Beginner Honduras
Roatán
The Mesoamerican reef, ten minutes from shore, with walls that start in the shallows
The reef isn't far away: along most of the coast, you leave the dock, motor for ten minutes, and the wall is already below you. Roatán is the part of the Mesoamerican reef where the drop-off comes almost close enough to touch the island.
In this guide you'll find how diving works on the largest of the Bay Islands, what kind of reef makes up the second-largest barrier reef in the world, what you'll see, when to go, and why it's one of the places where the most people learn to dive.
It's the destination that brings together three things that rarely go together: quality Caribbean wall diving, low cost, and a huge training infrastructure. That makes it the entry point into diving for thousands of people every year.
Geography and access
Roatán is the largest of the Bay Islands, an arc of islands off Honduras's Caribbean coast.
Its reef is part of the Mesoamerican Barrier Reef System, the most extensive coral reef in the Western Hemisphere, running from the Yucatán Peninsula to the Honduran islands.
The island shelf is narrow: the barrier reef runs parallel to the coast a short distance out and drops off a wall toward the deep channel that separates the island from the mainland.
The south coast is sheltered from the prevailing wind and is where most of the year's diving happens; the north coast works well in the lower-wind months.
The western end concentrates most of the activity and training, with sites accessible just a few minutes by boat.
Access is by international flight to the island or domestic flight from the mainland, with the ferry from the mainland as an alternative.
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