2012

2012.
What this year will bring us we can only wait and see.

Will the electric company RECO keep charging high fuel adjustment surcharges all year around?
Will the West End road project ever get finished? And if so, will residents and visitors think of it as a big improvement or a total fiasco? ,

Will The Tax People come back in even bigger force and audit businesses twice a day instead of every second day for a month?
Will any of us ever fully recover from 2009's Zelaya fiasco?
Will the world go crazy because of the Mayan Calenders ending?( Maybe a calender ending might just mean its time to get a new calender.)
Too many speculations for the first month of a New Year.
Some things seem never to change though, like the prices for diving and courses, and the availability of baleadas, rice, beans and chicken. At least we have this to hold on to so we can have some stability
in our daily life.

Looking very much forward to see a lot of you again this year for diving, hanging out, a game of Scrabble, Cribbage or Rummy 500, home cooked meals, catching up and sharing stories, fantastic diving in a small group. Not just watching fins and bubbles.
A recent diver at Tyll's Dive mentioned that we are not a big fancy shop, but a small shop with a big heart and where a small group experience is what you get, not just promised. Like that, because thats what we are really.
This is why Tyll's Dive can never be a big busy shop. We need to have time for our people,
make sure everyone has a good experience and a good time on Roatan, and thats why we love what we do. And hope we will be able to continue on with this .

Hope we can add more to the Tyll's family over the year!

Back to superstitions and such, would like to close this blog entry with a quote from Groucho Marx:
"A black cat crossing the street signifies an animal going somewhere.
Sometimes thats all it is."

Muddy December to remember

I know I have neglected the blog for a while. But there has not been much to report apart from contractors and the mayor making progress for West End this fall.The progress is digging random holes and putting in pipes . Its a perfect thing to start a project like that in the rainy season. But I am not an ingeneer. Just a spectator.

People have been troopers to get from A to B. Rubber boots are really fancy things to have these days.
For the diving. Its been turtles turtles turtles. I wish the turtlekid would have been here with his turtle tapper. Geaorgina and Pete might have been turtle whisperers as well.
Team New Jersey rocks. Dory, Tracy and Beth. What a fantastic team. The rubber boot diva diving team!!!
HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND ALL BEST WISHES FOR THE NEW YEAR!!!!
Yours team Tyll's :-)

The June blog that turned into the August blog

The June blog that turned into the August blog.

The biggest event in June was probably Peeter. Peeter is a rescued kitten from West Bay. The litter lost their mother when they were 3 weeks old and a watchman brought them to Celeste at West Bay Lodge who lovingly brought them up. We were ready for a new family member and got in contact with Penelope from Roatan Renegade Rescue who told us to go see Celeste.

Peeter

So a few days later we scheduled a dive to Mandys Eelgarden so the dive boat could drop of Amanda and me to go and meet Peeter. There was no doubt at all about the kitten. Peeter kind of looked up "Hi my name is Peeter, how are you?"
Afterwards Amanda and I walked around in West Bay and felt like being on a different island and being tourists. The watch and sunglasses guys didn't first recognize us, we being out of our natural environment of West End.
You may wonder why Amanda was not taking out the dive that day. She is also having a new family member, although not a furrry fourlegged one, but a little boy. She is glowing and happy to be a real mom some day soon.

Helen




We love Clay and Lisa, they always come back and bring good vipes to this place. Even though Lisa had to study so much this time, we found time to have lots of laughs together. Samuel said, Lisa is always smiling and happy. Samuel got that absolutely right.

We have been studying too: Watussas interacting with Peeter or vice versa. Very interesting. Am not sure if Peeter relates himself more to a Watussa than to a cat.
Also observed we have sucide sugar ants at the house. They climb the water bowl, and then drown. Does that make any sense?
Ever heard of Mini bees?
Mini bees are another thing. They live in a little plastic fitting outside the diveshop. Actually next to the meters. They are tiny, apparently friendly and don't sting. I guess its because you don't see them, and they are just there minding their own business.
Water tap wasps are another curiosity. They like to hang out underneath the water taps. Maybe they are just thirsty???

So who is filling in for Amanda. Melanie did before she went to the Caymans. Mo is still filling in when needed.
We recruited Helen. English science teacher and now Scuba instructor. Dive teacher is more fun than beeing a dry teacher. Her class room is in the sea, decoration is the coral reef and marine life.
Unfortunately or maybe it is fortunately that Ed, Uwe and Kristian do not always follow Helens advice in building bombs out of draino, alufoil and plastic bottles... The yard, the diveshop, The Wet Spot and the Blue Marlin are still intact.


Oh, The Wet Spot is now next door, great breakfast and lunch, and they are actually consistent with opening hours. Not like the Sharkcave. What a nice change that is, and we dont have to complain about the music volume every day.

What happens on thursdays? Karaokee night at the Blue Channel. Mo always fills
us in on how horrible the singers can be and want to sing over and over again. One thursday Hartley decided he can sing Bob Marleys "One Love". And he did. The two words he could remember were "One love" so the song was like this: One Love, One Loove, One love, one Love. one looove etc. Yes he could have read the tele prompter, but he didn't.
Details, details...

Helen just finished a rescue course with Martin who actually has DMP (dive master potential). It went very well. Instead of calling out Pizza pizza they called out Peeter peeter (course code for help help, to not attract a scene in our little community). Austin, thank you for helping out.

One last thing, keep supporting the Roatan Marinepark, read their newsletters and help where you can.

April and stories

April

April began with the almost yearly visit from Team Wisconsin, who have been coming down over the years to get certified and dive a lot. As always we had a really fun week which ended with what has become a tradition of their last night on the island: Pizza, rum and beer on the deck.
Semana Santa came and went. It was not too bad as long you stay away from West Bay Beach.

Officially the low season begins in may according to hotel pricing. Its pretty low already now.
Anyways what to do then?
Clean out old file cabinets from Tyll. Student files back from the mid nineties. Went through them and in the bin they went. Then the interesting part came. Felt like history. Receipts from a meeting at French Harbour yacht club 7 of September 1993: 5 beers and a water for lps 58,50 including tax.
An old copy from Lonely Planet pages about Roatan.

Dangers and Annoyances:
In the water keep an eye out for spiny sea urchins on the coral reefs. Be sure to wear adequate foot cowering- not-thongs-if you walk on the reefs as coral cuts and can easily become infected in the tropics.
NOW THAT has hopefully been changed in Lonely Planet.

Roatan, population: 10565
today 2011 its more likely 80000!!!

Places to eat:
HB Warrens in Coxen Hole. It says: The cafeteria at HB Warrens supermarket is the most enjoyable place to eat, mostly because its air conditioned.

West End: West End Village is probably the most beautiful part of the island, It's only a small village, but it is exceptionally lovely, on a turquise bay laced with coconut palms.

Places to stay:
Cheapest alternative is to pitch a tent on
West Bay Beach. This beach is probably the beautiful part of the island. Its over 3 km long and most of it undeveloped with nobody on it, but a forest of coconut trees just of the beach to provide shade.

Jimmys, Roberts Hill and other places have rooms from $2,75.There are more expensive places with own cabins like Fosters for $25.

Places to eat:
Various places offers fresh fish dinner for around $2.75

The few dive shops in West End offers
courses for $200 (Monterosa in Sanday Bay $300)
1 fundive $25
10 dive package $200

This was all 15 or so years ago,

And where are we now? I will leave this open.

One more gem I found to post on the April update. I found an:

Important information list. It begins:
1)Please read the "Diver Safety Plan". Sign on the same wall with numerous diplomas. Then inform us if you want to sign.
2) If you want to go deeper than 100 feet on any dive, please go down the road to another dive shop...some of them love deep diving . (See Bugseys cement cross on 150 ft or so).
3) On a guided tour please try to stay at the depth of the divemaster. Its much easier to plan our dive profiles this way.
(I am skipping some of them)
6) The Republic of Honduras has no insurance laws. You are on your own. (That's one reason diving is so cheap here),
7) Nothing we have is for sale unless you want to buy the whole dive shop, or if you lose or break
something.
8) The most dangerous thing you may encounter during your dive here are motor boats. Here they drive boats just like taxis.


Hope you enjoyed the April blog entry with a smile.

Marquito and Carmen are finally back home on Roatan

Marcos (our boatcaptain) and his fiancee Carmen are telling me once again to thank everybody who helped them getting through the months of uncertainty for their little boy, Marquito. Are the doctors going to remove the kidney or not? Is the new treatment they decided to try out gonna work? And on top of all these worries, Carmen herself had to have kidneystones removed.
Thanks again for all donations and great tip money to Marcos which went to help to pay the hospital bills.
Well, Carmen and Marquito are back on Roatan. Marcos is happy. They came for a visit today at the diveshop. (I know the photo got a bit too much sun}. As I understand, Marquito will still be on medication for a long time still. If no complications occur, they will first have to go back for a check up next year. So fingers crossed. He is a sweet little boy, who has been in and out of hospital many times over the last many months.

Chasing the sunsets

Kristin Haynes has over the last months been a busybee here in West End.
She has made a painting of nearly every diveshop, bar and restaurant by now.
Postcards have been printed and the profit from the sales goes to the SolFoundation:
www.solroatan.org
You can see more if you visit www.kristinhaynes.blogspot.com

2010, this is gonna be a great year.

It has been months since there has been any activity on this blog. There really hasn't been much to post. But now Christmas is over and everyone in West End (diveshops, restaurants and bars) had a busy week. Everyone is feeling things really will be better again on the island.

Cruiseship business is picking up. Not all cruisers want to stay in a big group, and thats where the small diveshops in West End come in. Who wants to dive in a group with 14-15 other divers. The marinelife will scatter away when they see all the bubbles and flaring arms and legs.

As to the weather, it has mostly been fine, but when we have a northern coming in we quick change from bikinis, boardshorts to warm clothes to keep warm and dry.
And we can warm up and hang out with Ed at the Blue Marlin across the shop.




2010 can only be a much better year. Already with the diveshop staff and dmts the vipe is great.
Yes cheers to good happy year.