Quizzing Experienced Snorkelers...

[texancruzer]

You do have some questions don't you :D

 

Lets see if I can help - just returned from our 3rd visit and 2 of those were one week stays at Infinity Bay.

 

First Tabyana is right next door to Infinity Bay resort. Tabyana has no pool but Infinity Bay does. I think the only other resort that has a pool that is accessible to cruisers (for a day pass fee) is Mayan Princess and there has been discussion that they are no longer offering the pool in their day pass. Not sure on that tho.....

 

Both Tabyana and IB have plenty of shade. There are palm trees right on the beach and they also have umbrellas and palapas at IB.

 

Bouncy thing (;)) is in front of Tabyana but we saw lots of kids using it that I don't think were at Tabyana.

 

Concern about missing ship is a valid one here. Would be a bit of a pain to catch up to ship from here. That said, just allow plenty of time to get back and you will be fine. Travel time from West Bay beach to Coxen hole is about 30 minutes - a bit more to Mahogany Bay. There can be a bit of traffic going thru Coxen Hole in the "downtown" area but not always.

 

Private tour will be yours for the whole day. They will take you anywhere you want - its your tour. Yes, they will wait for you while at the beach and no, don't know of any that will snorkel with you. Have heard of some ppl saying they had a guy in a kayak go out with them but I do not know of these or how to find one. Anyone ? We are divers so are also very comfortable snorkeling so can't help on that. I do know the reef begins very close to shore here and goes out from there. There are usually a lot of people snorkeling in this area also so perhaps safety in numbers ???? Most snorkel tours go out on a boat - usually with divers on it too.

 

OK - hope this helps. Roatan is awesome. We will be going back !!!! as we are really taken with it.

 

OOOPS - Guest 2000 got here first .... oh well :)

Edited January 13, 2013 by texancruzer
Add an ooops

[Guest 2000]

Texan, no worries, more info is better than none. :D

 

By the by ~ People don't have kayak guys go out with then. On cruise ship days there are kayak guys in various places on the water. I do not understand if this to to keep people from standing on the reef or to help in a situation.

 

If there are not ships in then guys are no where to be found.

[kwbound]

AquaRoatan is the vendor with the bouncy/water slide. They are at Tabyana but anyone can use their services. Prices are on their website.

 

Have fun!

[Keksie]

Has anyone been to Pristine Bay Resort? Is the snorkling good from there. Thank you.l

[luv2gonow]

Thankyou sooooo much Guest 2000, texancruzer and kwbound:D:D

 

I appreciate all of the info provided!!

Love this place......feeds my love of travel through the obsessive planning:rolleyes:

Thanks again:)

kerri

[Guest 2000]

Has anyone been to Pristine Bay Resort? Is the snorkling good from there. Thank you.l

 

My guess would be the snorkeling would be very good idea, the hassle is the reef is to far out, one would have to hire a boat.. it may be worth while to have a chat with Pristine Bay to see what they offer.

 

Do you see the white wave line at the back of this pic? That is the reef crest. I think I could prolly get out there easy enough but after several hours of snorkeling I doubt I would want to swim back. :0) This is another pic..man! That is some distance. :D

 

AquaRoatan is the vendor with the bouncy/water slide. They are at Tabyana but anyone can use their services. Prices are on their website.

 

This is good info, thank you so much! I had not idea there was a web site!

[texancruzer]

I have been to Pristine Bay. It is a really beautiful upscale resort. Spent the afternoon there while dh played golf on the Black Pearl course.

 

Also went to another resort down the coast just a bit while on a dune buggy tour.

 

Seems there was a lot of seagrass in the water close to shore and the reef was a ways out as Guest2000 has mentioned.

 

This is NOT where I would head to snorkel from the beach !

 

Truly the best and easiest location to snorkel from shore is West Bay Beach.

[Keksie]

Thank you for your responses, it helps so much to get information from people who know the areas.

[banditoo]

West Bay is definitely easy access for reef snorkeling. Just go out left of the pier in front of Infinity Bay Resort and the reef and sea life are plentiful. Lots of places along the beach to stop and sit or eat or have a drink.

[Mocamps]

Hi,

We'll be in Roatan on a cruise in early May. As keen snorkelers we are definitely headed for West Bay and plan to just park ourselves there for the day. The info on this thread is great about where to go - the kidney shaped channel to the reef etc. We plan to use all that info. Thanks to everyone who has contributed.

 

Now all that remains is to work out how to get there! We have used local minibuses in other Caribbean islands and have always found them fun and interesting! Does anyone know if you can get to West Bay from Mahogany Bay using them? We don't mind walking a bit to access them!

 

Thanks

[souperjen24]

Hey All! I was never able to post a full review, but I wanted to chime in here that I had a private tour through Victor Bodden, and our last stop of the day was West Bay Beach. Like everyone has said here, it was FANTASTIC. Our tour guide sat with our stuff the entire time, but we paid about $10 each for a chair so that we could relax if we wanted to.

 

We loved Roatan so much that a few weeks ago we rented a private house (from VRBO) for TWO WEEKS in July. The house is on the water on the east end, so I'm sure we'll do a bit of snorkeling there, but we plan to rent a car for the trip and go around to different spots to snorkel. Woohoo!

[texancruzer]

Hey All! I was never able to post a full review, but I wanted to chime in here that I had a private tour through Victor Bodden, and our last stop of the day was West Bay Beach. Like everyone has said here, it was FANTASTIC. Our tour guide sat with our stuff the entire time, but we paid about $10 each for a chair so that we could relax if we wanted to.

 

We loved Roatan so much that a few weeks ago we rented a private house (from VRBO) for TWO WEEKS in July. The house is on the water on the east end, so I'm sure we'll do a bit of snorkeling there, but we plan to rent a car for the trip and go around to different spots to snorkel. Woohoo!

 

That is what happened to us.....we fell really hard for Roatan on a cruise stop and have now been back twice with plans for more !!!! Paradise found :)

[souperjen24]

That's too funny Texan! I remember you saying you stayed in IB in West Bay. Did you explore any other parts of the island? Do any snorkeling at other beaches?

[Guest 2000]

That's too funny Texan! I remember you saying you stayed in IB in West Bay. Did you explore any other parts of the island? Do any snorkeling at other beaches?

 

Just in case Texan has not.. My goal this visit is to explore a better part of the reef for snorkeling.. there was little or nothing to see in Paya Bay, Camp Bay was the same... this may or may not have been due to the 9 straight days of rain just before I arrived. I took a kayak to Old Port Royal, the snorkeling was slightly more interesting. I took a boat trip to Pigeon Cay, the only thing of interest was a huge star fish but I have seen then both at Cocoview and Blue Channel. The wall as CocoView is pretty cool, if you are a string swimmer, one could get to it from Fantasy Island, CocoView doesn't do day passes.

 

I am in West Bay now and going to Sandy Bay in a few weeks.

 

In most places the reef is just to far out, I took a boat out to the reef several times from Paya Bay... I was not impressed by anything I saw, I think it is cause the locals fish to feed there families out there.

 

The Roatan Marine Park protects the reef and life from Sandy Bay to Lighthouse point..I think this is the reason for the high fish and critter counts in West Bay.

 

I want to get out to Maya Key cause people talk about it a fair amount..have not figured out how to sort that being I am not on a cruise.

 

I am going on a the Free Radical next week, they have several snorkel stops on the east end...should be interesting to see what the what is there.

[texancruzer]

That's too funny Texan! I remember you saying you stayed in IB in West Bay. Did you explore any other parts of the island? Do any snorkeling at other beaches?

 

Yes, we have explored - mostly on two tours. First was with Big Al with Victor Bodden tours. We asked him to show us the REAL Roatan.... not monkeys or parks etc. He drove us all over. Did not go up past where the road ends (see map) but next trip !!??!!

 

http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.roatansunsplashtours.com/attachments/Image/Roatan-Island-Tourist-Map.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.roatansunsplashtours.com/roatan-mangrove-tour-eco-friendly-day-tour.php&h=746&w=1512&sz=821&tbnid=s0OxL5YY3eNIlM:&tbnh=62&tbnw=125&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dmahogany%2Bbay%2Bisla%2Broatan%2Bmap%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=mahogany+bay+isla+roatan+map&usg=__6jX85k97umLIZ4V4Ilt1DKizeho=&docid=1dEvNR9OO6bfDM&sa=X&ei=lAUMUYbfH479qAHikYHwCQ&ved=0CDQQ9QEwAQ&dur=36

 

The second time we were on a dune buggy tour (a blast by the way) and we went way up into the mountains, into the jungle and by the beach, mud pits etc.

 

As for snorkeling in other parts of the island, the answer is no. We really do more diving than snorkeling as we are avid divers.

 

I agree with guest2000 in that in many places unless you are doing a boat snorkel, the reef is too far out. Even if you are a strong swimmer I would not go out that far.

 

Also agree that the Marine Park area is nice since nothing, I mean nothing, is to be taken out. Divers have a saying " take nothing and leave only your bubbles" We do take a lot of underwater pictures tho since I gave dh a nice camera with strobe etc. for Christmas 2011.

[proyroatan]

There are several good places to snorkel on the East End of the island as well where there is virtually no tourist and the coral is pretty much virgin.There are a few catamaran tour companies that will take you out for the day. In particular there is one couple that will take you out of Calabash Bight and take you to two islands called the Calf and Cow where the snorkeling is amazing. Look for them online

[Guest 2000]

There are several good places to snorkel on the East End of the island as well where there is virtually no tourist and the coral is pretty much virgin.There are a few catamaran tour companies that will take you out for the day. In particular there is one couple that will take you out of Calabash Bight and take you to two islands called the Calf and Cow where the snorkeling is amazing. Look for them online

 

 

That would be Free Radical. I am looking forward to Calf and Cow.

 

Sure the coral is virgin in the east and there are tourist about, but the locals fish the area.. so the critter count is very very low. :0) Or at least what I have seen is.

[CRUIS4ME]

Just off the NCL Star/W. Carib with a stop in Roatan. Used CC extensively to try to understand what we should do while there. Thought I'd post now that we've been there and very happy with our day.

The following link has a map of the "kidney" shaped snorkel spot off West End Beach which was SPOT ON...invaluable...and gave us the guide for our spectacular snorkel experience. The kidney place was like being in a national aquarium with fish of all kinds to see. We snorkeled for about 1.5 hrs in this spot. Hope it helps you.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1407265

 

Further thoughts:

Was not sure whether to do Victor Bodden or do it ourselves. Went with do it ourselves with goal of going to West End Beach, Infinity Bay Resort Day Pass; water taxi to West Bay Village for some local shopping; snorkeling and beach day. All went perfect with just a few minor changes along the way.

 

The other option was Victor Bodden tours which we found out passengers who took his tour were very happy. They liked the island tour, the monkey zoo, was dropped off for an hour at Banarama for the beach; and lunch.

 

I know VB says they will take us to where ever we wanted to go. But for the $80 transportation costs with him, we were able to get a driver, get into Mayan Princess ($25/pp), take a water taxi ($3 pp) and be in the snorkel area and a fresh water pool for more than 2.5 hrs. So cost wise and time wise, we were happy with the do it ourself day.

 

Our minor adjustments to our plan was that Infinity Bay was full and not selling day passes. So we went to Mayan Princess - just a few doors down the beach...and it was fabulous. Their pool is actually three cascading pools with waterfalls, flowers, lovely pool decks and clean. Their beach area was small and not crowded but only about two spots down on the beach from banarama and much quieter. Restrooms and showers were excellent.

Banarama has a good outdoors cafe at which we had a good lunch (Turtle something or other). They have live band/music and/or blaring recorded music which was fine for lunch but as we walked by along the beach, we were glad we did not have a spot there for it was much more crowded and higher noise factor. We liked the quiet of Mayan Princess, fresh water pool, and relaxing nature of the beach and pool areas.

The other hiccup was procurring transportation. We went with the Independent Driver for $15 pp round trip. We had to wait 15-20 mins while they found another couple for us to share with. The car broke down on top of the mountain and we wasted another 30 mins while the driver cooled the engine and tapped it off with water. The white busses and taxis seemed to do just fine getting their passengers to the beach faster. The independent driver came with a "tour guide" also. This was a lady in the passenger seat who pointed out the school and cemetary. She kept wanting us to change our mind about where we wanted to go. I insisted on Infinity Bay and then Mayan Princess...she relented. I kept thinking she wanted to take us to somewhere where she got tipped for getting us to another location. She ended up staying in the vicinity of where we were and appeared at the designated time to go back with the driver. Her "wage" was our tip - even though we didn't find her services helpful or informative....but we did give a tip. So in thinking about next time - we'd go with the white busses or a regular taxi.

 

In short - our day was excellent. We brought our own snorkel gear minus the fins and used water shoes. Snorkeling in the kidney shaped area was awesome. Once we got to the Mayan Princess, we dropped our gear in a chair and took a water taxi to West End Village where we walked and shopped a bit and then returned via water taxi to our spot. It was easy to pick up the water taxi right down from the Mayan Princess. We had a good lunch of tacos and chips at Banarama restaurant. Enjoyed our day immensely and returned back to the pier with an hour to spare.

[kwbound]

Thank you for posting a review of your day. We will be there in less than 2 weeks and have booked the Banarama day pass that includes a chair, one drink and transportation to and from the ship for $35pp. We are also going to Snuba with Aquaroatan and according to their map, the snuba is done in the kidney. I'm excite to be in the kidney aquarium!

 

Was it worth the time to take the water taxi over to West End Village? What all was there to see and do?

 

Thanks again for the information and taking the time to post.

 

Donna

[CRUIS4ME]

The West End Village was "ok"...the water taxi takes about 10 mins there and 10 mins back and we took about an hour or so to wander in and out of the shops. DH bought a piece of pottery. Actually the village was one street of small shops...not really a "village"...a smattering of shops and places to stop and have a bite or a drink.

Other than that, I didn't find any real eye catching things to purchase. If time were a crunch, I'd say skip the trip. In fact, if going again, I'd probably do two snorkel trips of about 1.5 hrs each rather than the one we were able to work in.

[texancruzer]

The West End Village was "ok"...the water taxi takes about 10 mins there and 10 mins back and we took about an hour or so to wander in and out of the shops. DH bought a piece of pottery. Actually the village was one street of small shops...not really a "village"...a smattering of shops and places to stop and have a bite or a drink.

 

Thats what I thought on my first visit which was a cruise stop and a short visit. But we have been back to Roatan twice since for a week each time...... and we have found that there is a lot more to West End Village than originally thought. I think they use the term village to keep it easier : West End Village and West Bay Beach. The last time we were there (Christmas) they had completed paving the road. It was easier to walk on but I like the ambience when it was unpaved...... oh well progress :roll eyes:

 

As for shopping - I always find something new to buy. Just this last trip I bought two small purses that were made from hand embroidered material. One was real small and perfect for on the ship on my next cruise (Oct to Europe) to carry my sea pass, glasses and lip gloss. I also purchased a table runner made the same way (its gorgeous) and another wooden bowl.

[souperjen24]

While on my tour with VB, we didn't get a chance to stop and do any shopping at West End, but I'm looking forward to doing that on our 2 week return trip.

[moon girl]

We will be on the Dream in March. Do the buses run from Mahogany Bay to West Bay Beach? Would love to do nearly the same itinerary as first posted above!

[minidriver]

We will be in Roatan next week, and plan to snorkel in the "kidney" area on West End Beach. Here is my question . . . I am having some health issues and my legs are not terribly strong, so I am hoping that I can just float about without having to do a lot of strong kicking. I'm assuming that this area is fairly sheltered from currents, etc? Any thoughts?

[vg247]

Thank you so much everyone for this very thorough and most insightful thread.

 

We will be coming on the NCL Dawn 3/26 and wanted to some up to date feedback if possible:

 

So far we have booked for a private driver with Victor Bodden during our port day so that transportation and related logistics wouldn't be a concern having our own driver. - my spouse said this is a waste to have a driver booked when all we will be doing is laying on the beach, but I figure it's good peace of mind to have a driver there waiting to meet our needs @$80 for the two of us.

 

Mainly the two of us are only interested in a beach day with some snorkeling for me as the spouse only loves tanning and frequent dips in the water.

 

My understanding is beach access is free in the West Bay area so I would like some feedback on whether paying for a day pass at one of the resorts is necessary? Are the beach fronts directly on a resort just limited to their guests or are they public so long as you don't use their chairs ? From pictures, we like to be on a beautiful beach with clear water and not filled with people..something like Infinity Bay Resort.

 

We don't really need a fresh water shower, etc. as we love to spend days end tanning and being in the water. We already have a driver at our disposal and figure we can ask them to take us any where in the area for food and dining, therefore is there any other perk to having a resort pass aside from beach chair and having access to their facilities? We have always been fine with laying on a beach towel all day long on a nice beach...

 

Many thanks as always for your input and thoughts..