Saturday May 7th

Today we welcome aboard our guests for this weeks charter onboard the Roatan Aggressor, a couple of familiar faces along side a lot first time Aggressor newbies. Check In is followed by the Welcome safety briefing then up to the Sundeck where we enjoy a Barbecue Pork Rib & Jerk Chicken dinner prepared by Chef Milton. Guests get to know each other over a cold drink, excited for the up & coming week of diving here on the Roatan Aggressor. We all call it an early night and turn in ready for an exciting day of diving tomorrow.

Sunday May 8th

We start our day at 6am, making our way east along the south side of the island to our first dive site and check out dive at Valley of the Kings where we see an abundance of Creole Wrasse along with Nassau & Black groupers, huge Cubera Snappers are hanging out under the vessel, there are Arrow Crabs & Arrow Blennies, Neck and Decorator Crabs along the wall with juvenile Spotted Drum in the shallows and a free Swimming Green Moray Eel along with a single Reef Squid who is laying eggs. Chris begins her Enriched Air Course under the instruction of Willie. During lunch we move to Mr. Buds where we spend the afternoon. Splashing in there are over 20 Reef Squid as we head over to the wreck, huge Permits exit the wheel house, Yellow Snappers are moving around inside along with a huge abundance of Silversides, it is fantastic to move through the wreck and exit being engulfed by the Silversides. A huge Reef Mantis Shrimp is in his hole on the stern of this magnificent sunken shrimping vessel where there are Sun & Squat Anemone Shrimp, pairs of Spotted Cleaner Shrimp inside the Sun Anemones along with the Banded Channel Crabs, there are gatherings of Pedersen Shrimp at their cleaning stations, Arrow Crabs are in the Giant Anemone’s, on top of the wreck beautiful fans hiding Flamingo Tongues and Slender Filefish, the Sgt. Majors are buzzing around, Pike & Sail fin Blennies in the sandy area and Yellow Headed Jaw fish with eggs! Willie finds 3 Seahorses a small yellow one on the port bow, an orange one and a black with white bands on the slope of the wall. The night dive has all of the usual nocturnal critters including Reef Octopus, Channel Clinging Crab, Cryptic Teardrop Crabs, White Speckled Nudi Branch’s & Lettuce Leaf Slug, Not a bad day to start our week :-)

Monday May 9th

We are off to a great start this morning with a pre breakfast dive with our female Caribbean Reef Sharks who put on an awesome show for us we are famished & ready for breakfast after such an exhilarating dive, we head along the south side of the island heading west and around the west point Butcher’s Bank where we begin our Turtle action, 2 Hawksbill Turtle’s dive down from the surface towards us, another is munching on the coral seeking out their favorite food, sponges surrounded with Grey & Queen Angels, Spanish Hogfish all hoping to catch some tiny morsels of sponge which is flung into the water column. Our late afternoon & night dives are at Half Moon Bay Wall where we see yet more Hawksbill Turtles along with free swimming Green Moray Eel’s, on the night dive we see huge Channel Clinging  & gatherings of Cryptic Tear Drop Crabs, there are Red Knight and Peppermint Shrimp, a huge Spotted Scorpion Fish, White Speckled Nudi Branch’s, a couple of Reef Squid, Arrow Shrimp & Spotted Lobster

Tuesday May 10th

It’s a pre breakfast dive at the El Aguila Wreck, Spanish for ‘The Eagle’, is 230 ft. long and rests at a max depth of 110'. It’s final voyage, according to Samir Galindo was a trip from Puerto Cortes to Haiti, carrying a large cargo of concrete. It wrecked near Utila possibly from sabotage and was there for several years, partially submerged. It was eventually salvaged and towed its current resting place on the North side of the island just a few minutes from West End. When El Aguila sunk in 1997, it was upright in 110 feet of water. In October 1998, Hurricane Mitch arrived and gave the north shore a real beating and broke the El Aguila into the current three pieces. Mitch really provided a service to the wreck divers of Roatan as the new layout makes for a wonderful and interesting dive experience, our next stop is Spooky Channel with it’s stunning topography meandering through overhangs and swim thru’s towards the end of the channel where it exits onto the wall we find Caribbean Pipefish, Arrow Crabs, Arrow Blenny’s, Midnight Blue Parrotfish, Banded Channel Crabs, Spotted Lobsters amongst an array of all the usual suspects. Our afternoon is spent at Tavianna’s Wall where we gently make our way down the wall with Porcupine Fish, pairs of White Spotted Filefish, Cero’s, several Hawksbill & Green Turtles, huge Channel Clinging Crab, Permits, a large school of Horse Eye Jacks & Scrawled Filefish, ending our dive up in the sandy area where we watch the Sail Fin Blenny’s, Havana Mantis Shrimp, Pedersen Shrimp, Pistol Shrimp and a multitude of cleaning stations. The night dive is full of Reef Squid, Channel Clinging Crabs, Spiny and Spotted Lobster, White Speckled Nudi Branch’s, Criss Cross Tritonia, Longhorn Nudi Branch’s; these are Willie’s specialties in finding.

Wednesday May 11th

It’s an early start at 3.30am as we head south to Cayos Cochinos, on our approach we see Dolphins in the distance, it’s Jorge’s birthday today and what a day he is going to have, 6 miles north of Cayos are the wonderful Seamounts where we splash in at 7zm and 9.15am to see a Grey Reef Shark, a pair of huge Wahoo, Ocean Trigger Fish, schools of Horse Eye Jacks, Kevin finds a Large Eye Bearded Toadfish, there are Creole Wrasse, Blue Tangs and Blue Chromis everywhere, Tom and Jerry our friendly Nassau Groupers are following us around like puppies, this mainly untouched area is home to Reef and Pelagic, engulfed in an abundance of fish all different colors, it is breathtakingly beautiful. We celebrate Don’s 700^th dive! With everyone back onboard we head west to Utila with lunch on the sundeck, cheese burgers in paradise, we arrive in Utila to splash in at Ted’s Point where we see Southern Stingray’s, Turtles and a huge Stargazer and for the first time ever a juvenile Stargazer the size of your thumb! The remainder of our afternoon and night are spent at Jack Neal’s before we head around the Utila Cay’s to Spanish Bay our night mooring. The night dive is superb with a Large Eye Bearded Toadfish coming out of his burrow, Kevin’s eagle eyes spots a tiny juvenile Upside Down Jellyfish and a Mushroom Scorpion Fish, it certainly has been a wonderful day for unique critters. We celebrated Jorge’s birthday with a wonderful cake that Chef Milton had prepared, luckily Jorge’s was happy to share, most went to bed early, some stayed around for the popcorn and a couple watched Captain Ron on the big screen.

Thursday May 12th

A gentle start to the day as we head over to the Cannery which is a small seamount a couple of miles offshore of the Utila Cay’s, this small but vibrant area is fresh with budding and bunches of Blue Bell Tunicates, streams of Creole Wrasse and Blue Chromis but the highlight of the dive are the 3 Nurse Sharks that come to visit and with whom we have close encounters, Brian spends some time with a group of 5 Reef Squid & Jill finds a Spotted Scorpion Fish. After a couple of dives and during lunch we head over to the North side of Utila mooring up at The Pinnacle, so diverse from the previous dives we have experienced so far during our stay this area is colorful with deep walls, shallow top reefs and it’s name sake this huge pinnacle which rises up from 110ft to a mere 20ft on top where such a variety of macro life, along the wall we come across Wire Coral Shrimp, Arrow Crabs and Blenny’s, up in the sandy pocket we find a False Cilicate Mantis Shrimp and a Caribbean Pipefish, up on top of the shallow reef we come across Secretary, Triple Fin and Rough-head Blenny’s along with a juvenile Yellow Tail Damsel Fish, there are Gawdy Clown Crabs and Orange Spot Blenny’s on the Pinnacle, a very awesome macro dive. With everyone back onboard we head back to Roatan with our special meal of the week surf and turf followed by white chocolate Crème Brulée, it’s time for the movie of the week which is followed by a quick chat about the next couple of day’s activities. Arriving back in Roatan at 10pm we moor up at Eel Garden for the night.

Friday May 13th

Fridays always come too fast and this week the days have flown by so fast, we set off early travelling from the West Bay area where we moored last night around onto the South Side of the island where we have a couple of dives to finish our week of diving Our first dive site is at the infamous Mary’s Place which is noted in most dive magazines as one of the best dives, our 2^nd dive is at 40ft. where we get lucky with a Seahorse, our 5^th this week. It is a lazy afternoon, a couple of guests head over to the Monkey and Sloth sanctuary, Becky heads over to Pineapple Villas for a massage whilst the rest remain on the vessel relaxing. At 5.30pm we say our farewells at the Captains Rum punch cocktail party. Congratulations go out to this weeks’ Olympians, our Iron Divers, Becky, Bill. Karen and Don, congratulations to Don for reaching his personal milestone of 700 dives and Bill 400 dives! Congratulations to Chris for completing her Padi Enriched Air Nitrox Course & thank you to Jorge’s for choosing to spend his birthday with us this week. It’s over to Romeo’s for a five star dinning affair.

Saturday March 12th

Loading the luggage onto the buses some are off to Silversides for a tasty brunch with idyllic views, others head to Pineapple Villas or the Grand Roatan Hotel where they are staying on the island whilst the remainder head directly to the airport. We have had a wonderful group of guests onboard this week with a big thank you to you all for making this another safe fun week of diving aboard the Roatan Aggressor.

Until next time your Roatan crew………….