September, to coincide with Carnival. The tournament brings in fishermen from all over the island, and several from the mainland. Custom fishing boats show up seemingly out of nowhere. The record fish this year was a 242 pound Blue Marlin which will make next years contest a lot more marketable. The record story this year however was the 150 pound frozen grouper someone tried to get past the judges. My buddy Delsie Rosales won the women's division. No one dares to point out that she was the only entrant.

So far we have avoided any threat of sever weather this year, but that doesn't stop boats from running aground. "Teddy bear" a forty foot steel trawler dragged her 15lb anchor up into the eel grass during a northern cold front. The two foot waves rocked her gently back and forth in a foot of water until the hull opened up. The owner, who thought a 15lb dingy anchor would hold her, now has the boat on wooden blocks on the eel grass. Clearly unaware that severe weather will eventually come! This week there is also a fifty some odd foot yacht on the iron shore at Sea Grapes Plantation. Since the weather has been good we have to assume that alcohol was a contributing factor. In any event, the salvage diving in that area is getting better since at least one boat a year is lost there, and the last two were pretty nice boats.

Our chicken population continues to grow. Chickens left to their own devises do some very peculiar things. In the evenings they manage, amidst much squawking and commotion, to launch themselves up into trees to roost for the night. During the day they forage under leaves and move gravel by the ton looking for tasty bugs. Our morning feeding can attract upwards of twenty birds including the neighbor's guinea foul and an odd duck. Mother hens sit for almost two months but will leave the eggs daily to feed. Once they hatch, a chicks life is one huge obstacle course as they zip around trying to keep up with mom. One hen would routinely fly up into a tree every night leaving her squealing panicked chicks on the ground. After about 20 minutes she would drop back down and look for shelter under a hibiscus bush. As long as the roosters are under control, our guests seem to truly enjoy the entertainment. Yet another aspect of life on a developing tropical island.

December 2004

Roatan Update #33

Horn blowing time.

"Honduran National Chamber of Tourism, Chapter of the Bay Islands presents this appreciation award to Mike Dewar, active executive member for his unconditional dedication and support to this chamber during 2003 - 2004"

Came with a plaque, ceremony and some free food. Keeping a behind the scenes low profile may have just become a little more difficult.

A new set of laws to protect the islands environment has been passed down by Presidential Edict this month. The new zoning was met with considerable opposition by developers, and was watered down noticeably from the first draft. Initially no residential construction was to be allowed within 365 feet of the water. Realtors and developers that had planned out or sold lots on the beach 100 feet deep went into a state of panic. Meetings were called groups were organized and public officials were kept busy well past their normal hours. In the end, we have a set of rules much like the old rules. Everyone still does whatever they want just like before. Democracy still works here!

The rains started late this year, which made most of us happy. Unfortunately the Municipality planted a couple hundred palms and assorted foliage around the perimeter of the Dump and the sewage treatment plant in early September, in anticipation of rain. When they didn't come, massive efforts had to be organized to water them twice a day. Good weather has a price. Tourist however are enjoying the summer like conditions. This was our best November numbers yet which interfered completely with plans for painting and renovating.

As the cruise ship season gets into full swing, it was brought to the attention of the tourism board that the public schools would be closing down for winter break. Having an extra thousand kids on the street seemed a bit worrisome but Tito Dixen, the Police Chief, was able to organize a small foot ball league to keep some of them busy. The public school system in Honduras takes a two month break in December and January every year, in lieu of the summer break that we are all used to.

I opened up a new toaster last week that I purchased in Tampa, to find a six page instruction booklet inside. This is only remarkable in light of the new scooter I purchased last month that came with no paperwork at all. If you haven't caught on to this trend, the latest generation of Chinese scooters are cheap, comfortable to ride and get 70 some odd miles per gallon. Mine is a 125CC 4 stroke, so it runs clean and it has a variable rate automatic transmission with an electric starter. There was an optional key fob remote starter and alarm, but I thought that would be overkill. Scooters have always been a popular way for tourists to get around but with all the cruise ship traffic many of us are riding them because they can be parked.

As our school project wraps up in Milton Bight the Lions club is looking for new projects to take on. One ambitious proposal is a Pediatric Fellowship, where we would fund the wages of a pediatrician in training at the Roatan Hospital. First however, we need to do some fund raising. When the school supplies were sent to us from Rapperswil Switzerland the easiest routing was via Miami. Once on US soil however things started to go bad. Customs selected our container to be unpacked, and while the supplies were in the warehouse being searched, the container was stolen. As calls were being made and the container searched for, a warehousing bill in excess of $9,000 USD piled up. We refused to pay - Customs threatened to send the supplies to auction. A well crafted letter was sent to the editor of the "Miami Sun Sentinel" by yours truly, highlighting the injustice of big bad Customs picking on a bunch of underprivileged school kids and suddenly the supplies are released for a nominal handling fee. We still had to rent a shipping container, but customs has located ours in China, and has promised to re-patriot it. Nothing worthwhile in life is easy.

Several horribly rainy cold days and sleepless nights led up to a children's Christmas party that I was conned into organizing. The day of the event though was warn and sunny. We bussed 60ish children from the two orphanages, plus a hundred street kids into Palmetto Bay Resort and set them lose on the beach. The Florida-Carribean Cruise Ship Association supplied a truck load of presents and a couple dozen elves to help out. We kept the kids distracted throughout the day with games and sandcastle building, then fed them hot dogs and cup cakes before Santa arrived. Everything went extremely well, the kids had a blast, and it was a fun day out for all of us. (maybe not the bus drivers!)

In my spare time, we have finally undertaken some well deserved renovations in our apartment. We rebuilt the bedroom by moving a closet to a better location. Built all new office furniture, and completely gutted and remodeled the kitchen. We had gotten pretty used to the way things were, and with the constant changes to the apartments, just never got around to doing anything up here. So paradise for us has become a little cozier.

It is the feel of Roatan that our customers like best, it just feels comfortable. Like a small town, relaxed and friendly. People often tell me how glad they are to have been here before it gets too busy. Roughly 1.3 million people will go away with that feeling this year

May 2005

Roatan Update #34

This is the first news letter of this year, because there simply hasn't been time to write. Add to that a few computer crashes, problems with our server and phone lines. Island life, not just beaches and sunshine! I also spent all of January and February finishing construction on the school in Milton Bight. Then went on to build a reception building here at the Lodge. If this sounds busy, remember that the Lodge has been full since mid October and Friends and Family have been stopping by to visit. Busy, Busy, Busy, but still having fun.

The Lions Club School project drifted off kilter just before Christmas. The contractor went bad on us, bills were adding up and work wasn't getting done. I took over the project at that point, fired the contractor when he wouldn't meet with me, then set up a recovery plan to get the necessary work done with the available funds. I ended up working seven weeks to run the electrics, install the plumbing and then painted inside and out with the help of some local boys. With desks and equipment donated from Rapperswill Switzerland, the school was fully operational at the Inauguration on February 18th. The school is serving one hundred and twelve children now, and is considered one of the finest schools in the Bay Islands. Just for the record, these one hundred and twelve children had previously shared a fifteen by thirty school house.

Meanwhile back at the Lodge, the Tsunami in the Far East changed backpacker traffic patterns again, so that what was expected to be a busy season turned into an unbelievable amount of traffic on Roatan. So much that a long overdue decision was made to increase staff. With considerable help from my visiting Dad, the reception building went up quickly. As much as we enjoy meeting new people and talking about the island, it was taking its toll on us. Too many interrupted meals, far too many times answering the same questions every day. "My name is Mike, I moved here from Canada 5 ½ years ago because I don't like snow or taxes. I apologize for speaking with my mouth full" I was seriously considering having a tee shirt made. Emily now answers all the questions, shows rooms and helps out with housekeeping and we can focus on the guests and getting chores done. Why didn't we think of this earlier.

Two new "Art Galleries" have opened in West End, Waves of Art and one in the old Casa Marta location, which is the old Tony's Restaurants location. Art and culture may be slowly making there way onto the island. Restaurants come and go so quickly that many open up, and are gone before we get to check them out. Our favorites now are Dian's Garden of Eat'n and the Lighthouse Restaurant which has undergone huge changes in the past year. Condo's are the next wave of change in the tourist market. It seems that every day we meet someone that is building a new set of high end Condominiums, Houses are even starting to sprout up in several of the new housing developments.

Dive shops are even starting to raise their prices a bit and will hopefully soon be improving their services. It has always bothered me that we have some of the best diving in the world and give it away well below cost. Just before Christmas one dive operator had to shut down and do a roofing job to cover the cost of repairs on his boat! I have actually found time for some diving recently when a buddy from Canada came down to visit. Turtles and spotted eagle rays are still abundant as are all my favorite little critters. Somehow we missed out on the pod of Orcas that passed through this year, but there have been more people diving and snorkeling with dolphins than ever.

For those of you that ask, Cindy is still doing fine. She is getting a little calmer with age, (almost 3) but still enjoys runs on the beach and regrettably, rolling in the sand.

August 2005

Roatan Update #35

Update
After Easter, traditionally, tourism drops off. Things are supposed to calm down so maintenance and cleaning can get done. Tourists however seem to have different opinion. It's been busy on our little island and there's no sign of anything slowing down. Despite all that I was able to get away to Tampa for a week in April and Sue took all of May off to spend time in Canada with family. Somehow all the rooms got painted, Plumbing jobs got done and I even managed to tile the entire middle floor.

Shortly after the Easter holidays, the water, or lack of it in West End finally came to a head. The impetus for change came from the old water committee itself, when it got tired of listening to all the businesses complain. They believed that the hotels dive shops and other bad gringo businesses were using too much water. Residences in the Eastern side of West End didn't feel they were getting their share. They also claimed that increasing electrical costs were going to leave them in ruin. The proposed plan was to split the community in two by placing valves on the line in front of the Baptist church. The old committee would handle the East side and the West side was on its own to sort things out. Within a day, the new Wayward Water Committee was providing enough water on our side to keep everyone happy. Two months into it they have thousands of surplus dollars and are now upgrading the system. It didn't take long before people on the edge of the two systems were connecting to our side.

The next big debate is over the West End road surface. A lot of people like the feel of our sand boulevard, and it does give the village a quaint easy feel. The problem as I see it is that the sand washes out to the ocean every time it rains hard, leaving behind craterous mud holes. Long term this means dredging sand to replace it and having to run the grader through town every few weeks. Since dredging is now banned as an environmentally damaging practice something will have to give. The other huge headache will be getting around once the construction begins. We are going to need a plan. The interesting thing is this debate seems to have heated up due to an alleged municipal plan to pave the road without any local consultation. I use the word alleged because the Municipality doesn't have a clue about any paving plans. I guess we are all just arguing for something to do.

Parasailing has arrived in West End. Three new operators have started up with all new equipment this summer. Because of the proximity of the fringing reef, and the scuba divers popping up everywhere, the parasail boats pick you up at the dock and take you off shore a few miles. It was inevitable that water sports other than diving would arrive here. Not that it hasn't been tried before, but these guys show signs of being in for the longer term. An odd thing on Roatan is the propensity of something that didn't exist before to suddenly spring up by the dozen, ensuring that no-one makes enough money to survive. Always interesting to watch island economics.

Some time in June next season, the folks that run the Galaxy ferrying passengers between La Ceiba on the mainland the island of Roatan, plan to launch a new high speed service. The new ship will be a twin hull, to get it up out of waves. A huge benefit to those of us that suffer from motion sickness. The Galaxy crosses the forty mile stretch now in a smidgen under two hours at a cost of about $15.00 USD per person, but the deep V hull, rocking through a cross wind makes for a fairly unpleasant ride. It is expected the new hull will get up over the troughs and cut the ride time in half. If they can keep the costs down, I expect they will be able to improve the schedule, and get in more crossings as well. The cost of a local flight to the mainland is around $32.00 USD. and takes 18 minutes.

There are aspects of island life that you get used to. Things you see every day that just seem normal after a while. A family of four riding a bicycle, Dad on the seat, Mom on the cross bar with the baby and another kid on the handle bars. Necessity provides options. It's perfectly normal to spend an hour or more in line at the bank and there is no respect for personal space while you wait. It is perfectly normal for a family to have ten or more children, and they look at you very sadly if you have less. I have seen truck beds held on with rope, and vehicles so badly bent and misaligned that they appear to be crabbing towards you sideways. You get used to hearing the phrase "it wasn't my fault" when someone is explaining how they drove off the road at two in the morning. I don't expect much to happen on time so I can be surprised when it does. Parasols are common, as are just about anything to keep the sun off your head, We watched a elderly woman walk by holding her chest x-ray over her head as a sun shield the other day.

Our neighbor Kyle, with the empty lot decided to put up a new fence. Since he was cutting trees and digging anyway, I asked him to have his guys take out the old Cashew tree that was leaning on our house. Then I showed him where the bee hive was.

They started at 8:00 on Sunday morning. One guy climbed up into the branches and cut limbs one at a time with a machete. Another guy carried everything over to the brush pile. When the first big section was ready to come down, they tied onto a truck while they worked away at the bottom with an axe. It came down perfectly and got dragged out of the way. At this point the bees didn't seem to care what we were doing. When the trunk with the bees came down it looked just like a Bugs Bunny cartoon. Everyone just stood and stared as the bees swarmed out by the thousands. Even Cindy was snapping and running for cover. I ran upstairs and only got one sting. People seemed quite impressed by the whole adventure and kept coming up the hill to look, until they get stung and ran off. Sue even managed to get stung in the hand walking out of the pequena.

One of the Spanish guys actually took the axe and started splitting the stump open while all this was going on and managed to rescue several gallons of honey. By morning most of the bees had gone leaving a few stragglers behind to harass people. The workers came back at 7:00 and started trenching for the new wall and a crew has started hauling off the brush pile. The rooms are a lot brighter with the tree gone and I think there is more air going through.

December 2005

Roatan Update #36

Hi everyone,

Happy holidays

After some careful consideration, we decided to expand the Lodge by two more rooms. There has been some interest in air-conditioned rooms lately and for the last two years we have been turning away customers because we were full all the time. When the new fence went in and the Cashew tree came out, an opportunity presented itself to put a 30 by 15 base along the far right side of our property. We toyed with six, then four and settled on a split level, one story, two room unit. Construction started at the end of September and finished the first week of December. The rooms are simple, spacious hotel rooms with private baths, air-conditioning, cable and tiled floors.

We have a new restaurant in town called Tres Fratelli, offering Italian cuisine on the strip. West End Rick's has closed, he moved to Copan, and the coffee shop downstairs has become a pizza and ice cream shop. The Moonlight Gallery is gone, I thought a combination of gift shop and karaoke bar was a little odd anyway. A new Indian restaurant called Ooloonthroo opened its doors to rave reviews, but is a bit pricey. There is a new sandwich shop beside the Twisted Toucan that is doing well and deconstruction is in full swing at the old Sun Set Inn location where a new batch of luxury condos will be built.

Some weather arrived by the names of Wilma and Beta. Beta never amounted to anything more than rain when it got pushed south by a cold front. Wilma however pushed a hill of tidal water in front of it that messed up the street for a few days. The winds knocked down transmission towers so Cable and internet were gone for a few days. The docks that normally get knocked down in a storm got knocked down hard. Sueno Del Mar lost the back half of the building, and restaurant dock. Ray was getting ready to move the operation down to his new property anyway at the end of the year, so a premature move was in order. We hardly noticed the storm from the lodge, and were a bit surprised when we saw what had happened. I actually spent the day putting roof rafters on the new building.

Mayor Jerry Hynds came in with twenty or more guys the day after the storm and cleaned up the beach, then bulldozed the road, dropped monstrous rocks in the washouts and leveled everything with 50 or more trucks of sand. As Mayor, he did his job well being on the ground and keeping everything organized. As a candidate for Congressman, he scored some major points. By Sunday afternoon the street looked better than ever. It's also wider!

As to the November elections. Jerry got in as Congressman, Shawn Hyde is our new mayor. When Shawn and Jerry tried to fly 300 party supporters in from the mainland on election day, the Julio and Dale blue party team blocked the road with bulldozers. Julio drove the length of the island handing money out his car window while Mayor Jerry gave away plywood and zinc roofing to his supporters for "storm relief". Wells got dug, clinics were opened and slanderous accusations were thrown about. All in all, a good election.

Business got back to normal pretty quickly after the storms. Wilma actually missed the island by 300 some odd miles. The highest warning we had was "tropical storm" with a 10% chance of hurricane strike. On the street however, everyone that was here for Hurricane Mitch, believes this was worse, due to the 6 to 8 foot storm surge coupled with the duration. Are three days of 70 mile an hour winds worse than one day of 170 mile an hour winds?

We re-staffed this fall when Emily decided to leave the island. Bornie Miller has taken over reception and Isabel Ebanks is taking care of housekeeping. Isabel's nephew Norbert, stops by after school to pick up leaves and do odd jobs. Bornie and Isabel are best friends and have worked out tremendously well for us, though there have been moments. Isabel found a little snake in the lime tree beside the reception hut one morning. Since she is terrified of them she stood in terror and stared at it squeaking. Everyday for a few weeks the girls would search the tree, find the snake and scream. Bornie's explanation was that as long as they knew where it was they were safe. If they couldn't find it, it could be anywhere!

The newest addition to the family has been dubbed Dobby after the Harry Potter house elf. Dobby turned up on a bathroom window late one evening in October. She is a tabby cat about three weeks old when she arrived. She is 4 pounds of absolute terror. When she isn't hanging off the dog, she can often be found lunging into a gaggle of chickens or in the bananas leaping from tree top to tree top in pursuit of geckos.

People make fun of the national currency here primarily due to its value of roughly 19 limps to 1 US dollar but also due to its shabby condition. More recently we have been getting small influxes of newer bills. Though the new bills are more colorful and crisp when they arrive, before long the magnetic strip falls out and they quickly start to deteriorate. Well here is the secret, the bills are produced by the Bank of Canada! Really, its actually written very very small on the back. So who do we make fun of now?

"To survive island stress", Sue and I take turns sneaking off to La Ceiba on the mainland. As one of the principle ports for United Fruits, it hosts golf courses, hospitals, parks and a lot of nice old homes. La Ceiba has developed a bunch in the past few years owing to the influx of island tourist dollars. A highlight of the island visitor is the shopping mall, complete with food court and cinema. I like to wander a bit further afield and I'm always delighted to see horse drawn carts bringing fresh produce into town or finding a back alley where lifestyles haven't changed in a century. Happy content people embracing a life style devoid of the trappings so many of us couldn't live without.

March 2006

Roatan Update #37

Welcome back

Despite the big storms early on in the season the rains weren't that bad last fall but the rainy season, managed to persist well into February. This means that diving was at times cold and damp but there were only a few days when the seas were too rough to go out. Beach days were few and far between. With every day of drizzle now there is the possibility that it will be the last we get until fall. Life at the lodge remains busy, the new rooms are selling well, our new girls are working out fabulously and even the new cat is worming her existence into the collective family. I'm not sure if the dog is more bothered by being attacked at random intervals or having the kitten crawl on top of her for a nap. The whole situation reflects a lack of respect for the pecking order.

Excuse me for doing a bit of name dropping here. Actor Michael Douglas visited Roatan early this year, allegedly shopping for investment property and getting in some diving. Richard Geere is here on Roatan this week with his family. Sue arranged a dolphin encounter for some of our guests and Richard managed to tag along. Then he showed up at Lighthouse restaurant for dinner, where Isabel managed to serve him a majito and get an autograph. This is only noteworthy because Isabel works for us, not the Lighthouse restaurant. Her nephew Patrick was sent to tell the rest of the family he was there, but being only ten and not very celebrity savvy, Patrick ran into the house out of breath and screamed out that Michael Jackson was eating in the restaurant.

I receive a lot of e-mails these days complementing us for choosing "a simpler life style" and thought it best to try and dissuade some of the myth of island living. It's not all sitting on the beach drinking margaritas. Here are some thoughts. As a business owner, I have the unlimited freedom to do whatever I want whenever I want but rarely get a day off, and only get sick days when hospitalization is required. There is no dress code or commute, but our customers know where we are all the time and don't hesitate to wake us up at all hours of the night. Many new comers are attracted by the lack of rules and are as quickly chased off when they discover other people don't follow the rules either. Taxes are low but government services non-existent. On Roatan you fight for every inch. It is a hostile business environment but if you're willing to do some hard work the rewards are here. If your plan is to sit on the beach partying all day you probable won't last long.

A weeks vacation on the mainland led to some interesting surprises. I shipped my scooter over ahead of time and picked it up at the dock when I arrived. Day one was the usual running around to re-stock supplies for the lodge. Day two I scootered east 20K from La Ceiba to Sambo Creek. After a tour of the Village and a look at some tourist hotels, I was directed to the Sambo Creek Canopy tour. I don't know where this concept came from but they are popping up everywhere. Three on Roatan alone. This one however starts at the base of a four thousand foot ridge line called the Los Naguas Mountains. After gearing up, we were introduced to our horses and start the climb. Mid way up the ocean views started appearing through the trees. At the top we were given instructions on breaking and strapped in to climbing harnesses. You then hook up to a pulley on a half inch cable and zip from station to station amongst the tree tops. There are six primary zip lines getting progressively longer and steeper. Then we get a break to check out the head of the thermal springs, a smallish two foot hole spewing out 200 degree water. Six more lines, the last being one kilometer long, and its time for another break, this time at the hot spring basins. Ten pools in a steep valley the lowest being 100ish degrees, the upper being around 140 degrees. Each is accessible by wooden steps, and spills into the one below it, some with amazing falls of water you can swim up under for a shower. A couple hours of testing the basins later we dress, gear up and zip down four more lines to the base.

The next day I spent in Pico Bonito park on the Rio Zocate trail. This trail starts out at the back of the El Pino, pineapple farm. I was able to park the scooter with a family for the day and hire a guide for the hike up the river, checking out pools and water falls along the steep slopes. On day three I ride the Rio Cangrejal trail which is more of a dirt road that follows a high mountain pass between La Ceiba and Los Yargo. This road passes the white water rafting outfits and has hiking trails off in each direction that seem to be accessed exclusively via private tour operators. Great ride though, with a few small villages along the way and a lot of spectacular views.

Part of this trip was exploration of the developing tourism industry surrounding La Ceiba that will soon be accessible via the high speed ferry service from Roatan. With only one hour travel time, day trips will soon be a piece of cake opening up all kinds of options for our guests. I found the people I encountered to be nice and very helpful. English is not widely spoken.

July 2006

Roatan Update #38

Hola,

Great waves of confusion have settled over the lodge lately. It is a local custom, being that door bells are rare and dogs unpredictable, that to get someone's attention you stand outside their property and call Hola. There are exceptions of course. We occasionally find people where they are not supposed to be, that claim to be looking for work when surprised. Then there was Pastour, who would arrive for work and hide in the garden so he wouldn't disturb us, but those are other stories.

The aforementioned confusion arrived in the guise of a rather large scarlet macaw named Rickey. Rickey sits in the Kapok tree beside our deck calling Hola to anything that moves. The result is that everyone that passes now stops at the entrance and calls Hola in hopes of seeing the big red bird. Parrots were hunted to extinction here on Roatan reputedly for their feathers; I suspect it had more to do with the above. There are several stories about where Rickey came from but the most plausible is that he escaped from Gumbalindo park near West Bay. Rickey's vocabulary is so far limited to Holla, Hello, Big Red Bird, Bad Bird, Rickey and Quack Quack. (I taught him the last bit!) Sue feeds him apples and nuts in the morning but Cashews and Hog Plums are in season so there is plenty of food to go around. If he can find a friend, it would be great to reintroduce parrots here. Time will tell.

Yes, we did survive Semana Santa again this year. This "week of the saints" is far more celebrated in Latin America than Christmas. To keep pace, the Galaxy switched up it's schedule to three runs a day and Air Atlantic was flying Fokker 50's in lieu of the 20 passenger planes that they normally use on this route. Anything that has a roof becomes accommodation, anything with a fridge becomes a bar. A curious part of the religious experience seems to involve playing on the beach all day, partying till dawn and generally drinking your self into a stupor. The local authorities are getting better at crowd control every year, closing off the road to vehicle traffic and shutting down bars when they get out of control. We make it through the holy week with long afternoon naps. Between the street noise at night and the 5:00am checkouts, the end of Semana Santa is always a welcome relief.

Only a month to go now before the old Galaxy is replaced with a new high-speed ferry service between Roatan and La Ceiba. Construction has now become frantic at the new dock in Brick Bay. The old facility in Coxen Hole had been out grown long ago, with passengers spilling out onto the narrow street blocking traffic whenever the ship was in. The new modern facility will provide ample parking and air-conditioned comfort to passengers waiting to board. The challenge will be the Taxies. With the new landing 5K past the airport it is likely the taxies will want $15 or more for the trip to West End, which is more than the ferry ticket. Hum, we may need to start planning bus routes.

Dian's Garden of Eat'n, closed down last Saturday. She will be in Bali for a few weeks and then re-open both the restaurant and furniture store in her new building in August, on West Bay Road. Denny's restaurant has moved down the beach to the old Moonlight Gallery location, rumor has it we're getting another little strip mall at his old beach front location. Les Boucaneers has new management, still no customers, but Pura Vida has pilfered the chef from the Argentinean Grill and is doing much better with their restaurant. Jackamo has even built a new grill. Eagle Ray's has rebuilt the back deck and has again become the place to watch the sunset. ATM's have been added to the Landscape at the Dolphin Hotel and Coconut Tree Convenience Store. Outside of West End, Alamo Rent-a-Car has opened a big time operation in the old Chinese restaurant location across from Bo-Jangles. A wonderful new bakery has opened in Jackson Plaza up in French Harbor. Another Zip Line operation is up and running on West Bay Road, and Delta Airlines is now flying scheduled flights between Atlanta and Roatan. Still no sign of the Wendy's we were promised, but no loss there.

Then as if all that weren't enough, we have new phone booths in town, and even one here at the Lodge, that accepts credit cards, can make collect calls and can even reach those elusive 1-800 numbers in the US of A

I'm not sure why, but the taxi union has decided to start a protest against the electrical company, for raising their rates. It could just be that with the slow down in Cruise ships during the summer these guys just have nothing to do. Four hundred taxies is certainly enough to block the only road on the island and mess up schedules for a lot of people. Tourists arriving by ferry couldn't get out of Coxen Hole and school kids couldn't get home from school but the blockage raised enough interest to warrant a government auditor to say he would look into it. I remember it wasn't that long ago that taxi drivers voted themselves a 25% fare increase. I don't remember a big protest over charging the poorest members of society an extra 150 limps a month to drive children to school. There is no doubt that the Roatan Electric Company is mismanaged. They claim they have to raise rates to pay off debt caused by delinquent accounts. Maybe they should have started by cutting off the companies that are more than a few months behind. In the end, as prices continue to rise the one thing we all need to support is higher wages for working people.

September 2006

Roatan Update #39

Things, as always, have been busy here at the Lodge. Sue took a few weeks off to go on a cruise and visit family back in Montreal. Then I spent a few weeks in Florida restocking supplies. Somewhere in between these two trips, eating got out of control, and the Lodge has how become a health spa! Sue gets private yoga lessons two mornings a week on the front deck. Bornie, Sue and I are doing weight training, four days a week and the girls all go off for a mid-afternoon walk everyday. Can't figure out why everyone looks so tired? While Sue was away we started having staff lunches on Saturdays. This started out simple with a few boxes of BoJangles chicken but now involves taking turns cooking and hanging out for the afternoon. Having Bornie and Isabel around definitely makes things more fun.

Back in the 80's I went to a lot of purchasing seminars that focused on "Just in Time" inventory management. This was a very sound practice in manufacturing, as it reduced warehousing costs and freed up capitol. Last month I experienced it at the retail level, while shopping for supplies in Florida. Many things I needed from refrigerators to ceiling fans and televisions to cases of garbage bags, were available only in quantities of one. I was sent from store to store buying out stock. Here in Honduras, business often, do not have the capital to stock inventory. When we signed up for a new high-speed internet service we were told it may take about ten days to get the hook up. Ten days later they admitted that the modem is on the Hybor boat from Miami and should be in next week. Seems to me that if the world economy is slowing down, its simply because its getting to be too much work to buy things.

OK, I'm not supposed to write about the bad stuff but! I for one have always complained about the lack of security on the Galaxy, that ferries people between Roatan and the mainland. Islanders are affronted by the notion of having to show ID or have their luggage checked when traveling within their own country so, there is no security check at all. Last week this led to two gentlemen in the cabin admiring the gun they had just bought, and one of them firing it into the other! This was obviously an accident, and could have happened anywhere. I personally don't think it should have happened on a crowded boat, and don't want to be wondering if the person next to me has a loaded gun in his pocket the next time I take the Galaxy. So far the only change I've seen is a new "No Firearms" sign at the ticket booth. Beyond that I'm told there will be proper security checks when the new dock opens up in a week or two.

Our new Mayor Dale Jackson has found funds to do some real road improvements. The stretch past Bo-Jangles that washes out every year, now has a massive culvert running under it. The entire length of paved road has also undergone restoration. Pot holes were actually cut out and refilled with real asphalt, not just refilled with dirt. The West Bay road is also getting a complete resurfacing. Now if we could just get people to drive on their own side of the road, and convince taxi drives to pull off the road when they stop for passengers. In other municipal related news. Due to the exponential growth of tourism, its related unchecked construction and population boom, the "New" dump is close to overflowing. When the World Bank funded this project in 2002 there were strict guidelines put in place to ensure the protection of the surrounding environment. One rule was no burning! Recently, in order to alleviate the pressures put on the site, workers have started dragging garbage out through the dump gate and burning it across the street, obeying the letter of the contract while completely missing the point.

The official story has something to do with the high cost of the digital equipment needed to create the new plastic residency cards. The truth probably lies closer to complaints of rampant corruption. Whatever the case, foreigners can no longer renew visas or residencies here on the island. You are now required to go to the La Ceiba Immigration office with all your original documents, fill out the renewal form and have digital photos taken and hand prints done. We have been through the process here many times so we know that overwhelming bureaucrats with paperwork is the only way to go. Once you fill in the application and get digitized, you are handed a bill for twenty US dollars that has to be paid across the street at Banco Atlantida and returned. You are then given a sixty day document with your picture glued onto it, until your permanent card is ready in two to four months? So the minimum amount of times you need to travel to the mainland is two, once to apply, and once to pick up the card. If there are delays, you will need to return every 60 days to get the temporary permit stamped. Non-corrupt efficiency comes with a steep price.

Looks like the Boulangerie will need to find a new location. Seems Karl had a disagreement with the buildings owner about whether or not he needed to actually pay rent? Dian's Garden of Eat'n has re-opened in her new West Bay Road location. I don't think she will get much West End tourist business, but she will do well with her regular followers and the new building will also house and showcase her Bali import business. A new mini-storage facility will be opening imminently in Sandy Bay, a business that is long overdue for Roatan's seasonal guests.

Roatan update # 40

November 2006

I have always supported the notion the English language was an evolving art form, and have on occasion claimed to be on the cutting edge of that evolution. I share with you now some phrases I have picked up here on the island, to help those of you with educational deficiencies.

Shift. “We gots to shift that rock ” Shift replaces the words move, carry and lift.

Changin Color. “I see you is changin color of you house” Changin color refers to anything done with paint irrespective of color

Gorilla Butt. “You got a Gorilla Butt” Replaces the word lazy, Implies someone sits around so much they have worn the hair off their butt, like the monkeys on the discovery channel.

Ponging “Man they been Ponging all day can’t they be quiet?” Ponging is something you do to nails, but can refer to construction noise in general. Please scratch out the word hammering in your copy of Webster’s.

Spin “I see you is getting ready to spin some cement” Direct replacement for the word mix, again please make the necessary changes to your dictionary.

Borrow. “Can you borrow me that shovel” Replaces the word steal, and provides a form of assurance that you will never see the item being “borrowed” again nor the borrower, for quite some time. On occasion, a very worthwhile sacrifice.


In other unrelated news, we had our first annual staff dinner out at Casa Romeo’s this week. Nothing too fancy but we didn’t check the calendar close enough and arrived in French Harbor at the start of Carnival. We tried to drive down the main street but were turned back at the Mercado because the marching band was getting set up. We drove around to the other entrance only to be turned back because the marching band would soon be heading that way. Back up at the intersection, I let the girls out and found a grassy knoll to park on beside some other trucks, and then we followed the marching band down the hill to the restaurant. Many hours later we emerged to find the street deserted, half way up the hill we started running into sidewalk Bar-B-Qs and milling people. At the intersection, much to my surprise was the bandstand, with the trucks being the leaning posts. Fortunately, mine had no immovable obstructions in front, so after a bit of elbowing and ‘Con Permisso’s” I opened the door pushed in the clutch and ever so gently started to roll down the hill. Once off the actual dance floor, I turned on the lights and started the engine. Before long I was out of the crowd at the bottom of the hill and starting back up the other road past Romeo’s, the Bar-B-Qs and back up to where I had started, now having to find a place to park and look for the girls, who had gotten themselves lost on the dance floor. All in all, it was an interesting evening and a most memorable parking job.

Speaking of things not going as planned. Our guy Denver is normally very reliable when it comes to getting guests to the airport for 5:00 am for ridiculously early flights. But on November 4th when I heard the footsteps and knock on the door, I knew the day wasn’t going to start out well. I drove the girls to the airport where we found the gates closed and a bunch of heavily armed police. They politely let the girls through without any explanation but I wasn’t allowed to drive them to the door despite their heavy baggage and a gentle drizzle. As it turns out, we had arrived just a little bit after one on the islands biggest drug busts. 2,000 kilos, $360 Million US dollars worth of cocaine, had been seized as it was transferred from a plane into a waiting van. 12 people were arrested including airport tower and ground crews as well as the airport director. Effectively the airport was closed until new staff could be flown in. The girls made their way back to the Lodge by mid-morning and stayed on for five more days, finally leaving with a great travel story. The drugs were burnt at the Mud Hole Dump.

On the home front, Eric McKenzie won this years fishing tournament with a prized 260 pound Blue Marlin. The new mall has opened on the hill behind Bo-Jangles. The nicest thing I can say about it is the view from the parking lot is spectacular. Beyond that, you kind of get the feel that the designer had never actually been to a shopping mall. Time will tell if it catches on. Mayor Dale Jackson is pressing ahead with road repairs as the main road through to Coxen Hole from here gets a fresh coat of asphalt. New road signs and center lines now have the Flowers bay road looking pretty good. Aaron Etches has opened a paint ball court in Gibson Bight. This is a particular hit with the young boys in the neighborhood who are all trying to trade their lunch money and little sisters for paint ball equipment. Paint ball bruises are the new badge of honor.

Douglas Adams wrote: ”any man who aspires to political office should automatically be disqualified from running”. Arlie Thompson is one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. Maybe that’s why he was appointed second to the elected Governor. When the Governor stepped down three months into her term, Arlie graciously assumed his responsibility and took over as Governor, a position that has been largely ceremonial in the past. But now, as the Bay Islands gets ready to sign off on a Free Port Treaty that will effectively separate us legislatively from mainland Honduras, Arlie is about to become the head of state to Roatan, Guanaja and Utila, reporting directly to the President. It is a job he didn’t want, didn’t run for and frankly doesn’t have time for. I can’t think of a better person to be in charge.

Update 41

You know you need a break when your excited that you only had to spend an hour and a half in the bank. Maybe you’ve been in the tropics too long when you say Holla to a man waiting for a bus, and don’t register until later on that he had string beans hanging out of all his pants pockets.


In other unrelated news, we had our first annual staff dinner out at Casa Romeo’s this week. Nothing too fancy but we didn’t check the calendar close enough and arrived in French Harbor at the start of Carnival. We tried to drive down the main street but were turned back at the Mercado because the marching band was getting set up. We drove around to the other entrance only to be turned back because the marching band would soon be heading that way. Back up at the intersection, I let the girls out and found a grassy knoll to park on beside some other trucks, and then we followed the marching band down the hill to the restaurant. Many hours later we emerged to find the street deserted, half way up the hill we started running into sidewalk Bar-B-Qs and milling people. At the intersection, much to my surprise was the bandstand, with the trucks being the leaning posts. Fortunately, mine had no immovable obstructions in front, so after a bit of elbowing and ‘Con Permisso’s” I opened the door pushed in the clutch and ever so gently started to roll down the hill. Once off the actual dance floor, I turned on the lights and started the engine. Before long I was out of the crowd at the bottom of the hill and starting back up the other road past Romeo’s, the Bar-B-Qs and back up to where I had started, now having to find a place to park and look for the girls, who had gotten themselves lost on the dance floor. All in all, it was an interesting evening and a most memorable parking job.

Speaking of things not going as planned. Our guy Denver is normally very reliable when it comes to getting guests to the airport for 5:00 am for ridiculously early flights. But on November 4th when I heard the footsteps and knock on the door, I knew the day wasn’t going to start out well. I drove the girls to the airport where we found the gates closed and a bunch of heavily armed police. They politely let the girls through without any explanation but I wasn’t allowed to drive them to the door despite their heavy baggage and a gentle drizzle. As it turns out, we had arrived just a little bit after one on the islands biggest drug busts. 2,000 kilos, $360 Million US dollars worth of cocaine, had been seized as it was transferred from a plane into a waiting van. 12 people were arrested including airport tower and ground crews as well as the airport director. Effectively the airport was closed until new staff could be flown in. The girls made their way back to the Lodge by mid-morning and stayed on for five more days, finally leaving with a great travel story. The drugs were burnt at the Mud Hole Dump.

On the home front, Eric McKenzie won this years fishing tournament with a prized 260 pound Blue Marlin. The new mall has opened on the hill behind Bo-Jangles. The nicest thing I can say about it is the view from the parking lot is spectacular. Beyond that, you kind of get the feel that the designer had never actually been to a shopping mall. Time will tell if it catches on. Mayor Dale Jackson is pressing ahead with road repairs as the main road through to Coxen Hole from here gets a fresh coat of asphalt. New road signs and center lines now have the Flowers bay road looking pretty good. Aaron Etches has opened a paint ball court in Gibson Bight. This is a particular hit with the young boys in the neighborhood who are all trying to trade their lunch money and little sisters for paint ball equipment. Paint ball bruises are the new badge of honor.

Douglas Adams wrote: ”any man who aspires to political office should automatically be disqualified from running”. Arlie Thompson is one of the nicest guys you could ever meet. Maybe that’s why he was appointed second to the elected Governor. When the Governor stepped down three months into her term, Arlie graciously assumed his responsibility and took over as Governor, a position that has been largely ceremonial in the past. But now, as the Bay Islands gets ready to sign off on a Free Port Treaty that will effectively separate us legislatively from mainland Honduras, Arlie is about to become the head of state to Roatan, Guanaja and Utila, reporting directly to the President. It is a job he didn’t want, didn’t run for and frankly doesn’t have time for. I can’t think of a better person to be in charge.

Update 42

Update for 2007

Hum, been a year since my last scribbling. A lot has happened in the past year. Some of it good, a lot weird, and some just foolish. 2007 may be remembered as the year that Roatan out grew its infrastructure. The first warning signs came as our power company (RECO) started running out of fuel. It didn’t take too much investigation to discover that the managers had been taking profits out, before paying bills. The diesel supplier put them on a cash basis and soon after that we were without lights for a couple of days. With some government intervention, and the installation of a new management team, it was quickly discovered that there was no inventory of spare parts left, no maintenance had been done and none of the generators produced better than half the output they should. So began the rationing. West End went without electricity for six to ten hours a day for most of the high season.

A lot of adapting went on. Freezers were bare, cold drinks scarce. At the lodge we were able to quickly install a 500 Amp, 12 Volt back up system for lights and water. With some tweaking this soon become our security lighting as well. I made one trip to the mainland in January to look for generators, but was told I couldn’t even get on a waiting list until May. All in all, our guests have come and gone without much hardship. A few hours of missed television, delays at the ATM machines and limited internet availability. Most assured me they had a wonderful time despite the inconvenience.

RECO is currently up for sale at reportedly $800,000 USD give or take a little. The buy in looks interesting but most sources suggest the equipment upgrade could run into 20 million dollars or more. Four two megawatt generators have been leased and today we have lights with intermittent outages. I understand there are some serious bidders in play, some with green solutions. We are not out of trouble yet, but there is hope of light on the horizon.

Aside from all the foolishness of trying to get laundry done, and planning projects around limited power tool usage, I did manage to get in a fund raiser for the Roatan Hospital. With the help of a few dozen school kids, the Lions Club collected over $4000.00 USD that went into creating a maternity waiting area. Just over 1000 babies were born there last year and 32,000 patients were served. I am still fighting to get them 24 hour running water! I also got to spend the past three months re-constructing Isabel Ebanks house. A fire in late August burned down the Lighthouse Restaurant and all the houses behind it, including Is’s. Is now has a new concrete house that she was able to move into on Christmas Eve.

Road work continues. You can tell where the municipal borders are by looking at the sophistication of work being done. Roatan Municipality, the end that gets tourist dollars, is using crews with picks to clear out the pot holes, then they pour in hot tar and gravel. These patches last longer than their previous attempts at dumping cement into the holes! The east end of the island, Santos Guardiola has a crew filling holes with dirt, and a guy in a truck driving back and forth to pack it down. The truck guy is so focused on his work that he is apparently oblivious to the traffic weaving around him. Don’t know which of these teams will get the contract to resurface the airport? The lowest bidder usually wins!

And then we had the hurricane that wasn’t. Felix had built quickly to a category 5 hurricane after passing Aruba and was on a bee line toward Roatan. Fortunately for us it tracked a few degrees south and slammed into a lightly populated northern corner of Nicaragua. The press however was having a slow week, and a day before it made landfall there were already stories circulating about the damage it had done? Television coverage was showing Coxen Hole under water. One internet news release stated we were struggling to evacuate after being hit by an 18 foot wave! Sine 1948 when hurricane tracking began, three storms have actually hit the island. Pessimists insist we are over due! The rest of us are enjoying the sunshine.

One of the countries largest internet providers (TTI) was assaulted in early January. Rumor has it that they were stealing satellite time from AT&T, who complained to the US government, who in turn complained to the Honduran government. We’ll never know I guess. The government took swift and decisive action however by closing their offices arresting the management and destroying all the transmission equipment. A few weeks later the whole thing was thrown out of court, but the damage is done and TTI is gone forever. Their competitor, Globalnet, has quickly picked up the slack with only slightly outrageous connection fees and a higher monthly cost. Just another little reminder of third world politics.

On December 13th a law was signed into effect that will make The Bay Islands a tax and duty free zone. Trouble is however; even the guys that signed it don’t seem to know what it means! So far, new taxes have been added to air and sea departures? I spent days going between the tourism office, the chamber of commerce and various other quasi government entities trying to get answers, only to hear “they” are still working on it. Our accountant says his interpretation is if you’re a tourist you don’t have to pay tax, if you’re a local you do. “But what about mainland Hondurans vacationing here?” “No, no, no. they would have to have a foreign passport to be a tourist!” “OK” I ask “An ex-pat working illegally on Roatan will now qualify for tax exemption, by virtue of owning a foreign passport, but a local family, traveling to the mainland for medical needs will have to pay an additional departure tax?”….. Its going to be a while before “they” work out the details. I, in the meantime, will try to stop asking questions that make my brain sore.

Roatan is growing, and we are suffering our share of growing pains. We are an island completely dependent on fossil fuels and their rising costs. We do what we can and keep costs down here at the Lodge, but in the last eight years our prices have gone up a smidgen. We get lots of travelers through that are surprised that everything on Roatan is higher priced than their guide book suggest, and a lot higher than the cost of traveling on the mainland. One young lady recently was quite offended with us because she had stayed on Roatan many years ago and only paid $5.00 a night. “How could we have the nerve to charge so much!” We suggested she might find a dorm bed in that range at Valerie’s and sent her on her way, while the taxi driver shook his head and rolled his eyes. Later in the afternoon, we spotted her outside Tito’s store chugging a $6.00 can of Arizona Tea. Guess we all have our priorities.

Update 43

Update for June 2008

Let’s start with the re-illumination of the island. Following a year of turmoil and strife with the electric company, then the inept management team the government installed, we now have a new and improved electrical company. It did not of course come with out some usual island silliness. The winning bidder Kelsey Warren lost the bidding process at least twice to a Dominican Republic consortium. Since the powers that be wanted Kelsey, they voided the bidding process and handed the keys over to Kelsey. New general manager Matt Harper has done a great job so far, though he does keep saying he can’t repair three years worth of corruption overnight. Outages quickly dropped from six to one hour a day and as of this writing the lights have been on for a ten days straight! Equipment overhauls are continuing and new generator sets are on the way.

After five years of hard use we have replaced the Mariposa Lodge truck. The Moshida served us well but parts were becoming more and more scarce. After looking at several options in various price ranges we settled on a 900CC three cylinder Chevrolet micro passenger van, CMP. For anyone familiar with our old Moshida, this is actually a bit smaller, but seats 6 and gets roughly 45 miles per gallon. From a comfort point of view, there is A/C and a stereo with MP3 input jack and actual seat belts, all for $10,500. Oddly enough there is no towing capacity listed in the manual?

After the fires on light house point last year it was good to see the newly rebuilt lighthouse restaurant open to the public. Sam rebuilt a little bigger and fancier than it was and even included some very North American kitchen standards. The old Hot Chilies restaurant is now the new Tong’s offering pretty good Vietnamese food on a new waterfront deck. My favorites are still Jurgen and Dolla’s Roaisery Chicken, Sandy Bay Pizza and Mavis and Dixies on light house point. Diane’s Garden of Eat’n should reopen soon after a three month break.

And the really big news is we have a gas station just outside of town in mangrove bight that will soon have a banking kiosk! Our closest bank today is in Coxen Hole. The new mall on the hill above Coxen Hole has been a bit of a flop. They have now reorganized the upper floors into commercial office spaces and it is attracting some business off the main street with the lure of customer parking. The ground floor is now mostly grocery store which is holding its own. In French Harbor construction is under way for a larger mall that will include a movie theater, Carrion department store and a Wendy’s.

There is no doubt that Roatan has been growing. I guess the original inhabitants are still shaking there heads in disgust at the first wave of developers that changed their way of life. The next stage however is getting frightening as bigger dollars start pouring in. Entire hillsides are being removed for fill, so large in fact that mining permits are now being required. Two separate developers are planning over one hundred eighty five combined marina slips in Gibson Bight, hard to imagine there will be any room for boats once all the docks go in. Berths are expected to sell for $85,000 each. Niki Resorts has bulldozed close to one hundred acres of land and removed heritage mangroves to build a 200 unit condo that will have a “Natural pristine setting”. I guess no one should have expected big development to come without some price.

There are rumors that a Pete Gye world class 18 hole champion golf course is being built near Crawfish Rock, That may explain the beautification project going on at the Mud Hole Dump, the main road to Crawfish runs through the center of the dump. It is receiving a lovely red stone wall so you won’t even notice the dump is there, unless you happen to breath! There are also negotiations to resurrect work on the failed Mystic Harbor Golf Club project at Never Stain Bight.

You have hopefully already noticed that you are viewing this info note on a newly reformatted, redesigned and re fluffed up web page. There is still some work to do, more pictures to add and more editing and writing to come. One thing I’m having some fun with is the link to LuLu that has allowed me to put all of this scribbling into a printable or downloadable book. Could even consider selling copies! If I get my mother to buy one and trick someone down here into a copy, would that make me an international author?

Real life author Dr.David K Evans, professor emeritus of anthropology at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina and long time Island resident, is about to release his second book titled “Red at Dawn”, based on the lives of the people of Roatan during the pre Garifuna times. “The Judas Bird” was his first for anyone that missed it.

From the author:

My new Roatán novel, currently written and in its proofing stage, titled "Red at Dawn", is about the Maroons of Roatán in 1722...well before the coming of the Garifuna...when History tells us the islands were totally deserted. Many of these maroons were white and were the descendants of English-speaking escapees from the much earlier Spanish destruction of the English Providence Company that had brought planters and their slaves to the island from Virginia, Maryland, and some say the Carolinas, and established a very successful agricultural Colony on the island in 1631. They even changed the name of the island back in London to Rich Island in honor of Sir Henry Rich of London who bankrolled the Providence Company. Because these people used the island Indians labor for their enterprise- the very same labor that had been supplying food to the capital of Honduras that was then Trujillo (Spelled Truxillo) on the Mainland across the Bay from the island, the Governor of the area sent Spanish troops in 1639 and destroyed the colony, capturing as many of the English colonists at the time as they could. Those who fled into the bush, later to be joined by runaway slaves up as late as 1666 for sure, became Maroons.

These people were fiercely freedom-loving, and even had conflicts as late as the early 1700s with Pirates as well as English and American colonists who came down to the island to illegally cut the Spanish-owned logwood and sell it to the British for their budding textile industry. Many of the maroons of Roatán were white and spoke English, and also. many were escaped Irish and Scottish indentured servants who has been shipped to the Caribbean to labor for seven years on English-owned sugar plantations. Later they were joined on Roatán by runaway Africans as well as some Indians from the mainland. Anyway, the novel tips its hat to these mysterious and elusive people.

To be continued...

Update 44

Update for  December 2008

When Earnest Hemmingway was asked how he came to write so many great books, his answer was simple “I was cursed to have been born in interesting times” Here is some of the interesting stuff I have been avoiding writing about!

With the sale of RECO to Texas oil baron Kelsey Warren, the island electrical service started to improve fairly quickly over the summer. Maintenance was done on the old generators, brand spanking new generators arrived and the electricity started staying on. Soon enough, power outages became a once in a while thing, instead of how many hours will we be out today?

Then world oil prices went up and next thing you know we are in the middle of an island wide protest. Electricity had gone from “give it to us at any price please” to “wait a minute, I can’t pay that much” in a heart beat. A fuel surcharge had been added to everyone’s bill to compensate for the $5.00 a gallon fuel being used to feed all the new hungry generators. The Lodge bill went from $250 a month to over $500 a month. Every ones bill was doubled or tripled.

Thus “The Great Riots of Roatan” began. Starting on a drizzly Monday morning at the gates of RECO a swell of people slowly grew until traffic was stopped. Officials were called in, delegates from the rioters were chosen and meetings of terrific importance were held to explain the world fuel problem and show the costs of producing energy. Encouraged by the attention, the protest spread the full length of the island effectively stopping all traffic, including ferry operations and closing the airport. Over the next few days no less the three cruise ships were turned away. With the potential of lost income literally floating on the horizon, President Mel Zalaya flew over from Tegucigalpa, told the protesters they were absolutely right and would receive corrected bills within a few days. Problem solved.

Sometime during the spring I somehow over stretched some shoulder tendons, which persisted in being more and more painful until I finally was convinced to see an actual doctor. Dr Pastor came highly recommended so a quick trip needed to be planned. I also needed to get to the Canadian consulate in Telgus so might as well start with a flight there.

So, Monday morning at the airport, all flights canceled due to rain. Tuesday morning might be flights later, maybe, so I change the ticket to Wednesday. Wednesday I make it to La Ceiba but a short delay is enough that I arrive at the consulate as the doors are closing. Nice folks that these darned Canadians are, Yesselle stays late to look at my passport renewal application, and decides I need different/bigger pictures. Off to find a photo shop with a cab driver that I suspect is new in town. That done, I walk a few blocks back towards the center of town until it starts to rain. The second hotel I come to has a Chinese restaurant attached, and I get change back from $10 for the room.

The next morning armed with my new photos at the consulate, the application process takes less than fifteen minutes. The cab driver doesn’t really know where Hedman Adlas bus terminal is and drops me off a few blocks away. No biggy, but I walk in as the 9:00 bus is pulling out. Time for some pastilitos and coffee before the 10:00 bus to San Pedro.

San Pedro Sula is a sprawling city built on a hillside, pretty easy to find your way around by judging the slope of the terrain and watching the skyline for familiar buildings. Dr. Pasture lives up to his reputation, and schedules me for cat scan and x-rays the next morning. In his office the next evening I get a Quartazone shot, an exercise list and a prescription for anti-inflammatory. I was out in time to walk over to the mall for the early showing of the new James Bond movie. $2.50 for the movie, $2.00 for the “CiniPack” large drink, medium popcorn and four little chocolate bars!

Rain delays the incoming La Ceiba bus on Saturday morning, that I need to be on to get out of San Pedro. As a consolation, the terminal has a first class lounge with leather couches, big screen TV and free coffee and biscuits. Driving out of town I’m looking down from the Mercedes Coach at cars pushing water with their bumpers, the delay is understandable. A nice quiet night at the Paris Hotel and off to the airport for the flight home to Roatan.

They warn you about walking around on the mainland. Used to be because of crime but recently with the rise in scrap metal prices, thieves are stealing manhole covers and metal sidewalk grates making it necessary to carefully watch where your stepping.

People sure seem to have some odd prejudices’ over which birds they chose to like. I have had folks complain about roosters crowing in one breath, only to tell me how much they liked being awakened by the parrots in the next? The Kapok tree next to our deck has attracted everything from Scarlet Macaws to Ruby Throated Humming Birds and Turkey Vultures to Wood Peckers. Recently the crows have been hanging out in the morning to snatch any leftover cat food from the morning feeding. Doesn’t say much for the integrity of the cats? When a young Toucan joined them the other morning I hardly recognized the difference until it turned in profile and I could see its beak. We now refer to the crows as short nosed toucans. It just sounds more tropical!

There is an interesting conversation that keeps repeating when I talk with young people. I guess some of it stems from years of corruption, but the police are viewed more as criminals, than people that break the law. When a thirteen year old boy backed a beer truck halfway through the Baptist church last winter, everyone steadfastly believed that it wasn’t anyone’s fault, just an accident. When four young boys do a few barrel rolls in a Toyota Prada, proudly claiming they left the road at just over 160KPH, it’s just an accident, nobody’s fault after all and the insurance will cover it!!!

So when our thirteen year old gardener speaks of getting a motor bike, I cringe. There is no effective argument to explain that he doesn’t have a license and won’t be able to get one for three more years. His older cousins all have scooters and no license so why should he need one? Oddly enough he knows that they get stopped by the police all the time because of this, but also understands it’s only because the police are trying to get money from them. The concept of “Not Legal” has no meaning at all, nor does the concept of an honest policeman.

Christmas day while having a coffee break, Sue noticed that the top of our neighbor’s electric poll was smoking. She called RECO who said they would send an emergency crew out right away. When the smoke burst into open flame, the fire department was called but they said electric polls are not their job! So 45 minutes after the first call was placed the top three feet of the poll came down, with the insulators and live wires. A quick and spectacular zap later and the power shorted off in all of West End. 15 minutes after all that excitement, the RECO emergency crew arrived, doused the pool top with buckets of water, then climbed the smoldering poll, soaked it down good and left! An hour or two later, they returned with some spars to attach to the burnt poll top, hauled the wire back up and threw the switch. By island standards not a bad job, especially for a holiday.

I am reminded from time to time that we do still live a world apart from normal. While having breakfast we watch for passing whales, and occasionally spot them. Parrots and dolphins have become common. We walk barefoot on the beach with the dog at sunrise and we buy our produce from the back of passing pickup trucks. We read internet news of crumbling world markets, winter storms and flight delays and we know that life here is uncomplicatedly good in so many ways.

Plan your next visit soon...

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

I am reminded from time to time that we do still live a world apart from normal. While having breakfast we watch for passing whales, and occasionally spot them. Parrots and dolphins have become common. We walk barefoot on the beach with the dog at sunrise and we buy our produce from the back of passing pickup trucks. We read internet news of crumbling world markets, winter storms and flight delays and we know that life here is uncomplicatedly good in so many ways.