Roatan Island – March 24, 2011 – Seeing and Touching Monkeys

Another day, another new country, this time Honduras and the spectacular island of Roatan. For the first time on this cruise, we saw something that was actually close to what we imagined. Lush green scenery, hills and valleys and pristine beaches. The excursion we picked was a combo, beach and park tour. First up was Gumbalimba Park, where we excited to have the opportunity to see and touch monkeys. I have included a link to their site.

http://www.gumbalimbapark.com/index.html

As per the normal, we disembarked, found our tour group, hopped on the bus etc. This time there was a switch to the plan. Apparently this bus wasn’t good enough so we had to change buses. Happily re-ensconced, we departed. The scenery was beautiful, and for the first time felt I wasn’t travelling in Saskatchewan. Ocean views, smooth highway, mountains, it was all there. We arrived at our initial destination, where we met up with our guide and set out on our trek. We began with our guide pointing out lizards and explaining something about their colours. I was not very interested as I WANT TO SEE AND TOUCH MONKEYS. After what seemed like an eternity we crossed a rope bridge and were close to nirvana, but first we had to see and touch parrots.

That is one big bird!

The happy look on the parrots face is because he just took a major crap, all down my back. I guess this doesn’t happen much because, the handler had nothing to wipe it off with, instead preferring to point and laugh. He must have won a pool or something. Enough of the parrots, BRING ON THE MONKEYS!!!

Sure enough, next stop, monkeys. We get to wander around, as the primates decide who has the shiniest things to steal. They then come down and try to steal the shiny stuff. We were well prepared, but as my glasses are shiny, I didn’t exactly see any monkeys, but I did get to touch them I discovered that they make an excellent hat.

Touching Monkeys

Lori, on the other hand, decided that they made a good scarf.

Lori wanted to take it home

At this point, we began the trek back to where we started to wait on the bus to take us to our next stop, Tabyana Beach. I ran out of battery so I have borrowed someone’s video off You Tube to give you an idea of how spectacular this beach is.

After grabbing our free lunch at the bar (where else?), we headed to the beach. We decided to try snorkelling around to get me used to the gear after the problems I had at Costa Maya. I figured it out at last and we began to check out the surroundings. I heard a funny sound, kind of like someone screaming underwater and then saw a flash go speeding by me. Surfacing, I saw Lori standing up and pointing. She was saying something that sounded a lot like, arggbggghh gurgle gurgle big f*****g fish look, gasp gasp gag gag lokk!!! i think that was it, but don’t quote me. I took a look as I was still close to where she came from, and lo and behold. she was right. We were maybe 20 feet from shore and there was a big f*****g fish on the bottom. I am thinking reef shark as it was bottom feeding, and I think they are harmless. No matter, I turned tail and joined Lori, pretty much quoting her word for word. We waited a few minutes and headed off again. This time we came across a mom and young son combo. She notes our snorkelling gear and asks if we had seen any fish, and that her son said he had seen a bunch of big ones. I looked under again, and immediately saw 4 five footers swimming around everybody’s feet. Kind of spooky, but no issue as they were definitely not the dangerous type, at least I hoped so. I reported what I had seen and I think the kid crapped his pants on the spot. Not wanting to verify that, I swam off as diplomatically as one can under the circumstances.

This was hard work, and we had worked up a thirst. We went back to our deck chairs and got something to drink. I do love trying local beer and this time settled on a Port Royal. Very good quality beer. To learn more about this beer hit the link.

http://www.sabmiller.com/index.asp?pageid=980

Unfortunately, our day was coming to a close. All that was left was the bus ride back to the giant taxi and running the gauntlet of shops. we successfully navigated the shops yet again without any further damage to our personal finances and re-embarked to the ship, where we again enjoyed aperitifs, supper, more aperitifs, a crappy show which included aperitifs, excellent conversation with friends and family and then off to bed. Of course we would be dreaming about tomorrow and what would come in Cozumel. As for Roatan Island, we will be back. A beautiful place that demands more of a stay than 7 hours on a cruise excursion.