THE SAIL FROM GUATEMALA TO THE BAY ISLANDS OF HONDURAS AND OUR FIRST COUPLE DAYS THERE 12/2 - 12/6/2018

DJ, Jennie, Delana, Starship and I checked out of Guatemala on December 1st. Checking out of Guatemala is pretty easy. We use an English speaking agent named Raul who has an office in Livingston, which is where the Rio Dulce enters the Gulf of Honduras\Caribbean Sea. A few days before checking out we email Raul our passport and boat information, so by the time we get down the river to Livingston most of the paperwork is already complete. Then once we arrive, all we have to do is anchor, take the dinghy ashore, go to Raul's office, take a walk around town while the paperwork gets wrapped up and then pay Raul 450 Quetzales ($60) for a zarpe and 80Q ($10) per person. I have no idea how much of that are official fees versus Raul's cut. The zarpe is very important. It tells the next country you arrive in, when you left the last county and who was on-board. If you take too long to get to the next country or if there are any crew changes, you won't be allowed to check-in unless you have a very good excuse.  

Below is a photo of one of our navigational apps. Livingston, where we check-in and out of Guatemala, is located in the lower left hand corner, above the word Morales and where the little blue crooked line, which is the Rio Dulce, joins the large blue area. The far left end of the very small blue area that is left of the crooked line, is near where our marina and the town of Fronteras are located.  When going to and from the boat, we fly in and out of San Pedro Sula, Honduras and then have a four hour taxi ride.

Over the years there have been some "pirate" incidents along the Honduran coast. So we've been advised that when sailing west of Utila to travel at night, keep all the navigational lights off, stay at least 30 miles offshore, minimize radio contact and turn off our AIS (automatic identification system), which allows us to be seen by other boats. 

We always try to time leaving an anchorage, so that we arrive at our next destination when the sun is high in the sky. That, along with polarized glasses, make it much easier to see the often narrow passes through reefs, when going to and from anchorages. The passes can be anywhere from 10' to 100' deep, while just to the right or left it might be as shallow as a couple feet. So you definitely want good visibility.

Since going to Roatan, as well as the other Bay Islands, is directly into the almost non-stop 15-20 knot easterly trade winds, and we didn't want to tack back and forth for a couple days, we planned on motoring the entire 150 nm. We checked out of Guatemala around noon, figured an average speed of six knots, so anticipated getting to Roatan by 1ish the following afternoon. 

When motoring you want calm conditions and that's how things started out. It was nice and boring, so we were sleeping, reading, doing some foot care, trolling for fish and taking turns at the helm. As far as the latter goes, being at the helm consists of looking out for other boats, noticing if anything doesn't look quite right and making sure all the instruments are working properly, especially the autopilot. 

As the sun set and we motored farther out into the Gulf of Honduras the easterly winds and waves began to build, making it a pretty uncomfortable night, which was compounded by playing cat and mouse with a huge Carnival Cruise ship, which was compounded by me mistakenly turning off the autopilot. Jennie did a great job of steering by the stars until I figured out what I goofed up. The next morning we decided to see if we could check-in to Honduras at Utila instead of Roatan. Utila is about 20 nm closer and it would most likely be DJ and Jennie's only chance to go there. We had never checked in or out of Utilla before, because we had heard that it was a crap shoot as to whether an immigration official would be there or not. 

Utila is the smallest of Honduras' three major Bay Islands, which also consists of five smaller islands and 53 small cays, lying 10 to 40 miles off the northern coast of Honduras. The Bay Islands make up the southern end of the 600 mile long Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System, which is the second largest reef in the world. Utila is 6.5 miles long, 2.5 miles wide and is about 20 miles from both the mainland and Roatan. Columbus visited it on his fourth voyage. It's is known for its pristine coral, some of the world's best dive sites, whale sharks and being more of a backpacker's type destination. 

As you can see the coast is really treacherous. As a matter of fact, about a month after I took this photo a catamaran that was at the same dock as we were in Guatemala was driven ashore here during a big storm. The same storm generated winds of nearly 100 knots in Cozumel, Mexico, while we had winds near 50 where we were anchored in Belize. 

The harbor on the south side of Utila is large, well protected, provides easy access to town and has great snorkeling near by.

This passenger ferry runs between Roatan and Utila daily. If arrives mid-morning and departs mid-afternoon.

This is where we tied up our dinghy whenever we went on shore. There's a coffee shop with wifi on the first floor and a pretty nice restaurant on the second.

.      This is the customs house. As it turned out, no one from immigration had been in Utila 
     for the past five days, but luckily an official arrived the day after we did, so we were able       to check-in with both immigration and the Port Captain. Roatan is by far the easiest and     least expensive place to check-in and out of. You don't need an agent and it only cost 500      Lempira ($20) for the four of us. However, depending on where you check-in at, who the              officials are and what side of the bed they got up on, there are definitely some                     inconsistencies in how you are treated, as well as the fees you are charged. I really                         believe that when checking-in and out it helps to be with a female.

       Once we got the check-in process going we rented a golf cart for half a day, which allowed us to see the entire eastern fourth of the island, the only part with "roads".

Though treacherous, the north and east shores of Utila are very pretty.

 

There are a couple displays like this on the island. They each include copies of pages from a book written by a local guy who claims that Robinson Crusoe was based on a real person and that Utila is the island where he was stranded. I've since read Robinson Crusoe again and really see very few similarities between his island and this one.

Not that the driver's sex had anything to do with it, but our rear right axle and wheel did fall off. I ended up hitch hiking into town to complete the check-in process, while Jennie, Delana and DJ were picked up by the rental people and given another golf cart to wreck.

Below are just some miscellaneous photos taken while on Utila. 

Straps included, what a deal.

With metal roofs and wood siding, the Utila houses are much different than the rest of the region, including the other Bay Islands. It almost has a southeast United States feel to it.

 

Armed police, military and private security are a constant.

It looked to me like a family "squatting" in this long abandoned partially completed construction project.

  

Deep fried plantains are typical street food.

                                                    Even Utila has a craft brewery.                                       

The 4,000+ residents are mostly of African (slave) and English/Dutch (pirate) heritage. And neither group like the mainland Hondurans who they refer to as Spaniards.

I continue to be amazed by the utilities in Central America.

 This is a public beach. There's also a private one, but this one's much nicer.

Here tuk-tuks are waiting to take tourists, who are mostly divers, to their hotels. There 

       are a few trucks on the island, but other than that, it's all motorcycles, tuk-tuks and four                                                                      wheelers.

Everything that comes to the island has to come via boat.

 This is the town dock where the passenger ferries, as well as cargo boats, load and unload.

 After a couple days in Utila we made the 20 nm trip to Roatan. Since Roatan is east of Utilla we were again sailing against the wind. But some of us wanted to sail anyway, so we did, that is until they got tired of tacking and seeing our arrival time continually pushed back. After all, we had a happy hour to get to.