Our Central American adventures continued as we headed down to Honduras from El Salvador. When planning this country, we weren’t immediately sure whether we wanted to head over to the Bay Islands or visit the Copán Ruins. Eventually, we settled on the Bay Islands with Roatán as our destination. Here’s what our itinerary ended up looking like.
Friday, July 1
On July 1, we woke up and worked in the morning before heading back to San Pedro Sula airport. Because of the flight times, we weren’t able to get to Roatán in one fell swoop. Additionally, because our flight wasn’t until 6 PM, we weren’t sure if we’d be able to get our ticket at the airport right away. Luckily, the airline was able to check us in and give us our boarding passes. This was amazing news because two different airport lounges were available beyond the security gates.
When 6 o’clock finally arrived, we boarded a tiny prop plane in the rain. Although there was some turbulence, we landed without issue. There was a slight delay, and we were nervous that our pre-arranged transport might not be there. But our cab driver had stuck it out. After arriving at our Airbnb, we headed over to the Argentinian Grill for dinner (roughly a 5-minute walk).
Saturday, July 2
On Saturday, I woke up feeling gross with a migraine. While I rested, Dan visited a couple of spots in town. He grabbed me a smoothie from Bean Crazy and arranged a refresher dive for the next day at a local dive shop called Jackson’s Dive Shop. I didn’t plan to dive with him because I wasn’t feeling optimal. I was a bit congested, and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to equalize.
Unfortunately, this was also the day that we found all the ATMs in West End (the area we were staying) were out of cash. This meant we couldn’t get any local Honduras currency (Lempira). While Honduras (particularly Roatán) uses USD in many cases, it’s still nice to have Lempira in certain scenarios.
For dinner, we went to Happy Harry’s. Dan selected it because it looked pretty on the water, and it was highly rated at a 4.6. However, once there, we clearly saw it was a tourist trap and suffered from “vacation inflation.” It should’ve been a 3.8 in our opinion. We don’t recommend it!
Sunday, July 3
On this day, I slept in once again to try to kick whatever bug I was still feeling. It wasn’t feeling awful, but the cold symptoms were enough to let me know it would be a bad idea to dive. We went to Ginger’s before Dan’s 2 PM dive. We loved that they had Trivial Pursuit cards on the table, and we used them to keep ourselves entertained.
Dan headed out for his dive — excited to get back underwater. He returned around 4, and we headed over West Bay via water taxi to check out the area and see whether any ATMs had cash over there. In July 2022, the going rate for water taxis was $5/per person/per way. Based on what I read, it had previously been cheaper, and the prices had increased because there was inflation due to gas prices.
During the first ride, we met Captain Winston who agreed to come back and grab us at 6 PM. During this initial trip, we found cash at the Infinity Bay Hotel. We also walked along the beach and got ice cream. Right where we got ice cream, there was a kiosk for Amazing Roatán Tours. We booked a sunset catamaran for 2 PM the next day (July 4th). We didn’t have any previous plans for the 4th of July, so we felt good heading back with this under our belt!
After we got back, we went to the Drunken Sailor for dinner, which was one of my favorite meals for food. While walking back to the Airbnb, we passed Sundowner’s which had great live music. Dan really wanted to stop for a nightcap…so we did! There was a lot of cigarette smoke in the bar, so Dan lasted longer than I did.
Monday, July 4
We went back to Bean Crazy for breakfast on the morning of July 4th. It was my first time in the actual restaurant, and we had a great waitress named Shantel. Before heading over to West Bay, we did about an hour of work.
Unfortunately, our catamaran was canceled about 20 minutes before we were supposed to be picked up. We were pretty disappointed with Amazon Roatán Tours overall because it was unclear whether the trip was canceled altogether or if the captain just didn’t want to come to pick us up. We didn’t receive a clear answer from the company, and we did see a catamaran close by.
They attempted to arrange a new tour for us at the last minute, which included snorkeling, seeing dolphins, and going to the mangroves. However, it completely fell flat for the price we paid. We did some snorkeling, “saw” captured dolphins from outside of an enclosure for about 30 seconds (the worst way to interact with dolphins), and drove into nearby mangroves for roughly 2 minutes. We ended up getting a partial refund because the tour lasted for about half as long as it was supposed to.
We returned to West End early, feeling deflated about our 4th of July Plans, but we chatted with a nice Midwest couple on the way back (one of whom was into diving). We ended the night by showering and returning to Ginger’s for dinner.
Tuesday, July 5
Tuesday was a return to the work week. I had a full day while Dan stopped a little early (by East Coast standards) and went diving again at 2 PM. We had our favorite dinner of the trip right across from our Airbnb at The Lily Pond House Restaurant. This was a super cool in-house dining experience. We tried booking again for Thursday night, but they had a large group coming and couldn’t accommodate us. This was truly one of the highlights of the West End for us, and we’d definitely recommend going if you’re ever visiting Roatán, Honduras!
Wednesday, July 6
On Wednesday morning, we went to Sandy Buns for breakfast. Dan wasn’t able to stay for the full breakfast because he needed to get on a call, so I stayed to eat and got his breakfast to go. We worked a full day after and learned that there would be a power outage in all of West End the next day. Even in a place as nice as Roatán, it’s a good reminder that Honduras still has some infrastructure challenges.
Because Dan needed to be able to take his morning calls, we needed to figure out an accessible workaround in Honduras. It was easy enough for me — I’m normally able to download work to do offline. Dan, on the other hand, has to interact with his coworkers live. So, we visited a couple spots on the island that we knew would have backup generators.
After that, we grabbed a late dinner at C-Levels Pizza and went back to do laundry because we’d be heading out in just a couple days!
Thursday, July 7
Dan woke up early when the power shut off (6:50 AM) and went to Bean Crazy which has a generator. The power didn’t come back on until a little after noon. We both worked there in the morning; although, I spent most of the time booking travel.
For our last night, we knew that we wanted to hit up Loretta’s because we hadn’t been yet. Our airport taxi driver (a local from Honduras) was Loretta’s husband, and he really talked up her restaurant. We enjoyed the food; although they had big portion sizes, and I wish we had gone there earlier in the week, so I could’ve eaten my leftovers.
We packed for the rest of the evening and collected everything for the following morning. With a 6:30 AM departure time, we knew we had to have everything together!
Friday, July 8
Bright and early, we departed from the airport to make our 8:20 AM flight. Dan was connecting to a trip to the Azores while I was off to Country #75: Panama. We’ll meet back up in Colombia to resume our collective travels. Thank you, Honduras! We saw a beautiful slice of your country, and you were ideal for a tropical vacation.