Gibson Bight, Roatan
21 January 2016 | Gibson Bight Marina, Roatan
Susan / mostly sunny, 80 degrees F
We've been enjoying the West End despite the cold fronts / trofs that have been blowing through every three to four days bringing West or West-component winds and seas with them. Until now there's been just a day or night of rolly-ness, winds no more than 10-12 kts while the weather passes. Everyone except us left the anchorage for the east side of the island a week ago, but we've stuck it out until today because we like the West End. While we woke this morning to clear skies and calm seas even though the wind is from the West, the cold front / trof arriving sometime tomorrow is much stronger with forecasted West to NW winds as high as 30 kts in squalls.
Jerry calls Gibson Bight Marina, a small marina still on the west side of the island but in a fairly well protected bight to see if they have room for us for a couple of days. We're in luck, they have one space that can accommodate Vida Dulce's beam for the weekend only. It is not cheap at $1.50 per foot per day (electricity not included), and the dock we'd tie to is somewhat exposed to the West. Decision time: if we move to the east side to anchor in one of the bights there - Bodden or Calabash, not French Cay where strong winds causes anchorage drag races (had enough of that 2 years ago!) - it's 4 hours of motoring / motor-sailing there. The fuel dock is in the French Cay area so we could stop on the way back once this trof passes, yet it's a pain to get to; not really on the way. Gibson is less than an hour away and they have a fuel dock. It also has the advantage of being close to the road that runs from the West End to Coxen Hole, and beyond; we can easily walk there to grab a bus or taxi for errands. The bights on the east side we'd consider have nothing in the way of stores and are not within walking distance to a main road served by bus or taxi. We decide to pay the dockage fee for three nights. To play it safe, we'll move there this morning; if the storm should arrive early tomorrow it'd be very difficult, perhaps impossible to leave this anchorage and / or safely enter Gibson Bight, somewhere we've not been. Once conditions calm, we'll top off all fuel tanks and jerry jugs and move back to the West End mooring.
Gibson Bight has a narrow entrance between breaking reefs - the markers not much wider than Vida Dulce - then the bottom is shallow in places, however we enter and get settled at the dock without incident in these calm conditions. We now have validated entrance waypoints. We'll get the West winds from the aft however the land masses, reefs and mangroves should shield us from the NW ones plus greatly diminish the sea swells that reach us here.
Gibson Bight Marina is a busy place, with small- and medium-sized tourist fishing, tour and snorkeling boats coming and going all day. The fuel station stays busy servicing boats from the dock, and vehicles that drive in from the main road. Towards the end of the day, several smaller boats haul out on trailers for safety. One thing we didn't pay attention to when tying up is that we're directly in front of the boat launch. It's a tight fit to get around us to the launch but again, no incidents, and no one seems angry we've made their trip to their trailer a bit more difficult than usual.