Days 105 & 106 - Monday 2nd & Tuesday 3rd January 2006

In times gone by there were apparently two boats that ferried passengers across from mainland Honduras to Utila in the Bay Islands, and this competition had helped to keep the price of a ticket down. When we arrived at the dock for the ferries, we found out that one of these two boats was currently in the dry dock for refurbishment. As a result the opportunist owner of the boat that was still in operation had doubled the price of the crossing.

Naturally this didn´t please anyone (except the owner of the ferry) & for a moment I did consider changing my plans and not going to the Bay Islands at all. I thought about it and realised that one of my main reasons for coming to this part of the world was to visit these islands, and it would be a shame to miss them for the sake of £25 or so. Therefore I succumbed to the opportunist forces of supply and demand, bought my ticket and climbed aboard.

I never normally get seasick, however my on this occasion the choppy waters made me feel a little queasy. The 1 1/2 hr crossing was a bit of a chore, but I never reached the point where I actually thought that I would be sick. I welcomed our arrival in Utila for two reasons, firstly to get off that damned boat, but secondly because it was immediately obvious that these islands were the Caribbean, due to the turquiose waters and palm trees swaying in the breeze.

Utila is famous for having some world class scuba diving sites, as well as for having some of the cheapest dive courses in the world. There are a lot of schools to choose from and competition between them is tough. As we disembarked from the ferry we were bombarded with hawkers trying to convince us that theirs was the premier dive school.

It is difficult to make up ones mind on an empty stomach, so we went to grab some lunch while deciding which company would get our hard earned cash. We made our choice, Altons Dive Shop, based on their facilities (cool jetty to chill on) and instructors. Ben and Angus signed up for their PADI Open Water course and began to read their book and take in the info, while Tom, Ryan and I simply soaked up the sun on the jetty until sunset when we all went out for dinner, followed by an early night.

I planned to do my first dives on Utila on the Wednesday, which left me with nothing to do on Tuesday bar chill out, read and soak up the Caribbean atmosphere. In the morning we wanted to find a beach so we walked for about 30 minutes, eventually spotting a deserted beach on the other side of a the bay. It appeared to only be accesible by swimming across the bay, which we did. We were correct, it was in fact deserted, unless you had a boat (or were willing to sim across!) it was pretty inaccesible. We stayed there, competely alone, for the morning and early part of the afternoon before heading back to the main town for lunch and some time on the jetty at Altons, where I read & generally chilled out before having another early night ready for my dives in the morning.