Saturday, February 4, 2012

Utila Diving (originally posted September 19, 2010)


Ok, so this was two months ago, but I spent a week at the Utila Dive Lodge with a subset of Our Own Damn Dive Club (OODDC for short), and we had a blast. The trip was eight days, seven nights. Utila is one of the Bay Islands of Honduras (the other notable island being Roatan), accessible by boat and small plane, about 18 miles north of the Honduran mainland. I flew direct to San Pedro Sula, Honduras from Newark (and wisely used miles to upgrade to First Class for the 5 hour flight), then flew from San Pedro Sula to La Ceiba, on the coast, on a 16-passenger plane. From there, we took a 5-minute flight in an 8-passenger plane over to Utila.
Once we landed, we were greeted by our driver, and his van, into which we stuffed ourselves and our gear (we were only 7 so this wasn't awful). The Utila Dive Lodge sits in the harbor, and is entirely self-contained. The week was all-inclusive, so we never had to go in search of meals after diving. The rooms were very spacious and clean, with lots of room for gear storage. The Lodge only has eight rooms, of which we took four. We had the place to ourselves. There was a reason for that. Apparently, every year there is Carnival, during which the islanders choose and crown the next Queen for their pageant. Each night's festivities were RIGHT NEXT TO our hotel. And it was LOUD. This really was the only blemish on the whole trip.
Diving in Utila was surprisingly beautiful. I say that only because all of us have been incredibly fortunate and have been diving all over the world. This was up there on our list of places to return. What makes diving in Utila so special are the whale sharks. There are only a handful of places on earth where humans can interact with these beautiful, huge creatures. We spent a late morning spotting and snorkeling with four separate whale sharks, and I was able to get some amazing video clips (which i will upload). The reefs were in really good shape and we saw lots of fish, turtles, even a frogfish one day!
Packing for this trip was a bit of a challenge, as we were limited to 50 pounds in our checked bag (due to the tiny flight). I managed to get my bag to 37 pounds, which included all of my SCUBA gear and clothing for the week. I used a North Face Recon as a carry on, and it held my iPad, keyboard, Kindle, iPhone, cameras (2 Canon SD-1100IS') and housing, plus paperwork, a change of clothes, and some snacks and water. All told, I'd say it was my best, most efficient packing job to date.
We're not yet sure where we'll be going next year, but I'll be ready with a really short packing list

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