ROATAN BAY ISLAND, HONDURAS

After a chaotic first day at sea we arrived in ROATAN, HONDURAS at 10, on a hot, sunny Monday morning. And winter in Maryland was but a frigid memory. It’s amazing how quickly that works.

The cruise terminal was bedlam on a grand scale. The soundtrack was reggae and the color scheme was bright tropical — all yellows, blues, and reds. The crowd was very round and slow moving, like big animals coming from the darkness into the light.

We were informed by our friendly guide Milton, who had once lived in New Jersey, that 10,000-20,000 tourons arrive on cruise ships each day in the winter. And Roatan Bay Island only has a population of 60,000. That’s a lot of people descending on a tiny mountainous island off the coast of Honduras every winter day. And it’s a double-edge sword.

We hired a van to the beach. There are at least fifty tour companies at the cruise port, lining the gangway in grass ticket booths with friendly native guides in bright polo shirts, waving bright plastic tour signs and yelling at you to book with them. “We have the BEST!”

They are exactly the same and they charge the same ($20), unless you are totally clueless. And they all use the same white, 12-person vans to take you on the thirty minute drive to West Bay, the best beach on the island.

Royal Caribbean’s Symphony of the Sea, the largest cruise ship in the world (5,500 passengers) had docked just before us, so all the beaches were full or near full by the time we got to West Bay around 11. Our first choice, Infinity Beach was full — so we ended up next door at the Paradise Island Resort.

These mini-resorts charge $20 to get in. That only gets you a beach lounger, a place to change, and a nice pool. Everything else — umbrella, food, and beverages are extra. Essentially we paid for access.

The mile-long, white sand beach is lined with resorts and it’s a three ring circus with locals offering jet skis, kayaks, paddle boards, diving, fishing, sailing, snorkeling, zip lining, massages, hair-braiding, sunglasses, shirts, hats, fruit, monkeys to touch, local crafts, ice cream, food, and beer. The tired natives walk up and down the beach relentlessly hawking their services. It reminded us of the homeless beggars in New York City constantly badgering every passerby. I have never said, “No thank you,” so often in my life. And after a few hours it became more than a good man could bear.

We spent $40 to get to the beach and $40 to get into the Paradise Island Resort. We bought two beers. ($5 per bottle of the local favorite Imperial). And we tipped Milton our driver $10. So, we did Roatan on the cheap and spent $100.

I’m guessing that most people spend way more than that — eating, drinking, shopping, recreating, and finding all sorts of expensive shiny things to throw their money at.

And that adds up to boatloads of money flowing into Roatan every day — let’s say, $35 million a week!

And yet Roatan is littered with trash and we saw raw sewage running past dilapidated cinder block shacks and directly into the sea. Many homes looked like they had been wiped out in a previous hurricane and simply abandoned. You see that a lot all over the Caribbean which is essentially situated right along hurricane alley in the summer and fall. But Honduras is way far south of hurricane alley and rarely gets hit by a killer storm. And yet, people were living in the shells of pulverized shacks and houses, with no doors or windows and laundry hanging on lines attached to exposed rebar and trees. It was totally Third World poverty and depressing as hell.

As we were leaving the harbor at sunset, looking at the colorful squalor along the now peaceful Roatan waterfront, Inna said, “Imagine what this place would look like if the Swiss or Germans owned Roatan. It would be a paradise, like Monaco.”

What is it about so many islands in the Caribbean that leaves them penniless and the natives living like animals when the blessed tourist dollar anoints them with rich bounty on a daily basis?