Holmespoint
Guest
We just got back from a fabulous week at AKR. The diving, location and staff were incredible. The food was top notch. We were diving with our children ages 11 and 14. The dive staff made us feel safe on every dive. Our divemaster, Wendell Omar Woods and our boat Captain, Tyrone were awesome. Since you dive with the same people everyday on the same boat you really make some nice connections and that made the diving get more comfortable everyday.
We took advantage of the shark dive/dolphin dive combo for $150 each. They were really fun.. the shark dive was a little stressfull because of the number of sharks and the volume of fish that were present. We did have three divemaster types with us, however, I probably would not do that again .
We took a walk towards Coxen Hole on a dirt road just on the other side of the RIMS. There is some pretty profound poverty mixed with some huge houses. We felt safe and everyone was really nice. You get a feel more for the locals just by the walk. There is also a small shop that has pop, chips etc just steps of the property. You save about 75% if you shop there plus help out the locals. We took a cab to West End and walked around. On our last day we rented a car from Island rentals for $40 and drove all the way to Punta Gorda . It was fun to explore and see the non tourist side of Roatan.
One thing about AKR that we found difficult was the tipping policy. There are so many nice staff that you wanted to give everyone a tip. The staff does rely on the tip because the salarys are appparently low. If we went again I would try to take tshirts, socks, hats, boxers etc that you could pick up at Old Navy on sale to give to the staff members and then just cash tip the divemaster and captain. Just and idea.
If anyone is going to AKR and could take a package to Wendell for us that would be great . We have some wetsuits that our kids have out grown and it is hard to get a package through. I would love to mail the suits to someone in the states to make sure that Wendell could get them for his own kids. He is wanting to start to teach his 11 year old son to dive so he can train to become a divemaster. We really got attached to our divemaster and his family. He and his wife both work to put the kids in private schools which is 450 dollars/month. A huge amount in Roatan.
Thanks in advance if anyone can help. Roatan is awesome and I can't wait to go back!
We took advantage of the shark dive/dolphin dive combo for $150 each. They were really fun.. the shark dive was a little stressfull because of the number of sharks and the volume of fish that were present. We did have three divemaster types with us, however, I probably would not do that again .
We took a walk towards Coxen Hole on a dirt road just on the other side of the RIMS. There is some pretty profound poverty mixed with some huge houses. We felt safe and everyone was really nice. You get a feel more for the locals just by the walk. There is also a small shop that has pop, chips etc just steps of the property. You save about 75% if you shop there plus help out the locals. We took a cab to West End and walked around. On our last day we rented a car from Island rentals for $40 and drove all the way to Punta Gorda . It was fun to explore and see the non tourist side of Roatan.
One thing about AKR that we found difficult was the tipping policy. There are so many nice staff that you wanted to give everyone a tip. The staff does rely on the tip because the salarys are appparently low. If we went again I would try to take tshirts, socks, hats, boxers etc that you could pick up at Old Navy on sale to give to the staff members and then just cash tip the divemaster and captain. Just and idea.
If anyone is going to AKR and could take a package to Wendell for us that would be great . We have some wetsuits that our kids have out grown and it is hard to get a package through. I would love to mail the suits to someone in the states to make sure that Wendell could get them for his own kids. He is wanting to start to teach his 11 year old son to dive so he can train to become a divemaster. We really got attached to our divemaster and his family. He and his wife both work to put the kids in private schools which is 450 dollars/month. A huge amount in Roatan.
Thanks in advance if anyone can help. Roatan is awesome and I can't wait to go back!