sugarsmacks

Hi everyone. Looking for a little help on deciding which place to go to on our day trip to Roatan in January. There are 5 of us and we are going to book with a private tour operator, but we have an option on what beach we want. We are looking for a calm waters with shore snorkeling not far out. We have beginners with us. I know West bay beach is suppose to be the best one, but has anyone been to Halfmoon Bay Resort and would you say it is better than west bay for snorkeling? The tour guide is recommending this beach. Looking for a place with chairs, bathrooms and food. Your opinions are appreciated. Thank you.

A group of us are going to be in Mazatlan in 3 weeks. Some of the group purchased a ship sponsored tour to Medina beach. I believe that ship tours go to Hotel Playa Mazatlan. Does anybody know if it is possible for the ones that did not book, can meet up later on with them? Can we just take a cab over and be able to sit with them at the hotel or do we have to buy a day pass?

houseflipper48-Thank you for the heads up. I did some research and I found out that private tour companies are still going to Bannister Island. Some of the cruise ships are still playing hard ball with trying to get lower prices so that is why they are cancelling that excursion. I will hopefully be there in 10 days and will report back.:)

Carnival is still going to Bannister Island. I will be there in a couple weeks and will report back on it.

momof4boys,

We were debating on trying the helmet dive, but decided against it only because we were there only an half day and the helmet dive takes an hour to do. You can just book the island and if you decide to do the dive booked it once you get there. The office is right when you walk in and they have all the times they go out posted. The day really went fast. The banana boat ride is really fun and the snorkeling was good. They also have volleyball nets up so we had a nice game of volleyball going on. The adults and older kids really liked that. We paid $69 p/p through the cruise line and thought it was worth it for what you get if you do everything. Remember there is an open bar. We found some of the drinks weak, but you can ask them to put an extra shot in and they will.

We went to DePalm Island in January. We had 40 people ages ranging from 4yrs old to 73 yrs old. We all had a fantastic time and wished we had more time there. We thought it was worth the money and there was so much to do that we did not get to do it all. The snorkeling was great and you see a lot of different fish beside the parrot fish. Just a heads up, they make everyone wear a life jacket. They are not uncomfortable and are the ones that inflate only if you need them to. We thought the food was good. The fish at the buffet was really good and so are the chicken tenders at the grill. When we got back to the ship we still had 2 hours to walk the downtown area. Great day and can't wait to go back!

We booked our tour with Coralbreeze. We had a large group so it was $45p/p. I know you can book thru most ships but you also don't get to go to the port. They leave right from the ship. I believe you can book just the snorkeling trip on the island for $20p/p. I heard you can talk them down alittle if you have your own gear. Not sure what the water taxi to get to the island will cost. There is no snorkeling on the island. You have to go to the reef. The island does have hermit crabs everywhere and you can see crabs and starfish in the water.