Day Three – Roatan Honduras and the Gumbalimba Preserve
The next day we pulled into port on the island of Roatan. For this port-of-call we had a trip scheduled to the Gumbalimba Nature Preserve. Again, there were tons places to extract money from tourists at the cruise terminal. This time we were able to avoid being sucked into a trap, and found a shaded spot to hang out and wait for our tour. This terminal isn’t exclusive to Royal Caribbean, so there were other ships in port. We watched the parade heading for the gathering spots.
Eventually we wandered into some of the shops. There were penis-shaped sippy cups and Trump hats. My first thought was, “Is this what they think of Americans?” I know there are just about as many non-Americans on these cruises, so I just don’t get it. Overall, though, it was more pleasant than Costa Maya.
We got lined up for our tour and boarded another bus. The area around the cruise terminal looked impoverished, similar to the Costa Maya area. I was appalled at the waterways littered with trash. The story on the south side of the island was quite different, though. The West Bay area has large estates. The views were spectacular, and I could see how they would command a high price.
Gumbalimba turned out to be more of a zoo than a true nature preserve. Some of the displays were artificial. We heard water and crossed small streams with waterfalls. All of these were man-made. There was a display of butterflies from around the world, all mounted and preserved. There was a fake cave with a history of natives and piracy.
The flora was spectacular. We could hear exotic birds in the trees, and there were iguanas about.
Our guide led us to a place where we had our choice of paths. We could take the chicken path, or we could cross a narrow, bouncy suspension bridge. We opted for the suspension bridge.
On the other side of the bridge we entered the Scarlet Macaw Preserve. These birds aren’t native to this specific area, but to the mountains on the mainland of Honduras. They are rescue birds. Even so, they were spectacular to see. There was a place with tamer birds where you could take a picture with them, for a fee.
On along the trail we came to the monkey preserve. Like the macaws, these were not native, but rescue animals. In this case, capuchin monkeys. There were some in the trees that were not acclimated to humans, but there were a few that were. These were coaxed onto the shoulders of the tourists.
We made our way back down to the park gift shop. There is an option to visit the small beach, but we were pretty much out of time. The last bus back to the cruise terminal left in 45 minutes. Laura and I walked down to look at the beach, but that’s as much as we got to do.
We headed back to the ship and got cleaned up. We were enjoying martinis at our favorite bar when we got quite a surprise. Laura looked at our calendar and saw that we were scheduled for dinner at 5:00 at Chops Grill, one of the high end restaurants on the ship. We hadn’t made the reservation, so we went to the help desk to see what was happening. Turns out our travel agent had booked us a complimentary dinner. It turned out to be probably the best meal on the ship.
That night was a full moon. We tried to find a dark place to see the moon and stars, but on a ship with bright lights everywhere, it’s not easy.
Continued on the next page.