Making casual conversation in a dive shop at West End, Roatan, I commented on a poster requesting info on lionfish Pterois volitans/miles sightings, and was astonished by the response.

Oh yes, the store personnel said, that newsletter is from October, when we had about fifty, but we had a lot more last month. In the last couple months it’s suddenly gotten much worse. We’ve seen them while snorkeling in 4 feet of water, and way down deep, and everywhere in between. They went on to theorize that a large number of fertilized eggs, or juvenile fish, had drifted from sites further east in the Caribbean.

In case this issue has flown beneath your radar, the story is that lionfish, natives to the Pacific, probably escaped from a Florida aquarium during Hurricane Andrew. They’ve been coming for some time, and now, according to this map, they’re everywhere.

These fish might have trouble overwintering in colder areas, but the guys in the dive shop told me in Roatan’s waters, they spawn 30,000 eggs at a time and can breed monthly. They eat the juveniles of numerous reef species, including the ones who keep the reef clean, compete for resources, and have a nasty venomous spine which makes them unattractive to the human fishers. In fact, if you do get stung, you probably won’t die, but you will be in pain for a month, and the best remedy is to pour hot water on the site. Lionfish are said to be tasty, if you cut out the poison sac under the spine. They apparently just sit still and look at you, so aren’t particularly hard to get.

I’m certain it’s a terrible thing, but there are so many terrible things of the same nature. The Burmese python in Florida, the giant carp approaching the Great Lakes, just for starters. A person could begin to suffer from Terrible Thing Overload Syndrome.

What particularly interested me was the response. “Does everyone carry spear guns to shoot them with on sight?” I asked. No, ma’am, they do not. There seem to be three reasons why not. One, they don’t want spear guns in the marine park, although presently the divemaster is allowed to have one on the boat. Two, they are there to conserve and preserve, and blasting fish in front of paying scuba divers is not the ideal image. Three, they, or someone in the larger reef management world, are concerned about humane treatment of the fish. The recommended method is to catch the fish – this involves a plastic bag behind the fish, and a stick in front of the fish – and put it in ice water to numb it before it actually dies.

I can just see it now.

In Bonaire I gather they’re sending out fish-killing patrols. Maybe they’re doing the same here and just not admitting it. I hope so. They do hope to keep the marine park free of lionfish, but I don’t think the pooper-scooper approach is going to work.

UPDATE: I met a woman involved in reef statistics who told me that a lot of the sightings were of juveniles, 1-3 inches, so you can see why they might not be spear gun material, and that they are not at this moment spewing 30,000 eggs per month. Even the intermediates, 5-6 inches, can be caught in a net, if you happen to be carrying one. But there were also a few larger fish of reproductive age. And of course, right up there with death and taxes are time and sex!
I also know snorkelers who found a lionfish on the reef in Belize. They thought it was one of the most attractive fish they had ever seen. They’ll go back out next time planning to shoot to kill, but with regret.
I also noticed that the first result on my Google search was about keeping lionfish in aquariums.

Here’s a little more detail on what’s so terrible about these fish. The entire website is worth reading if you’re interested in the issue.

Recent research by Albins and Hixon (2008) provides the first evidence of negative effects of lionfish on native Atlantic coral-reef fishes. The recruitment of coral-reef fishes was studied during the 2007 recruitment period (July-August) on small patch reefs in the Bahamas with and without a single lionfish. Over the five week period, net recruitment (i.e., accumulation of new juvenile fishes via settlement of larvae) was reduced by 79% on reefs with lionfish compared to reefs without lionfish. Stomach content analyses and observations of feeding behavior showed that reductions in native fish density were almost certainly due to predation by lionfish. … In addition, lionfish have the potential to decrease the abundance of ecologically important species such as parrotfish and other herbivorous fishes that keep seaweeds and macroalgae from overgrowing corals.

from the Nonindigenous Aquatic Species site of the USGS http://nas.er.usgs.gov/queries/FactSheet.asp?speciesID=963

A yacht named Kersti, was holed and sank the other night while on a passage from San Blas to Cartagena. The crew in their liferaft was picked up by another yacht sailing in company. But the boat is gone, and with it, I’m sure, the confidence and serenity of the crew, as well as all their personal stuff.

Then, a day later came the report from another vessel which had in view a “large white ship’s mooring” mooring measuring about 15 feet x 20 feet, drifting around on the rhumb line from San Blas to Cartagena. The report was radioed in and apparently will reach a US Coast Guard vessel in the area, which will deal with the obstacle.

I remember one of the most frightening nights of my life – years ago, in Arion, somewhere in mid-Atlantic. We were rollicking along, headlong into one of the darkest nights (but starriest) imaginable. All I could think of was a report I’d heard about a number of refrigerated containers that had supposedly been swept off the deck of a cargo ship in a storm. I was certain that the sharp corner of one was hovering about two feet below the surface and we would be upon it at any moment. I was miserable until sunrise, and then, although the containers may still have been there, I regained my balance.

I’ve buried those particular containers under a pile of other things I might worry about. The other night we were moving along the coast of mainland Honduras on a mainly clear but moonless night. There was a rock and a reefy area to avoid, and an isolated rain squall, whose boundaries I checked on radar. As it passed, a persistent little blip remained just behind us, and as I looked for it, a light went on. Apparently we had nearly run over an unlit fishing boat, provoking him into showing a light. A few minutes later another light suddenly appeared maybe a quarter mile off.

Other items for the worry list include logs washed down rivers, and whales, (although if I hit a whale I’d consider that it had the right-of-way and I had just drawn the wrong card )

Of course we stand watches all night, on the coast and offshore. But it’s impossible to see everything. We place a lot of faith in the odds that whatever danger lurks ahead is not directly ahead on the little line we draw across the ocean. For the men in the unlit lancha it worked out, for Kersti, it didn’t. For us, well, it remains to be seen. I’m expecting the best.

UPDATE: follow these links for a bit more information about Kersti
http://www.sail-world.com/USA/Blue-Water-Rally-yacht-sinks—cruisers-to-the-rescue/63931
http://www.noonsite.com/Members/sue/R2009-12-03-1
UPDATE: read about a more recent incident of container ships going overboard here:
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/state/containers-fall-off-ship-drift-toward-west-palm-200130.html

Arab proverb to the effect that you don’t truly own anything that you can lose at sea.
UPDATE: read about 30 containers lost in the Gulf Stream off Key West. Refrigerated containers have insulation which keeps them floating.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/state/containers-fall-off-ship-drift-toward-west-palm-200130.html

La Ceiba is the third largest city in Honduras, and it’s a pretty civilized size to my mind, meaning you can walk from the beach to the mall. Of course, that takes a while, but I like to walk and you can see a lot.

Mostly what you see is a jumble of old and new buildings. There are classic older wooden ones, but they don’t stand out because of all the other busy-ness around them. There was an Art Deco period near the waterfront. Then there’s the inevitable accretion of little ‘mixed media’ sidewalk and curbside booths. Shopping for something specific is the usual adventure into a warren of side doors and alleys; nothing is where you’d think to look for it, but compared to Fronteras, there’s a lot available here.
PHOTO DOWNTOWN WIRES
We came here to check out the La Ceiba Shipyard for some engine work we’re thinking of. They’ve been here for some time, but you wouldn’t know it by the chart.
PHOTO TRACK SCREENSHOT

Looks like we’ll be spending some time there in a couple months, uninstalling the 33-year old Westerbeke 40 and installing a new Beta 43.

Then a strong cold front came through and it began to rain, and rain. The river turned to mud, the streets in town turned to lakes. I was riding across the Rio Cangrejal with someone who showed me what a dinky little rain this was compared to Hurricane Mitch, which took out the bridge we were on, twenty feet above the present water level. In fact I’ve read that 80% of the bridges in the country had to be rebuilt.

It was Thanksgiving: I was grateful for a mere cold front and a secure mooring, among so many other things.
While others were watching turkeys in the oven, or football, we were tracking down a leak somewhere behind the headliner that was making its way into my book locker. It’s harder to think like a raindrop than you might expect!
PHOTO RAIN ON BEACH

Rain seems to have stopped. Today is Election Day in Honduras. Everyone has a different take on the immediate and future prospects. It seems a good time to leave the city for the Bay Islands and watch from the bleachers instead of the front row.

Pirates of the Caribbean: not Johnny Depp although I did hear somewhere (Armed Forces Radio, our English-language radio news source) that he is the sexiest man on the planet this week.

If I had the technology, I’d add a sound track, Elvis, ‘Hunk of Burning Love’ maybe.

No, I’m thinking of the mostly nameless and faceless bucaneers whose image he embellishes. We’re on the Spanish Main now, aarrgh, mateys, where pirates lurked, like spiders waiting for a tasty fly to come by, in the form of gold and silver aboard a Spanish galleon.

We were in a nearly landlocked harbor on the mainland coast, Diamante Lagoon, where the hills are alive with palm trees and orange, avocado and other fruit trees that were reputedly planted by these pirates on their days off. A cell tower twinkled in the distance, but otherwise there was no one around save the occasional small local fishing boat. Their crews had little camps tucked into the mangroves, which I’m sure they were glad to disappear to on such a squally evening.

I myself had a self-indulgent evening, a glass of wine, a good Thai-style soup with coconut milk, an engrossing book. I even smoothed the bedsheets, and got out a cover for the first time in months, secure in the knowledge that nothing was likely to disturb my slumbers here.

According to one pirate captain, life was good, or at least lively, for his men too:

In an honest Service, there is thin Commons, low Wages, and hard Labour; in this, Plenty and Satiety, Pleasure and Ease, Liberty and Power; and who would not balance Creditor on this Side, when all the Hazard that is run for it, at worst, is only a sower Look or two at choaking. No, a merry Life and a short one shall be my Motto ”

—Pirate Captain Bartholomew Roberts

I tried to imagine crews of yore, hanging out in Diamante between lootings, swatting mosquitoes certainly, planting trees? Were they happy to be so securely anchored, or were they happier about other things? And how did they get some of those ships through the narrow entrance and into the lagoon which even then probably had no more than ten feet of water anywhere? Did they have time for mascara?

We also went to Omoa, near the Guatemalan border, to look at its fort, the Fortaleza San Fernando de Omoa. Reputedly the largest colonial fort in Central America, it was built by the Spanish to protect their shipping interests.It took about twenty years to build and was completed about 1776. It’s a nice enough fort – along the lines of Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas tho slightly smaller, and today has a museum with a fair display (spanish and english) and the usual anchors, bits of pottery, cannons etc.

I was even thinking it would make an interesting hotel. However it was, like so many forts, later used as a prison, so the vibe can’t be good.

But you’ve got to wonder. The cannons couldn’t possibly have shot with any effect from their location to where the waterfront is now – that’s a whole lot of silting going on! Imagine the labor expended to build such a thing! Lime for mortar was transported in small boats 40 miles from the Sapodilla Keys (the boats kept sinking and a nearer source was found). And lime was the least of it, material-wise. The population was small, both of slaves and the men to keep them working. And the cost/benefit ratio? The place was abandoned within a few years, and twenty years after that, Spain completely lost its grip in Central America.

Omoa was also the main port of Honduras at that time. But every time I go someplace like this I’m also amazed, or maybe incredulous would be better, at how the ungainly vessels of the day could even use, much less ‘develop’ such terrible harbors. The anchors in the museums don’t begin to look appropriate for the slab-sided ships. Omoa, although sheltered from the supposedly prevailing trade winds, is wide open to the west and north, to the cold fronts that are beginning to trail down off North America now, and to anything squally or tempestuous. So, to a lesser extent, is Puerto Cortes, which replaced Omoa. Places that look snug, like Escondido, can turn nasty when the wind goes west and builds, and there would be no tacking out.

It’s all just unimaginable. But I’m trying! If a time machine comes along before I depart, I’d want to sign up.

The sea now is actually a couple hundred yards away, and the fort is next door to a natural gas offshore loading place.

OMOA FISHING PIER
Nothing to do with pirates, but this is pretty much all the action in Omoa these days. Your imagination might also conjure up the ghost of the Fantome, the Windjammer ship so famously lost at sea during Hurricane Mitch, which picked up its passengers here, I’ve read.

PS apologies to anyone who got emailed with a post from back in July. No, we’re not going into reruns. I don’t know what happened. Let’s just say we had a mouse going rogue.

MAP
We spent part of the morning clearing in at the industrial shipping port of Puerto Cortes, with the assistance of our new friend, Flash, who spent ten years as a long-haul trucker out of Boston. He met us at the dock; at first we couldn’t shake him, and then we didn’t really want to. We could see that the officials all knew and liked him, so we just went with the flow, and had a pleasant time of it. Although, when we went back the next day, we found out he had stiffed his friend the dinghy minder.
And I spent part of the morning in line in the bank, trying to get smaller change for the 500 Lempira notes (about $25) that the ATM spit out. That no one ever has change, so you need your own, is a basic tenet of travel almost everywhere. So I stood in line, observing my fellow patrons and the action on the street – also watching an automated revolving security door spit people back into the lobby for various perceived infractions. It got me three times, once for my big bag, once for my little bag, and once for my hat, I think. Finally the door let me in carrying nothing more than the wallet and the four bills. I left with almost half an inch of paper: there is paper money for the equivalent of a nickel.

Unlike in Fronteras, there was not a Mayan-dressed woman in sight. Here the population is mixed, ladino or mestizo, and most people approach, even exceed, my own height. Wearing glasses! Styled hair, not just long black ponytails. Short haircuts. Many more people speak some English and will approach us for a friendly chat. We were told twice that 80 percent of the school children take some English. Men especially have been in the US, sometimes in the shipping ports of New Orleans, Miami and New York. Lots of bicycles and ‘freelance’ driving. And the bananas sold on the street are the big ones we’re used to in the US, Gros Michel or its successor, still yellow.

Also no machetes in sight, and while the roosters still crow, the howler monkeys have been replaced by barking dogs and sometimes traffic noise.
We had a beer with a trio of young men, Omar, Alex and Anibal who told us that times were tight, nobody had work, be careful of bad guys, that they weren’t all bad, they just needed to feed their families even in a ‘crise economico’. Then one cell phone rang and they all pulled phones from their pockets and had a laugh about whether it should be answered, being from, I gather, some woman about some baby.

The town itself is pretty undistinguished and could use a general trash pickup, but people were accommodating and we enjoyed our visit.
PHOTO XMAS TREE
This will be the town Christmas tree, and only a major port would have one like it. It’s made like baggy wrinkle from bits of the polypropylene line – a blend of colors that ends up being greenish enough.