Of course we didn’t get robbed in Coxen Hole despite what the cruising guide said. So don’t believe everything you read! It’s a clean and friendly place, with a character totally unaffected by Disneyfication.
Maybe it used to be a little rough, but with tourism being such a big part of Roatan’s economy, they can’t afford any incidents.

Our specific missions in the ‘Big Smoke’ were to buy a 30 amp female Hubbell receptacle and some gasket material suitable for hatches. We couldn’t find either and can easily do without both, but we rather like the process of exploration. We covered some ground and got handed off between a dozen nice folks. We did our part to amuse and entertain them with our linguistic efforts and general appearance.

Finding a working ATM machine isn’t too hard, if you stick with a local whose cell phone brings in the up-to-the-second status of each of the five machines in town.
Sometimes the machine is ‘en malo estado’ and sometimes it’s the operator. I used the English menu, which asked me to state the amount of money I wanted ‘in units of one hundred’. So I erased ‘4000’ lempira, and put in 40, since I wanted that many 100 lempira notes. But of course the machine just stood stubbornly until I gave it the answer it wanted, not the over-analyzed answer I was contemplating. Next time maybe I’ll use the Spanish menu.
UPDATE: after a recent case of ATM fraud in the Rio Dulce, word is circulating that only people who use the English menu have a problem. All the more reason to stick to the Spanish menu, if true.

We have our snacks on the street. I’m really getting to like these mangos, cucumbers, radishes and other cut fruits and vegs sold in these little bags for fifty cents or so.The vendor adds salt and ground pumpkin seeds, a squeeze of lime or vinegar, and sometimes hot sauce. (although now that I look carefully, these are pictures of chili peppers, which no amount of lime juice could tame)
And I’d eat a lot more oranges if they were peeled for me like this.

The Port Captain graciously amended our cruising permit with his Underwood typewriter. At this office, the broom closet and the alcoves are stacked with neat bundles of permits from previous decades. By 2004 they were building shelves above the windows for the overflow. In three months, our permit will have expired, but apparently its shadow will live forever.

The school children are kept locked up: not really, but don’t cross this woman! There are soldiers behind her, further inside. They are dressed in arctic-looking gray/white camoflage and some look like very recent graduates.

I almost forgot to mention that for three straight days we were treated to some great acrobatic flying by a pair of bi-planes and a red ‘trainer’ whose wings read Fagen. Are they famous somewhere? Triple axels and reverse flips, just like in the Olympics. There are advantages to these airport anchorages.

Just like us, spectators trying to stay in the shade.