Empress of the Seas: Roatan

Today we are in Roatan and have an excursion so I set the alarm which woke me at 6 am. After getting my latte at the coffee shop, I met Sister T and her family on the lido deck where we chatted until it was time to meet everyone for breakfast at the main dining room.

Only the quarantined patient was not there. Half of us ordered off the menu and half used the buffet. Service was good but the cheese grits were a miss! Very watery and weren’t made with salt so tasteless.

Sister T. had booked a private tour for us with Rony’s Tours and we left the ship at 8:30 am to meet the tour guide.

People were very aggressively selling tours both inside and outside the port. My sister M stayed onboard with her grandson while my nephew joined us. I joined in on a couple of photo opps with Sister T and her family.

We found Ronny outside the port gates fairly quickly. Because it had started raining, he went and got the van after we told him our group had dropped to 5 and why. He didn’t blink an eye and we didn’t have to pay any fees for the two missing people. I highly recommend Rony.

Daniel’s Monkey and Sloths Hangout

Once he got back and we loaded up in his very comfortable van, we were off for the first stop. Daniel’s monkey and sloths. We were handed off to a guide, Ian, who stayed with us the entire time.

Our first stop was to hold a sloth. He told us how to hold our arms and one by one the sloth was transferred to us to hold for a few minutes and to get photos.

I was amazed how soft and light she was. Then we went to the monkey enclosure where we had to take off anything they would grab including glasses, hair ties and even earrings. The monkeys would jump on us without warning and either sit on our shoulder or head. They loved to play with our hair.

It was a lot of fun and we took a lot of pictures. The last and final enclosure was the Scarlet macaws.

We got to have it fly to our arm and get photos. We were warned not to move quickly. This was an awesome stop. There were clean restrooms and a very small gift area.

Chocolate and Rum Factories

We got back in the van and went on to our next stop which was a chocolate factory. I didn’t buy anything but it was interesting to see the different chocolates they make there and the process.

My nephew and great niece bought some chocolate. Across the parking lot was a craft store where I did make a purchase. I found two sloth magnets made from recycled materials. One for my sister who had to stay in the cabin and one for me.

I also bought my husband a hand painted bookmark. Very reasonably priced for handcrafted local souvenirs. We then drove to the rum factory where I bought some coffee while the guys in our group tasted the rum.

The viewpoint from there was beautiful.

Infinity Bay Resort

Our next stop was Infinity Bay resort. We paid $25 per person for access the facility, have a chair, wifi access and use of the pool. Although as a day guest, we had to use the beach chairs in a certain area which didn’t have a lot of room or options.

The ocean water was so clear we could see our toes no matter how far out we went. The pool was an infinity pool.Some of us had lunch and all the adults had drinks. 🙂

The food was good but I wouldn’t pick this resort next time. There was a much larger beach area and beach bars right by the resort. Having said that we all enjoyed ourselves. Rony was waiting for us out front at the appointed time.

We drove back to the port and stopped at the Roatan sign.