The Boat Ride

 

We spent yesterday afternoon aboard one of Roatan Boat Club's boats. Our friend, Colin, started this boat club last year and has been trying his best (he's very persuasive) to get us to join. This is the first boat to be acquired, a 32 ft., with twin outboards and a flying bridge. In this picture (modeling my new Tilly hat), I'm sitting up on the flying bridge. Great view from up there. Kinda scary climbing up the ladder to reach it though. Very nice riding.

This is actually one of the last photos I took, just after sunset when we grabbed a bite to eat at Infinity Bay. We had no idea that we would be out on the boat that long. We left around 2 p.m. and didn't return to the dock until after dark. Good thing the boat had a partial roof or I would have been fried.

That's Don in the middle, crew member David on the left, and Infinity Bay guest, Janet, on the right. I took this looking down from the flying bridge.

Leaving Sandy Bay with our hillside in the distance.

This is our hill. That's Dennis and Merlin's new BIG house at the top of the hill. Our house is midway up the hill, to the right of that 2-story white house. Our pastor and his family live in the house to the right and up the hill from our house. You should be able to click on this photo to enlarge it. This was really exceeding the limits of my telephoto lens. It was pretty cool to be able to see our house from the water like this.

It was a fun afternoon. We started out with just Colin, Don and I,  and the crew of three. Later we picked up Kellie, Colin's partner, Tom (one of the developers of Infinity Bay), two more crew members and two couples from Wisconsin who were staying at Infinity Bay. We didn't completely circle the island, but we made several trips back and forth from Sandy Bay (where we live) to West Bay and around Lighthouse Point to Keyhole Bay where we could see the town of Coxen Hole in the distance.  All of this is on the west end of the island, going from the north shore to the south shore.  What a great way to spend a hot afternoon!

Breakfast at Rudy's

We went to Rudy's in West End for breakfast yesterday morning. Two cruise

ships were already in port and some of the cruisers were in West End,

kayaking or snorkeling. It was a beautiful, sunny morning with a

great breeze and turquoise water.

We met an interesting couple from New Jersey while at Rudy's. They've

visited every Caribbean island and every Central American country.

They never visit any place twice. They said they were most impressed

with Roatan and thought this island had all the good things with none

of the bad (over-development, terrible crime, over-priced lodging and

food). They thought we had made a wise choice in settling here.

After breakfast, we walked along the beach, up past Sueño del Mar where we found this sign hanging in a beach bar.

It turned into a very hot day when the winds died. We spent the afternoon hanging pictures and putting up more hooks in the bathrooms and closet, as well as some decorative hooks for hanging hats and the like. I also spent considerable time being very technologically frustrated - more on that another time.

Last night, we picked up Kris and headed to the Oasis to grab a bite to eat before the movie premiere. Yes, that's right...a movie premiere...right here on Roatan! The movie, Tranquil Seas, was produced by Tim Blanton, a diver and photographer who has lived on Roatan for 15 years. This was filmed and processed in high definition and is visually stunning. It reminded me of Planet Earth or Blue Planet. It was filmed in various places like the Solomon Islands in the Pacific, Australia, North Carolina, Mexico, but 40% of it was filmed right here in the Bay Islands reef. His focus was primarily on macro photography - tiny, colorful fish as small as 1/4 inch long.  There was a voluntary cover-charge to see the film; the money went to the Roatan Marine Park to help support their work. With nearly 100 people in attendance, over $1,500. was raised. A fun evening.

A Fun Day

This is our friend and houseguest, Kristin, with friends George and his adorable children who came to visit us the other afternoon. Kris met George, who is an island taxi driver, last year when she first arrived. He speaks good English, is a very nice young man and was a big help to Kris. He was so excited to learn that she had returned and came right away to visit her and meet us, promising to bring his children next time. On his last visit, he had told us about wrecking his taxi back in December. He had bought his own taxi, was still making payments on it, didn't have the money to finish paying for the repairs, and now was having to rent a taxi in order to make a living. On top of all that, he is trying to finish high school so he can go to college. He had to reluctantly drop out of school and go to work after the 7th or 8th grade. His family could not afford to put all the children through school. That is very common here; even public education is costly to poor families since they must buy all the school supplies, books, uniforms and shoes. But George is determined to finish, get a college education and make a better life for his family. George did not ask for our help, but we were happy to offer it. He just needs a little assistance to get through this tough time.  Despite all his recent troubles, he remains optimistic and cheerful. He had walked from his house to ours, about a half mile, carrying the baby and leading the other children. It was a hot afternoon, so Don gave them a ride home. His taxi is also the family's only transportation. He is not allowed to keep the rental taxi overnight. He must return it to Coxen Hole in the evening and then catch a ride in another taxi home.

Earlier in the day, we met another of Kris' friends, Olman, who was the security guard at her condo last year. He is another delightful young man, speaks only Spanish, but was learning English from Kris while also teaching her Spanish last year. We had such a great time practicing Spanish and English over pizza, that we  agreed to meet again next week and probably every Monday for more lessons. Olman works 12 hour days, 6 days a week; Monday is his only day off, but he seems happy to share part of that day with us gringos.

In between these visits, I took Kris over to Bob and Debi's to pick up a house key. She's going to house-sit for them while they're in Florida, then she'll move into her newly rented apartment. She's busy packing and cleaning while I write this. It will be a bit quieter for all of us.

A Quiet Weekend

We seem to be in a changeable weather mode right now, which I'm finding pleasant. After two weeks of clouds and rain, we finally had two days of sunshine, blue skies, turquoise water, and....heat. The sun certainly makes a big difference in the temperature. But, we've also still been pretty breezy from the NW, which comes right at our deck. Nice. So, we finally got in the water for the first snorkel of the year. Glorious! We snorkeled in our favorite spot, at the bottom of our hill, where there is an old sunken pier. This is inside the reef, in the Marine Park protected area, so minimal boat traffic. Lots of fish come to this pier to spawn and raise their young. Big storms will wash additional varieties of marine life over the reef. We have seen octopus, nurse sharks, star fish, moray eels, lobster, shrimp, conch and more right there at "our" pier. We've seen changes in this area in the 5+ years that we've been snorkeling there. The walls of the old sunken, man-made island are collapsing, falling over and many of the hiding places favored by the more shy fish have disappeared.

This was the first time for our houseguest, Kristin, to snorkel from "our" beach. She enjoyed the variety, too. She's been reading through my fish reference book, identifying the different types. Our newest sighting was a large spiny urchin, about the size of a baseball. We also enjoyed sitting Chris's wooden pier afterwards and watching our friend, Merlin's, grandchildren playing in the water.

For two nights, we had clear skies studded with the brightest stars we've ever seen. It is always amazing to us, especially after living the past six months in mostly urban areas with too much light pollution.

I had hoped we might snorkel again yesterday afternoon, after church and lunch, but a storm blew in just before noon. It is supposed to be a quick in-and-out kind of storm, so perhaps we'll get to go today. We also had interrupted satellite service yesterday, so sketchy internet connection. I was able to call our son on my Blackberry via wi-fi, but towards the end of our conversation, the connection was failing.  Dave's birthday was Saturday, but we didn't get to talk then, other than to say "happy birthday"; he was taking Tracy to Chicago where she was flying out with a group of students, bound for 12 days of study in Belize.

The humidity is incredibly high this morning and it is still cloudy. The windows were fogged and are now dripping! They're still in need of washing to remove the sea salt residue that collects. I'll get to that after we finish scrubbing the mold off our white concrete stairway!

Life in the tropics. We love it! You just have to learn to go with the flow. We brought plenty of books and are pretty content to curl up on the deck with a good read, and plenty of movies to watch, if we have power. No cruise ships in port today...might be a good day to go into West End and maybe snorkel....

The Library

I read on one of the Roatan forums a posting from the librarian in
French Harbor about the need for school supplies for some of the
children. Many families cannot afford to buy the supplies needed,
especially if they have several children. Don and I decided that we
could help meet this need, so when we went in to Coxen Hole to run
some errands, we took a walk up Market Street and down Back Street to
the office supply/school supply store. The woman who waited on us
spoke English and was able to help us pick out the correct items.

We drove up to French Harbor and found the library (bibliotéca) and the librarian, Joan Dixon. This was our first visit to the library, and I must say, we were favorably impressed. Joan is a delightful young woman who seems to care deeply about the library and the school children. She proudly showed us around and apologized for the water on the floor at the back of the room, explaining that last year's earthquake had cracked the wall by the window and now when it rains
and blows hard, water leaks through. None of the bookshelves appear to have been damaged. The library is in a very nice municipal building
built in 1996. It does not appear to be very well maintained, though.
Joan said that is often the case. Buildings are built, projects are
started by one administration and then neglected or abandoned by the
next one. She does not know if she will still have a job after the new
administration takes office later this month. Her job is a political
appointment. I do hope she is able to stay on; she seems like such a
good fit for the job.
We asked where the books come from, are they donated or does she have
a budget to purchase books? Many of them are donated, some were
purchased. The paperbacks were all donated and she runs an exchange
program for them, or they can be purchased for about $1.00 each. She
had a decent selection of hardbound fiction for adults and paperback
books for younger children in English, lesser amounts of non-fiction,
and a fair amount of reference materials used mainly by the children
for their homework. She has the textbooks they use available; many of
them cannot afford to buy their books.
Some items they really need: computers and a copy machine. None of
these children have access to these, outside of the library, and often
need to use a computer or make a copy of something for their homework.
The libarary has very few computers and only one copier. Joan donates
the paper for them. She said they could really use a few more
computers.
Another need is for books in Spanish. She's getting more Spanish
speakers coming into the library wanting to check out a book and she
has perhaps 20-30 books in Spanish, some fiction, some non-fiction.
She would really like to have more to offer. I told her that perhaps
we could help her with this.  Don and I love to read, and we love
to encourage others to read. Perhaps when St. Louis has their big book
fair in April, we could have our daughter go shopping for Spanish
books. Joan said that we might be able to ship a box of books to
Roatan through Hyde Shipping for free; she knows the owner's daughter.
So, I'll see what we can come up with and then contact her for help
with shipping. There are so many ways to help out on this island;
we're happy to be of service.

A Busy Day

Yesterday we spent much of the day looking at apartments for Kris. After several attempts, we were finally able to get the key to look at the tiny house next to the pizza place at the bottom of our hill. Kris liked that it was so near our house, but it was also right by the road - lots of road noise. It was cute, but very small, lacked an oven, air-conditioner, or much furniture. 

I saw a new ad for an apartment on one of the forums that sounded perfect for Kris. We went there next. The property manager, Guillermo, met us on the road to guide us. The road was dreadful with huge, nearly-lose-your-car potholes full of water, lots of mud. Lots of twists and turns. It turns out that the house is connected to the big boat dock that is now part of our friend Colin's boat club on Mangrove Bight. We had been here before, but never inside the house.

The apartment was on the ground floor of this three story building and was obviously being used by the security guard. One thing that sounded good about this place was the security: five security cameras in operation and a 24-hour watchman. We prefer the watchman to be outside, watching. He must get bored doing that; he had quite the stash of movies and a DVD player inside, food in the fridge, clothes in the closet, wet towel draped over a chair, a book on the bed. But, we were told, he doesn't live there. Good to know. More good and bad points: Kris loves to fish and would be able to fish right from the dock. She also loves to swim but was advised NOT to swim in that bight. We got the impression that some of the islanders houses on the bight just might be dumping raw sewage into the water. Ugh. It's called Mangrove bight for a good reason; it is surrounded by mangroves and during the rainy season, becomes quite swampy, and smelly. He told us the mosquitos can be pretty bad. Kris wasn't too enthused.

We learned that the owner had a second apartment for rent on the road to West Bay, but Guillermo insisted that the boat club was a better, safer place for Kris. We decided to drive over there and look at the location anyway, liked what we saw, so we called Guillermo and asked to see inside. The watchman came up and let us in the locked gate. It does set beside a busy road, but it is built on the side of a steep hill going down the hill, so it was actually pretty quiet. Wow! What a difference. Beautiful carved and painted entry doors with huge carved Chinese figures standing beside the doors. Much bigger place, much nicer. Huge kitchen with enormous, commercial size double refrigerator/freezers and restaurant size stove with an oven, a separate ice-maker. Very nice. Built on two levels with circular stairs inside.  Larger rooms, lots of windows, surrounded by decks on both levels, more furniture. Beautiful wood floors with inlaid designs on the main floor, tile floors on the lower bedroom level. Lots of interesting built-ins. Kris liked it very much. And the price? Exactly the same as the other apartment. $600/month!
The security guard lives in his own tiny house at the top of the hill beside the locked gates and seemed to be a very pleasant young man.  Kris called Guillermo and said she would take it. On the way out, the guard gave me a cutting from the gorgeous purple bougainvillea growing over the fence.

We had invited Bob and Debi for dinner, so we went home to start preparations. Kris made a great chocolate cake for dessert. We had a lovely evening, visiting with friends, sharing our day's events.

A Mostly Dry Day

After days of wind and rain, we finally saw some relief. The winds have died down, the seas have calmed and there was little rain today. Kris and I were tired of being cooped up and anxious for some exercise, so we took a walk around the top of our hill this morning. Good glute exercise, climbing the hills.  While we were out walking, Debi called, asking if we were by any chance heading into Coxen Hole and if so, could she hitch a ride. Don said yes, we had decided we needed to get out and would pick her up after lunch. And we did.

It started raining just as we headed down the hill. Debi was waiting beside the road, with her umbrella up. By the time we reached Coxen Hole, the rain had stopped. We dropped Debi off at her new souvenir shop and Don parked the car at the International Pharmacy next door. Kris had not been in to see Bob and Debi's shop yet. We found Bob standing outside the shop, chatting with a man whom he introduced to us as Dave, from Ontario, Canada. Dave was from the Norwegian Cruise ship in port. We talked for a little while.

 I left them and went to the pharmacy to get some drugs. Nice being able to just walk into the pharmacy, ask "do you have Inderal?", they say yes, hand it to you and charge you only about $6.00 for 50 tablets. No prescription needed. While in the pharmacy, Dave came in, just checking it out, and began asking me questions about moving to Roatan, building a house there, all the hows and whys. We chatted so long that Don came looking for me, then he and Dave got into a big discussion on life in Honduras. I finally left when Kris came in looking for us. She and I wandered around in some of the shops and walked out on the pier looking at the cruise ships. There were four ships in today. Way too many in my opinion. It was pretty crazy with lots and lots of people, taxis, loud reggae music, etc. The cruise ship people were all chilly, too. Many were walking around with the Norwegian blue and white striped towels wrapped around their shoulders. Lots of Europeans onboard that ship.

Don and Dave finally ended their discussion when I popped in to say that Kris and I were going to walk on down to Warren's. Don came with us. He went into the bank, got in line and then realized that he had not brought his passport with him. No passport, no transaction. Well, at least we still had some cash. Kris stopped at an ATM to get more money (she doesn't have a bank account there yet). I went on into Warren's to pick up a few grocery items. Then we walked over to the Flying Fisherman to see what kind of fish they had. Kris wanted to make fish tacos. The boats will be in tomorrow and she will call us if they have an mahi mahi. On the way back to the car, Kris bought some beans from a street vendor and some nice big shrimp. Yum.

Don had been looking for the auto parts store that supposedly carries the brake light bulbs we need. We didn't see any parts stores anywhere around the bank. Dennis had told Don about another parts store a bit farther down Main Street, so we drove that way looking for it. I finally spotted a concrete wall with auto type logos painted on it, so Don stopped and parked the car. We still weren't sure that this was the Demsey place that Dennis described, but as we walked into the yard and I looked at the sign hanging sideways inside the wall, I saw the name "Demsey" in small print at the bottom of the sign. And they had our brake lights! Woo Hoo! A good day all in all.