Usually on the morning after I return from a trip I call some of my siblings, who all live thousands of miles away and whom I don't see for years at a time, to let them know I am back home. That may be a habit motivated by inherited remnants of our mother's anxiety about our whereabouts and safety whenever we were not at home, and especially when we were travelling.
I was about to instinctively reach for the phone when I realized that this time a call was not necessary. My siblings, with one exception, had accompanied me on this trip. We had finally been able to have an almost complete family reunion after more than ten years.
A cruise seemed to be the best venue for this. We sailed out of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a port that was as equidistant as possible for all of us. A gettogether for our family, as for most, I am sure, involves a lot of cooking, cleaning up and other busy work that severely reduces the amount of time for bonding and catching up on news. A cruise would eliminate all of that. If tensions arose, as also happens with family reunions, the gigantic ship, three football fields long, fifteen decks high and with a maze of restaurants, shops, theaters, lounges and other nooks and crannies would provide lots of places to hide. As an absolute and drastic last resort one could also jump overboard, as a passenger did one night (more of that later).
The itinerary was the Western Caribbean, with calls at Georgetown, in the Cayman Islands, Cozumel and Costa Maya, Mexico, and new for me, Roatan, Honduras.
That two hurricanes were churning about or developping in the Gulf of Mexico which we had to transit was cause for some concern even though with modern weather mapping ships have a lot of time to alter course to avoid dangerous conditions and will do so since no cruise line wants its ships full of seasick passengers. The magnificent weather we had at each port and most of the cruise emphasized that such concern was unnecessary.
Let's take a look first at Roatan, a small island belonging to Honduras where the vegetation in typical Tropical fashion is lush and colorful, the sea, even at the dock, is crystal clear, there's not a highrise in sight, enough infrastructure to show that there is no evident deprivation
Roatan provided a friendly welcome with folk dancers in their elaborate dress dancing to lively traditional music. No intrusive security meant to make you feel like a potential terrorist. And immaculate duty free shops including one drugstore which offered generic versions of Viagra, among other medications, as well as genuine potato chips and sunscreen.
