The Sunny South # 5: The Bay Island of Roatán

With today’s port call of the Crown Princess at Roatán Island in Honduras, I take a unique new step in my life of travelling adventures.  Honduras is the first country I have ever visited in the region known as Latin America. 

That’s right, I have never been to Brazil (near-heresy!) or Mexico (that is heresy to many of my friends!) or anywhere else in the Western Hemisphere south of the Rio Grande.  In fact, I’ve never even gotten close to the Rio Grande itself, let alone any farther south!

In a way, though, Roatán -- and the other nearby Bay Islands -- are something of an anomaly in the otherwise Spanish-speaking cultural landscape of Honduras.  Scarcely Latin at all, the island population shares a rich mixture of ethnic roots extending back to the Maya, assorted pirates, African slaves and English settlers (largely from the Cayman Islands), the Black Carib natives (deported here from the eastern Caribbean island of St. Vincent), and Spanish conquistadors – among others.  The common language of the island today is English.

Roatán (pronounced Ro-a-tahn) is a hilly, almost mountainous, but very narrow strip of land.  The island stretches some 50 kilometres from west to east but never more than 8 kilometres from north to south – and it’s often much narrower than that.  The first impression, as we approached on a cloudy, drizzly morning, was of dense tropical rain forest that wouldn’t be out of place in Tahiti.  That impression was right on target, as this is the rainy season on Roatán.  It kept raining, sometimes heavily, for most of the day.

Along the south shore are the visible remains of two shipwrecks, one right next to the new cruise terminal at Mahogany Bay. 

The cruise terminal is planned so that you have to walk right through a big duty-free shop, and then past a whole series of other enticing stores – and local musicians -- simply to reach the departure point of the partnered tour companies. 

All other tour providers have to hang around on the main road over a kilometre from the ship – a good way for the preferred contractors to simply freeze the competition out altogether.  I got that same impression over and over during my visit – a place where the local residents are kept at arms’ length, time and time again, by the one person or one company lucky enough to catch the favour of the cruise line’s preferred tour providers. 

We drove first to the town of Coxen Hole, the de facto capital of the island.  It was named after a pirate who used the small bay here as his hideout.  Hard to get pictures as we didn’t stop, mainly because there was another (and larger) ship docked at the Coxen Hole pier.  The streets were full of tourists looking for bargains and local people eager to sell.  We were driven up to a large gift and craft shop overlooking the harbour (and the other cruise ship), and there was also a viewpoint, but not much of a view with the persistent rain.  

Our next stop was at a small seaside resort, the sort of little place I would spring for if I were going to stay here.  The bar had a hummingbird feeder hanging under the thatched roof and I had some success capturing the brilliantly coloured birds on camera.

We paused at a particular spot on the road where we could see the shipwreck and our own ship at the same time.  A local woman and her children were there with hand-made crafts to sell, hoping (vainly) that we would be let off the bus to shop.  The smallest child was unconcernedly munching on a chunk of coconut.

The sun actually came out for a few minutes at the next stop, a nature preserve, and a dozen or so of the two thousand or more resident iguanas were out to enjoy the sun – the rest were roosting up in the trees, as they like to do in rainy weather.  Roosters and other fowl were also hanging around. 

Quick!  Count the iguanas in the next picture!

Record holder for longest tail in proportion to the rest of the body?  I think so!

 There were also some fish swimming around in a protected pen in the ocean.

Next, we drove to a viewpoint at a well-to-do home in the French Cay area, right near the centre of the island, with a spectacular view back west -- including both north and south shores of the island, and the spectacular offshore coral reefs and sandbanks.

From there, we went down to a lavish seaside resort built by a wealthy American developer, a combination of hotel and private housing estate.  Once again, the local population are kept firmly at bay by a lengthy private driveway through the forest and a 24-hour security-guarded gate.

I was left with two inescapable take-away conclusions about Roatán.  One was that the presence of great wealth, as in so many places, has led only to conspicuous excess coupled with conspicuous lack of good taste (example: the domed tower in the picture above is part of a private home).  The other is that the presence of great wealth hasn't led to much in the way of trickle-down benefits for many (most?) of the island's population.