Roatan

Thursday, November 6, 2008

We awoke this morning to blue sky, with a few clouds, and a lot warmer weather. We saw the sun most of the day. We took strolls down the beach, laid out in the lounge chairs and just had a very relaxing day.

We saw a lot of women in bikinis, and just took in the sites.

We learned from a few of the "regulars" here that there were 45 people arrested, 8 hospitalized and several shot with the protesting here on the island. We haven't noticed anything here, other than we can't get from one side of the island to the other and our resort is operating on a backup generator.

We're hoping that we can make it to the airport on Saturday to catch our flight home. Everyone we have talked to has said that we should have no problem. We'll have to see.

We have to keep reminding ourselves that we are in Honduras, a third world country, and things are done differently. Kind of reminds me of Nepal and the riots I saw there a few years ago. Everything aside, we have always felt safe and never in danger.

Today, I did another wall dive. It was a drift dive, meaning that we dove down to a depth of around 50 feet, along side of a coral reef vertical wall and allowed the current to carry us along the wall. Dive lasted about an hour. It was a good dive.

We have talked to a lot of people here. For example, this is Evelyn, from Lousiana. She owns two condos here and had to tell us about everything she knows about everything.

We ended the day watching the sun set...the first time this week. It reminded us of how beautiful this place really is.

Until tomorrow... We love you all!

Mom and Dad

3 comments:

Unknown said...: Mom you look like you have gotten a lot of sun in that picture with the sunset. I am glad that you finally had a day where it has been sunny. We miss you guys and love you!!; November 6, 2008 at 9:15 PM
anderson strong and growing said...: grandma i miss texting you at lunch every day :)

love your favorite grandaughter jestine; November 6, 2008 at 9:55 PM
Oggy Fam said...: Brad, Brad, Brad....what are doing taking pictures of a fat lady's butt!!! That was nasty...did you ask her out that for an evening get together? Is there some special bond between you and her? I thought I saw her lost puppy stuck in one of her rolls...nasty! Keep your nasty girlfriends to yourself...blah!!! (I have the shivers now...); November 7, 2008 at 3:26 PM

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About Roatan

Roatán, located between the islands of Útila and Guanaja, is the largest of Honduras' Bay Islands. The island was formerly known as Ruatan and Rattan. It is approximately 32 miles long, and less than 2 miles wide at its widest point.

Located near the largest barrier reef in the Caribbean Sea (second largest worldwide after Australia's Great Barrier Reef), it has become an important cruise ship and scuba diving destination in Honduras. Tourism is its most important economic sector, though fishing is also an important source of income for islanders.

The Pre-Columbian residents of the Bay Islands are believed to have been related to Paya, Maya, Lenca or Jicaque, which were the cultures present on the mainland. Christopher Columbus, on his fourth voyage (1502-1504) came to the islands as he visited the neighboring Bay Island of Guanaja. The Spanish soon after began using the Islands for purposes of slave raiding, and no original Native American communities survived.

Throughout European colonial times, the entire Bay of Honduras attracted a diverse array of individual settlers, pirates, traders and militarists, engaged in various economic activities and playing out political struggles between the European powers, chiefly Britain and Spain. Roatan and the other islands were used as frequent resting points for sea travelers, and on several occasions were the subject of military occupation. In 1723/1724 an approximately 20-year-old-man from New England, Philip Ashton, managed to survive as a castaway on the island for sixteen months until he was finally rescued(see Edward E. Leslie, "Desperate Journeys, Abandoned Souls", 1988, pp.100-120).

Britain, in its aggressive attempt to usurp the colonization of the Caribbean from the Spanish, occupied the Bay Islands on and off between 1550 and 1700. During this time, the buccaneers found the vacated, mostly unprotected islands a haven for safe harbor and transport. English, French and Dutch pirates established settlements on the islands and raided the cumbersome Spanish cargo vessels laden with gold and other treasures from the new world. The English buccaneer Henry Morgan established his base at Port Royal on Roatán in the mid-17th century; at that time as many as 5,000 pirates were living on that island.

In the 1850s for a brief period the Bay Islands were declared a colony by Britain, who within a decade ceded the territory formally back to Honduras.

Although Spanish is spoken in mainland Honduras, the main language on the island is English, because the first modern population originated from parts of the British Caribbean. In general, the history of the Bay Islands was driven by the various larger political, economic and cultural forces throughout the entire Caribbean and Central American region.

In 1998, the island suffered some damage from Hurricane Mitch, temporarily paralyzing most commercial activity. Many of the native islanders attribute this storm as having broken the previously undisturbed Aguila shipwreck into three pieces. –Wikipedia Encyclopedia

Roatan

Thursday, November 6, 2008

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