Live From West End, Roatan

[leadweight]

Live From West End

After a week of calm seas, the weather collapsed last night. Today all of the boats have been moved away from West End. It is raining and the surf is up. We will probably take the day off after 6 days of good diving.

Pura Vida:

Some say Pura Vida is a bit on the pricey side at $66 for a double. It is well located in the center of West End and has a good Italian Restaurant and its own dive shop. If you book here for a week an extra $100 will get you breakfast for 2 and airport transfers. Its probably not worth getting the upgrade IMO, as the cabs are only supposed to be $10 each way, although they will try to get more.

There are a lot of Europeans staying and diving here. Mostly Italians, but this week there is a group of 12 from the Czech Republic, and French Canadian lady with a great sense of humor.

The dive shop is run by a very pleasant Swedish woman named Helen. She has a 6 month old daughter who is with her all day at the shop. The baby totally steals the show. If you do 10 or more dives with your own gear the price is an incredibly low $15 per dive. However, at that price level service is minimal. You will be moving your own gear around and things can get a bit crowded on the first dive of the day. The atmosphere is relaxed with short or no briefings. The dive guides, for the most part do not act like the underwater police. If you want full service, try Native Sons.

Eats & Drinks

The Italian restaurant at Pura Vida is good and portions are large, but breakfast is unremarkable. Pasta dishes start at L150 (L19=US$1). I also had a really nice whole snapper for L220. At lunch they have sandwiches and burgers for about L100, fries are extra. Next door the West End Coffee Shop where sandwiches made on home baked rolls are L70. The Cannibal has fish burritos for L155 and they are fairly large. There is a very good Asian restaurant “The Bistro” featuring red curry. It gets a bit pricey as the portions are typically Thai sized. The Sundowner has a happy hour from 4 to 7 with L25 local beers and rum or vodka for L30. The Bamboo Cafe gets recommenced a lot by locals as the girls that run it have a lot of friends. The food was tasty, but the portions were impossibly small. Avoid the Cajun place upstairs at the intersection. Service there is a disaster. A place that serves rotisserie chicken is a block south of Pura Vida. Its good and the prices were comparatively low.

We are moving to Posada something-or-other today as our reservation at Pura Vida was only for one week. We might try Native Sons as they are next door. There is an Argentinian restaurant that we have yet to check out over at Posada.

Ron Scubadiver/Leadweight

 

[Praxus]

Thanks for the report. I will be staying at Pura Vida in two weeks; though I think I will dive at West End Divers. We'll see. Looking forward to it a lot; and will post my own report. Let us know how the rest of your trip goes!

 

[Doc]

After a week of calm seas, the weather collapsed last night. Today all of the boats have been moved away from West End. It is raining and the surf is up. We will probably take the day off after 6 days of good diving.

You don't need a weatherman to tell which way the wind blows...

Here's an easy trick:

When we are cursed in the US by those arctic cold fronts that turn the midwest into a single digit icebox... when they cause freezing temps in Texas... in the Bay Islands, this is called a "Norther". The North and West side gets pretty nasty... study the underwater terrain for further clues as to this phenomena.

You can predict the weather in Belize, Cozumel and the Bay Islands just by sticking your toe outside the door back home!

Sounds like you more than made up for this minor inconvenience. Great report!

 

[leadweight]

I did one dive yesterday, the boats launched about .5 mile west of Fantasy Island, about a 25 minute ride in a pickup. It was a nice drift dive along the edge of the wall.

The wind has picked up, there are white caps on the sea. I will skip the first dive, but may do the second if things get better.

The new hotel is Posada Arcos Iris. Its only $41 per night with A/C with the weekly discount of 10%. The power is off but I am eating breakfast at Pura Vida and they have a generator. I forgot to mention it, but the A/C leaked on the floor at Pura Vida. Other bits: Pura Vida has safes in the room, at Arcos the owner has a safe in her house. Pura Vida gives lots of towels, Arcos 1 per day per person.

We had wonderful huge steaks at the Argentinian Grill last night for L240 each.

-Ron

 

[Praxus]

In room safes were definitely a factor when I chose Pura Vida. With no safe I'd generally always carry my valuables with me; but that's not exactly easy when diving.

Sounds like the generator is a big plus too!

 

[hallboy]

About posada arcos, are you on the beach? Far from west end, if you want to go to a restaurant? ?

 

[Warmwater Wank]

Posada Arcos Iris is in front of a good beach on Half Moon Bay. It is sort of the northern terminus of West End, so lots of restaurants, shops etc are very close, a few minutes walk. The "main drag" of West End is a small dirt road, Arcos Iris is on the opposite side of that "road" from the beach. The rooms are in several 2 story buildings that have maybe 4 units per floor. Very nice rooms, some w/ kitchens for maybe $5. more per day. Arcos Iris is set back in trees, no real ocean views but it is quiet and you are right at the beach as soon as you walk a few steps past the office.

Leadweight, if you check back in, (and that Norther moves on!) you might take a right on the beach road, go up past Vela's restaurant (great local food) and head towards Sea Grape Dive Shop, maybe a 10 minute walk north (follow the signs) Last summer they were $17/ea for 17+ dives. Louis is a great dive operator over there--but then Native Sons is great too. If you go over to Sea Grape you'll see the other Posada next door--Posada Las Orquideas. Same family, a bit newer and all the units have a view of the water (Mangrove Bight) but no real beach. We stayed at Arcos Iris twice last year and next month will be at Arcos Orquideas. West End/Roatan makes it too easy, everything is close by. (If we could quit going down there so much, I could save up enough to dive at Co Co View and not be so jealous of Roatan Man's reports of what sounds like a great resort!)

 

[Doc]

Leadweight- sounds like you have found a good time, but please- just so other readers understand, a note on AI resorts versus the costs that you are finding, something that WarmWaterWank mentioned...

Let's do some math. 17 dives at $17 = $289. The room was $41 x 7= $287. That's $576 without food. Fun to go out and do meals on the town? Yes, in the West end there are two restaurants that are remarkable- also be sure to try the "Garden of Eatin", altho you have done my favorite- the Argentine Grille.

Going out in search of breakfast, lunch and dinner can put a crimp in your bottom time. This is not a big deal unless you have serious issues with getting in the maximum diving- not everyone does, but just do some math and see where you want to be if staying wet is your only goal.

It's a little like apples and oranges, but many AI divers, like at my favorite place CCV, get 25 dives in a week so... let's figure that at $425 (using the $17 benchmark). That means that the room and food are costing you $525, that would be $75 per day for room and meals. CCV has its own generator, so the power is on all of the time. Room safes are a non-issue.

Quite often divers from CCV go to the very US Style restaurants Romeos and Geos, which I just do not understand. The Argentine Grille, Garden of Eatin and the restaurant just E of CCV & FIBR- "The View" has always held my attention with their unique styles and flavors.

Pura Vida is one of those class act dive ops which will incur the extra expense and hassle and perform the kind of service that you enjoyed when the Norther closed down diving on the North and West. While you are on the South side, note the unique reef structure and get in close for the cool macro stuff hiding inside. Have them take you to the Wreck of the Prince Albert!

 

[Doc]

computer burped, dbl post

 

[undefined]

Yes, let's do the math.

From our recent trip:

Room on the water: ~$500
25 dives (total): $500
Food at several West End places: $350
Drinks at Sundowners and Purple Turtle: $200
Total: $1550 + tips
One week at Coconut Tree with friends who we will be coming back to see in less than three months: Priceless

Some things money can't buy, for everything else there's Amex

Oh, and for what it is worth - the same week would have cost us $1700 at CCV + drinks + tips. Assuming the drinks are the same price (25L per beer, ~80L per mixed drink + tips) we'd have clocked in over $2k. CCV doesn't become cost effective unless we were to exceed 4 dives per day every day. You can post the merits of CCV every day of the week, Doc, but the price is still significantly higher than West End unless one dives 4 - 6 times per day. The bottom line is that for the average vacation diver who is traveling to relax and diving 2 - 4 dives per day, West End is far more bang for your buck. And while I may feel as strongly about Coconut Tree as you do about CCV, one can replace the specific dive shop in my figures above with nearly any West End op and come out with the same total.