Roatan

[s/v Jedi]

Originally Posted by belizesailor

He hopes the political situation will get resolved and they can put the mooring filed back in place, but...who knows when and if that will happen.

The message they now send out is that cruisers are not welcome. I will not force our presence upon them as long as they have the "Keep Out" sign posted.

[model 10]

If your budget will allow, Barefoot Key, very nice. Although while we were there, the store next to the dive shop was held up. Poor bandits are all over.

[SoManyBeaches]

Update: we left West End yesterday after anchoring there for two nights. We had a great time (calm anchorage, beautiful water and snorkeling, restaurants, bars, etc a short dinghy ride away). No one came out to us or otherwise told us we could not be there and when we checked in with other boats, they said it was fine to anchor there. It seems some of the local dive boats/charter s/v's pick up the mooring lines for the day or overnight. So, at least one of the other S/V's in transit anchored, and then had a charter boat right on their stern (when they picked up the line). We preferred this anchorage to French Caye for sure (super windy and rolly) but great fuel and grocery provisioning.

Jeremiason - There are two marina choices, which are really a wooden dock circling mangrove island with a few fingers and mostly medmoors. We could not stand the bugs in the anchorage/marina (we went for happy hour). But the people were great.

[lorenzo b]

Just some background info on the West End;
A year or so ago the Park managers had some 15 moorings set out that cruisers could tie to for $10 a month, so the place was always packed with squatters that stayed for the whole season. There was always half a dozen boats waiting at French Key for a strong Northern to blow some of the cruisers off their moorings. Finally the municipallty had the Park pull the mooring balls and the police came out to tell people to leave.
The whole problem could have been avoided if the Park charged $20/day and limited the stay to two weeks, and set up pump out service.
There are many cruisers out there who feel it's OK to come to a foreign country, drop their hook, dump their sewage into a National Park, and just squat there for six months. As a result the cruising community lost the use of the West End.

[AnchorageGuy]

Originally Posted by jeremiason

When are getting ready to head north from Panama and are thinking about stopping in Roatan.

We have heard through the Coconut Telegraph that there are some safety concerns... Is Roatan safe and where shouldn't we go?

Thanks in advance!

Tom, If you haven't left yet, I would suggest you get on the NW Caribbean Net on SSB, 1400 UTC on channel 6209, I do believe. You can get the most current up to date info from cruisers that are either there or have been there recently. Chuck