Roatan: Glass Bottom Boat
Glass bottom boat excursions are available in many ports. I picked Roatan because they had limited excursions available that interested me.
I had my eye on the Atlantis Submarine excursion in Cozumel which goes 100 feet below water. It looks like fun but I want to start out with 4 feet. I’m going to “ease into the water like an old man into a nice warm bath.”
I booked the Shore Excursions Group Glass Bottom Boat tour for $62. The price is up to $65 per person now.
Mahogany Bay
Non-Carnival tour operators are not allowed to pick up guests in Mahogany Bay. If you book with them you will have to walk outside of the port area and over a hill to begin your tour. To do that you will need to walk under the building with the red roof.
Once you pass through the building with the red roof, you will come to an intersection. To the right is the zip line entrance.
Straight ahead is a Monkey La-La sign. Take a left and you will go up the hill. On the other side of the hill is where the non-carnival tour vendors meet guests. You can also catch a non-union taxi at this location.
I walked over the hill 15 minutes early. My driver was at the bottom holding a sign just as the tour instructions indicated.
It turns out the other people on the ship booked the earlier tour so I ended up with a private tour.
The driver said if I wanted to do anything else to just let him know. I told him I would like to see the chocolate factory. We stopped there on the way to the boat.
Mayak Chocolate Factory
Willa Wonka wanted me to eat cocoa and sugarcane out of this bowl. She dumped some in my hand and wanted me to throw it in my mouth. If you know me, you know I don’t like food that’s just sitting around for the general public. Now we’re talking about something that has been sitting in a wooden bowl for the general public in Honduras? I don’t think so.
She kept insisting I throw them in my mouth. If you know the caddy shack scene where Chevy Chase licks the salt, sucks the lime and throws the tequila over his shoulder…I pulled one of those. I opened up wide and threw the stuff over my shoulder. “It’s good!”
Glass Bottom Boat Pier
After the stop at the chocolate factory we continued to the glass bottom boat location. The yellow boat with the blue top is my ride. This boat is 44 feet long, 12 feet wide, air conditioned, and can hold up to 28 passengers.
The water looks pretty clear.
Glass Bottom Boat
I’m the only person on this tour. There is a driver up top and and a tour guide down below with me.
This is just the front of the boat. Behind me are more windows and seats. You can see the benches on the right that fold down. It was pretty comfortable with just me and the guide. If they had 20 people down here it might be a little tight.
They do have a place to put a beverage if you choose to bring one. I brought a Bloody Mary in my coffee cup,
This is great to be able to get pictures like this without putting on a wetsuit and an air tank.
This was, I believe a red snapper, they say always swims along side the boat. He said there’s another fish that always swims in front of the boat like it’s showing the way.
We saw two sea turtles on the way back. A small one and a big one. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get either of them to come out in pictures.
After we got back the boat took another group out. They had 5-6 people. I think they were locals.
Mahogany Bay
Afterwards the driver drove me back to Mahogany Bay. This time I didn’t have to walk up the hill. They are able to drop you off at the entrance. They just can’t pick you up there.
The driver gave me some Honduran money as a souvenir. This is worth about four cents.
I wanted to have a local beer before getting back on the ship. Fat Tuesday was the closest place.
Fat Tuesday
I enjoyed the tour. Booking a noon excursion was a good move because I missed the early rush off of the boat and I ended up getting a private tour. The driver was great. The tour guide was extremely knowledgeable about the fish and coral. I feel like this prepared me to go further under water in a submarine.
