The Basilica of Sagrada Familia in Barcelona has been completed after 144 years. In February the final arm of the cross was placed on the 172-meter-tall tower of Jesus Christ, completing the structure. Pope Leo XIV inaugurated and blessed the Catholic temple during his visit on June 10, 2026. The idea of the church, in the 1870s, came as a response to a growing rejection of the Catholic Church and faith. Construction began in 1882, and in 1883 architect Antonio Gaudi took over as chief architect of the project. Gaudi combined Gothic and Art Nouveau into an awe-inspiring home for God. Only anarchists in 1936 and a COVID scare in 2020 managed to shut down work on the church.

AI Data Centers

Estimates show that $8 trillion will be spent on data centers in the next six years. The huge data center structures are generally despised not only because of the skyrocketing electricity bills they bring, their noise, and water depletion, price increases in chipped devices or even job theft. They are generally unwelcome because of their huge scale, their sheer ugliness and the rising likelihood that they will herald the age of surveillance, loss of freedom and strict control of individual behavior. The data center energy consumption that is currently at around 430 terawatt-hours (TWh) annually — that is 3% of global electricity demand, or the energy consumption of Japan.

Bermúdez found Guilty

In one of the most horrific murders in Roatan’s history, Gilbert Santiago Reyes Bermúdez, an American one-time resident of the island, was found guilty of aggravated murder of three women: Dione Beatriz Solórzano, Nikendra McCoy and María Antonia Cruz. The murders occurred on Jan. 7, 2024, but their bodies were only found two days later inside a vehicle abandoned in a housing community. Reyes left Honduras on Jan. 8 and was arrested in March 2024 at the airport in the Dominican Republic on a warrant. After extradition to Honduras he was found guilty by a court on Roatan and is awaiting sentencing. Honduras abolished the death penalty in 1956.

Israeli base in Iraq

While the U.S. has constructed around 20 military bases in the Middle East over the past 20 years, Israel has constructed two military bases in Iraq. The first base was established in the Iraqi desert in late 2024 and in 2026 Israel established a second base there. The bases had landing strips in a dry lakebed 110 miles southwest from Karbala. When an Iraqi farmer appeared in the area he was killed by an Israeli helicopter, as was an Iraqi soldier the following day. The U.S. military knew about Israel’s plans and persuaded Iraqi authorities to turn off their radars under the guise of protecting U.S. aircraft, creating an opportunity for the Israelis. Israel has its sights on an old Soviet Sitalchay air base in Azerbaijan and is negotiating establishing a base in Somaliland.

Amnesty in Spain

Obtaining Spanish citizenship has never been easier. You can marry a Spaniard and apply for one after just one year or stay there illegally and apply. A “marriage of convenience” might cost you as little as 6,000 euros. Pedro Sánchez’s government advertised that Spain could legalize 500,000 illegal immigrants and provide them with proper documents and a path to citizenship; leaked documents suggest that this number could be as high as a million. That is in addition to the 300,000 asylum seekers in line to receive a Spanish passport as well. With a native Spanish birthrate of 1.1 children per woman at an all-time low, 33% of all children in Spain are now born to foreigners. Many of the estimated 120,000 Hondurans living in Spain are eligible for legalization of their status.

Spiritus ubi vult spirat (Jn 3:8) – the Spirit blows where He wills. These are words from the Gospel, which Our Lord addressed to Nicodemus, words that acquire their true meaning only when read in light of the sentence immediately preceding them: Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit (Jn 3:5-6). Yet there are those, within a “Church” that claims to be inspired by a “new Pentecost,” who would seek to compel the Holy Spirit to blow not where He wills, but rather where rebels and heretics desire, so as to ratify that which is born of the flesh. These individuals peddle their frauds, their doctrinal errors, the “Conciliar Spring,” the “Synodal Path,” deaconesses and female bishops, sodomitical unions, the ecumenical pantheon, and the worship of Mother Earth – all as the work of the Paraclete. But how could the Holy Spirit promote that which contradicts what He Himself has spoken through the Prophets and through the infallible voice of the perennial Catholic Magisterium? How could the Spirit of Truth teach falsehood? How could the Consoler sow confusion and division among His faithful?

The conciliar and synodal church – a grotesque counterfeit of the true Church of Christ – goes so far as to fashion for itself a god for its own use and consumption: an ecumenical and inclusive god, a god who demands neither conversion nor penance, a god who did not become incarnate to redeem us through His own Passion, but who “abdicates,” so to speak, His own divinity to allow Himself to be supplanted by man – man who makes himself god, and who deifies alongside himself a Magnifica humanitas in rebellion, a Dignitas infinita forged of pride and a rejection of the Cross.

The Spirit blows where He wills.

In the face of the apostasy of the highest echelons of the Hierarchy, the Holy Spirit continues to blow where He wills – that is, in the same place where He has always willed and where He always will – perpetuating, through the outpouring of His gifts, the work of Creation, Redemption, and Sanctification of the Most Holy Trinity. It is a work that Holy Church is called to accomplish principally through the Sacraments. To this task are called the Apostles, who received the Holy Spirit in the Upper Room, and to this task are called their Successors. They have received the fullness of the Priesthood, which perpetuates Holy Orders and the Holy Mass, the beating heart of the Church, within the unbroken line of Apostolic Succession. It is to them that Our Lord has entrusted the task of pouring forth the Holy Spirit, even when crisis strikes the very summit of the ecclesial body; even when, upon the Throne of the Prince of the Apostles, sits a usurper who, abusing a subverted authority, actively fosters dissolution and hinders good Pastors from fulfilling their Ministry. The Holy Spirit blows where He wills – the same place where He has always willed and where He always will – for He acts with absolute sovereignty, invisibly yet unequivocally, and without following the convoluted paths dictated by those who act according to the flesh. The fruits of the Paraclete – repentance, conversion, peace, charity, and holiness – are not engineered in synodal assemblies or discussion groups; nor are they achieved by adulterating the Truth, corrupting Morality, or through intrigue and falsehoods. He is the Spiritus sapientiae et intellectus; the Spiritus consilii et fortitudinis; the Spiritus scientiae et pietatis. He is the exact opposite of how the Prince of this World and his servants operate, both within and outside the Church.

The carnival atmosphere that surrounded political campaigning was known as “Partido Time.” Once in a while a presidential candidate would show up and speak in a language and using phrases that not many islanders understood the meaning of (at that time less than 10% of the 10,000 population in the Bay Islands had more than a sixth-grade education and a basic grasp of the Spanish language); the small Spanish settlements of Juticalpa, Spanish Town and Corozal were too small for politicians to be bothered with. “Partido Time” was a time associated with “rope,” free fried hog, beers, candidate caps and T-shirts. No one cared about politicians’ promises since they were rarely fulfilled.

Fast forward 40 years and the demographics have much changed. The population of 10,000 is now 100,000 and English-speaking Bay Islanders are quite probably in the minority, depending on who you talk to. Prior to the 1990s development boom, the majority of Bay Islanders were descendants of the second (Garifuna, 1797) and third (British via Cayman and Belize in the 1830s) permanent settlers of the islands (the first being the Pech, 400s to 1600s); beginning in the 1990s with the demand for skilled and unskilled labor, an influx of mainlanders came over, bought land, built communities and produced the first (second and now third) generation of English-speaking mainlanders with ID numbers beginning with 1101, 1102, 1103 and 1104.

They knew the language and the laws and brought with them strategies of land invasion. Their astuteness helped build large, well-run communities such as Barrio Los Fuertes, Policarpo, El Bight, Camponado and Mitch with voter blocks of around 10,000 in the large ones such as Policarpo (Sandy Bay) and Los Fuertes (French Harbour). Politicians now prioritize the Spanish-speaking communities during campaigns since this is where the voters are; English communities are now not the priority. A perfect example is the neglected island of St. Helena where, during the past eight years, it has not benefited from any municipal projects at all; the population recently turned their backs on political candidates during a primary election visit. The old Bay Islander dream of freedom from the mainland and indeed autonomy is fast dwindling, and if it is a distant possibility, it would now have to include the 1990s mainland settlers as equal partners.

While the population was growing exponentially over the last 30-odd years, so has development, and with it a concerning impact and risk to three facets of Bay Islands existence. First, the environment, where huge swaths of lush green hillside have been carved away by fly-by-night developers merely concerned with making a quick return and leaving.

Political leaders were given a bite, a mordida.

I was recently up in Camp Bay having a sandwich at a new cafe, and while waiting for my meal, I thumbed through a sales brochure that the developer had left there. One of the photographs showed an island which definitely was nowhere in the Bay Islands; closer examination revealed it to be Malapascua in the Philippines. It saddened me that a developer who has been welcomed here to do business had torn down acres of hillside only to dupe buyers into thinking Roatan was somewhere else. No love for the island at all, which is, I suppose, why the total destruction happened in the first place.

It is an unspoken secret that local political leaders were given a bite, a mordida, to turn a blind eye — leaders who would rather benefit from a few thousand dollars today and sell out their birthright for generations to come. If this keeps up, in another 10 years we will live in a dust bowl with no water resources.

The second impact is on the Anglo Bay Islander (Creole) culture, history and language. Unique in itself in as much as it has drawn from British (English, Scottish and West Indian in particular) culture as well as traditional Caribbean culture, it has actually come up with some contributions unique to these islands; the sweet dish “corn rice” is a perfect example. Sadly, the number of people who know how to make corn rice, a traditional “run down” or coconut bread from scratch, are few and far between. Young people nowadays are more attracted to mainland dishes like pollo chuco and tacos and are lured into eating fast-food fried chicken and pizza instead of preparing and eating traditional dishes and pastries.

Maypole and plait pole events are scarce and rarely observed or not done in the traditional way. Island calypso music using homemade instruments (washboard, spoon drums and handsaw with a bow) has disappeared completely. The pure Creole English spoken in the Bay Islands (which varies from community to community) is being watered down and in many cases pushed out and replaced by Spanish. According to Ross Graham, a linguist who wrote his Ph.D. thesis on Bay Islands English, the Creole spoken here is unique and worthy of preservation. I have been saddened on several occasions watching an interview on local news channels with a Creole (English) interviewer and another Creole — and they are speaking Spanish.

Honduranization of the Bay Islands is in full swing.

History is being neglected as well. I recently was dismayed to see that a developer had been allowed to build a road (cut and fill) right through the historic British fort at Augusta in Port Royal with no consideration for what lay beneath. Why were they given a permit to do this in the first place? This site and others in Port Royal and dotted around the islands are impressive and must be preserved. I maintain that the Bay Islands have a deeper history and far more historical places of interest than our northern sister islands, the Caymans.

The Garifuna, it is worth mentioning, have been more resilient in preserving their culture, mainly due to the priority they place on ancestral traditions as well as the strength within the Punta Gorda community and limited mixing with mainlanders and English-speaking Creoles. Punta Gorda’s main street has been transformed into a tourist mecca and a textbook example of sustainable tourism and opportunities through cultural and historical preservation; a few miles east in Pandyville, the English Creoles have a golden opportunity to do something similar if only they were given a hand and pointed in the right direction.

The third impact is the lack of loyalty to the local economy. Significant projects on the Bay Islands are being designed and built by engineering and construction firms from the mainland that have operating permits from mainland municipalities, while local firms that have long-established permits are being squeezed — some would say extorted — for unsustainable fees and taxes.

Local authorities, by turning a blind eye to mainland firms coming in, are encouraging an influx of firms that have no affinity for the island and see it only as fertile ground ready to exploit, while established island companies will always be here and have a vested interest in sustainable development. When charities come knocking at doors looking for donations, it’s the local firms that are always around to chip in. The mainland firms support mainland charities and social projects.

It is fitting to conclude that the Bay Islands are at a turning point environmentally. Creole-English Bay Islanders, as a group, are in crisis and oblivious to what is going on around them. The Honduranization of the Bay Islands is in full swing, and without knowing it, our local government leaders in all four municipalities and in Congress are facilitating the decline of a culture. We witness the paving of the way to destruction of our environment and the gradual erasure of a culture and its history. It is now imperative that voters get proactively involved.
Here is a list of ways the voting public can get involved:

There needs to be action by us, the voters, by asking questions of political leaders and holding them accountable. We need to ask them what the procedure is for developers to acquire projects and to hold them accountable for making sure projects are managed correctly with appropriate oversight measures in place. Each community council or patronato should be able to have the confidence to question why apparently damaging projects are being allowed.

Political candidates should be asked what they plan to do about stimulating economic growth for businesses and entrepreneurs wanting to start small tourism concerns such as the Creole village in Pandyville mentioned above. They should also be asked what they will do about reviving and preserving the Creole way of life through workshops and incentives to bring it to where Punta Gorda and the Garifuna are.

Voters need to get out of the partisan politics mindset that is sinking us into a swamp of conformism. Same old, same old will not save us from ourselves. Vote for the candidate — even if he or she is not well known — if they answer the tough questions with reasonable and logical answers. They are the candidate.

Citizens need to put fear aside and start pushing back against unfair local and mainland taxation and injustice.

There are tangible things that political leaders can do:
Seek and listen to advice. Gather a think tank of experience and ask them what concerns them and how they would go about addressing it. Put culture, history and local commerce as priorities. Create five-, 10- and 20-year work plans with clear objectives.

Ensure sound, consistent teaching of Bay Islands history through collaboration with regional education representatives.

Appoint a cultural city manager and a historical city councilor as full-time employees and give them the support they need.

Make a pledge to put the love of the islands before any personal or financial benefit by thinking about what sort of place we will leave for our children and generations to come.

Reach out to international nonprofits that have not only funding available but also expertise for sustainable tourism projects.

Join forces with other Bay Islands municipalities to lobby for more autonomy from the central government.

It’s not too late yet, but let us look further than the end of our noses and plan for the next generations so that they inherit a Bahamas rather than a Haiti.

Roatan is Becoming an Important Transportation Hub

Roatan’s airport upgrade is just in time, as by 2030 Roatan’s airport passenger traffic is expected to expand to 260,000 domestic passengers and to 730,000 passengers flying internationally. “The aim is to position the airport as a modern, efficient, and safe terminal that boosts the economic and tourism development of the island region,” said Nadia Sagastume, communications manager at Roatan airport.

The budget for airport work is around 800 million Lps. ($30 million). “Honduran Company of Infrastructure and Airport Services (EHISA) acts as the contracting and managing entity, responsible for the supervision and comprehensive management of the transformation plan,” said Ayala.

This is the second time the Roatan airport received a major makeover. In 2013, InterAirports, a subsidiary of Honduran conglomerate Grupo Terra, completed an expansion and upgrade of the Roatan airport facilities. The expansion included a larger check-in area and an expansion of the customs and security areas.

The upgraded facility has a waiting area for 1,200 people, a new check-in lobby and 128 new parking spaces. The current airport was opened in 1995 and was designed to handle about 250,000 passengers. By 2025 it was handling twice that number.

The expansion should eventually include a new control tower and a new airport fire station. The runway expansion, to allow for bigger airplanes to land on the island, is being studied.

The very first flights to Roatan began arriving from La Ceiba in the 1930s. One of the oldest living islanders, Mrs. Amylee Elizabeth Collins Bennett, born May 14, 1927, in Thatch Point, remembers the first flight that arrived on Roatan’s Spring Garden not far from where the current airport terminal now is. It was around 1935; the plane was a TACA Stinson airplane capable of taking three to four passengers on a flight to La Ceiba.

There were regular flights to Roatan since 1964, but the unpaved runway had no airport building, just a wooden rain shelter. In the early 1990s, a Spanish consortium began work on building the Roatan airport that eventually opened in 1995. It also featured a 2,090-meter-long and 45-meter-wide asphalt runway. In the mid-1990s, the island was just beginning to be recognized as an international tourist destination, and there were few cruise ships.

Roatan’s airport has become a hub for international travel to the Bay Islands and the Honduran coast. There are daily maritime connections from nearby Dixon Cove that take passengers to Utila, Guanaja and La Ceiba. There are seven international airlines coming to Roatan: American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta, Avianca, Sunwing, TAG, Cayman Airways and Tropic Air. It is conceivable that RTB’s traffic can eventually match that of the Cayman Islands, which has half the population and over a million air passengers a year.

The theme of the Roatan’s TEDx was “Island Mosaic” and focused on island’s diversity of cultures, languages, and values. The organizers wanted to present the island as a diverse mosaic of peoples, languages, cultures and traditions. The event was an opportunity for both islanders and foreign island residents to talk about their passions and concerns.

TEDx first speaker was David Dashner, a developer of Kimpton Grand Roatan and founder of Abundant Life Foundation. He spoke about aligning purpose with enterprise to create a vibrant, strong individuals and projects.

Aligning purpose with enterprise.

West Bay’s Jay Jeter, an electrical engineer turned dive shop owner and underwater photographer spoke about his 15-hour-long dive marathon along Roatan’s western reef.

Kelvin Martinez – AKA DJ Galán, a Garifuna DJ and lawyer spoke about culture, creativity and legal systems create an environment susceptible to economic growth.

There was over two dozen TEDx event already organized in Honduras and several Roatan based individuals had presented their work. A 2012 TEDx event in Tegucigalpa featured Roatan residents Jenny Myton and Ian Drysdale who spoke about their Coral Reef Alliance (CORAL) – Roatan based environmental non-profit. In 2017 Karl Stanley, a submariner and explorer, has given a presentation at San Pedro Sula TEDx about his extraordinary adventure of hiking up to Pico Bonito mountain. There is no license fee for any public, community-based TEDx event.

The commandant asked the men to volunteer for the build. While there would be no pay, their room and board would be covered. Some of the men volunteered, while others did not. So the commandant put those who refused to work to work anyway.

He asked who in the group was a carpenter and whether they could put a roof on the buildings. Those who said they could do the job were put to work directly on the buildings. The non-volunteers would not disclose what skills they had, so the commandant assigned them to the Coxen Hole to West End road being built at that time — by far the harder work. They had to carve out and level the road using only shovels and hoes.

My father, Archie Jones, was part of the group of men who volunteered. The next day, the commandant delegated duties to each of the men working on the buildings, matching each man’s skills to his job. My father was a painter and a seaman by profession.

The men worked the first week fully, and once the week was done, the commandant let them go back to their homes. Only about half of them showed up for work the following Monday. The commandant was annoyed, as they had all promised to return, so he sent the soldiers out looking for them. They caught a few of the men who had deserted, while others hid in the bush. The ones he caught were put to work on the hardest part of the road construction as punishment, and he did not let them go home the next weekend.

They caught a few of the men who had deserted.

My dad told me that he spoke to the commandant himself. He explained to him that he had a wife and children, as well as a farm. He was willing to do the work, but he needed to leave by 3 p.m. each day to tend to his duties to his family and his farm, and he would return by 8 a.m. the next morning.

The commandant agreed to his proposal, but warned him that he had better keep his word. The commandant had seen my dad work and was greatly impressed by his skill at painting, so he instructed him to paint the entire building — a job that took about two months to complete. Their deal stood strong the whole time.

Several other men made their own agreements with the commandant. For those who did not, a rift grew between the men and the commandant, and some ran off in the night. Eventually the structures were finished and painted. One building was the two-story cabildo and the other housed the commandant’s office, the governor’s office, the judge of letters’ office, the post office, and the customs house.

Burning of the dories

I should point out that at this time, not many islanders spoke Spanish, and as time went on, more disagreements arose between the islanders and the commandant. Another example of this rift was when the commandant issued a new law not allowing horses within the main street of Coxen Hole due to the waste. This caused issues, as most transport of goods was done by horse. Islanders were forced to leave their horses on the outskirts and walk with their items to sell.

The commandant later accused the islanders of smuggling merchandise off the ships that came from Mobile, Belize, Florida, and elsewhere. The merchandise was supposed to arrive at the main dock in Coxen Hole, but the men were accused of going out by dory, off West End, to take a portion of the goods from the ships before they could pass through the customs house. The commandant used to say, “These islanders would smuggle under the nose of Jesus Christ.”

The commandant decided he would go to West End and burn up all the dories. Someone tipped the islanders off to his plan. The islanders hid all of their good dories in the mangroves, sinking them with rocks and water so they would stay submerged and out of sight. By the time the commandant arrived, he found only some old dories that the men had placed there as a diversion. The commandant ordered his soldiers to pile up the old dories and burn them all. He suspected the island people had pulled a trick on him, since there should have been many more dories — but he decided this was enough to send his message and put a stop to the smuggling.

A woman, a dog, and a local

Around this time, a yacht arrived in Coxen Hole, and her owner was a woman. The boat stayed for some time in an area called Close Harbour, located near where the west end of the airport sits today. The commandant and the woman became close friends.

The woman had a dog, which she would bring ashore around the park each evening. The locals also went to the park in the evenings. On one occasion the dog bit a local man very badly and he ended up killing it. It was reported that this dog had bitten several other people as well.

The woman complained about the killing of her dog to the commandant, who responded by sending soldiers to arrest the local man. They beat him with a bullwhip as punishment. The local man had confided in a friend that he planned to take revenge on the men who beat him. His friend convinced him it would be safer to go than to stay and risk further trouble with the commandant. He later moved to the U.S. Once the commandant vacated his position, the local man returned to the island.

The complaint to the president

A group of islanders decided to travel to Tegucigalpa to submit a formal complaint against the commandant. It was 1944 and they met with General Carías, who was president of Honduras at the time. Gen. Carías listened to them and told them he would relieve the commandant of his post in Roatan and relocate him elsewhere. The general also told the men that he would be sending a new commandant — one he knew personally — and warned that if the problems continued, he would look upon the islanders as the cause.

Colonel Ernesto Cruz

The commandant’s replacement, Colonel Ernesto Cruz, arrived on the island in 1944. In 1945 he brought a secretary to work alongside him, a man by the name of Rafael Moya. The colonel got along very well with the islanders and was well liked by everyone. The Gough brothers in Oak Ridge built a boat and named her after him: the “Colonel Cruz.”

Rafael Moya married my sister, Caroline Jones, in 1951. As a boy of six, I spent a great deal of time in Coxen Hole with my sister between 1951 and 1955. I would stop by the colonel’s office a couple of days each week. He kept a paperweight on his desk — a brass anchor — that I used to play with whenever I visited.

When the colonel finished his tenure in 1956, after 12 years in Roatan, he returned to the mainland. Before he left, he gave me that brass anchor and told me to anchor my own boat down with it once I got one. I always planned to visit him when I became a man, but I was never able to make the trip. He later died on a farm outside of San Pedro Sula. There are still descendants of Colonel Cruz living in the Coxen Hole area to this day.

I still have that anchor. It hangs in my den at my home. I often look at it, reminiscing about those years.

Both roads were dealing with an increase in vehicular traffic. They were not built even for small Japanese made sedans. Those were the first of the taxis coming over from the mainland. Those old jalopies had been driving around French Harbour and Roatan for years. Then there were the busses ferrying passengers from the bus depot on the Hill to Coxen Hole, points further west and to Oak Ridge to the east. Some islanders had the latest models of Ford and Chevrolet trucks and SUVs.

This would have been the setting in French Harbour when I joined my older brothers to visit our cousin Howard [Howie] Woods beneath his parents’ house on the Point. In the evening time, in his back yard, Howie was building a speedboat from the bottom up. This would have been after a long day’s work of preparing shrimp boats for the approaching season.

It all started with a movie that Howie saw.

We enjoyed taking some time to watch Howie work. I listened to him tell me what inspired him to build the speedboat and what his plans were for the structure that was slowly coming together. Others enjoyed doing so as well, and there was usually a small gathering of friends and family – distant and near – observing Howie’s progress on the speedboat.

It all started with a movie that Howie saw at Mister Homer’s movie theater, a structure that stood next to the cement bridge for decades. The movie was Tequila Sunrise, and featured a speedboat that captured the imagination of the eighteen-year-old. Howie was so impressed with the custom-built Chris-Craft 312 Stinger that he decided to build one himself. Albeit his version was to be a smaller, one engine boat.

Working for roughly one year, part time in the evenings, Howie figured the process out along the way by trial and error. He did not have a blueprint. He did not have the internet. It was difficult and time consuming to get the supplies he needed, but he persisted. “I was going to name the speedboat the Tequila Sunrise,” he said. “But people started calling her the Red Devil.” That is the name that stuck, although it was not painted on her.

It was on the Red Devil that, on the day the speedboat was launched, many folks made their way to his father’s wharf near the harbor entrance. She was twenty feet long, eight feet wide at the widest point, and carried a 200 horsepower Yamaha two-cycle engine that reached speeds of 62 miles per hour.

It seemed that half of French Harbour had come out to that wharf and Howie was giving quick rides to most of them. Three or four people at a time went speeding west just past Sarah Key and speeding back. It seemed Howie did so for hours. I am happy to note that I was among them that day.

With the proof being in the pudding, over the next several years Howie built five more speedboats. While most of them were for folks in French Harbour and one was for a lady from California who lived in the West End area. After some years, Howie parted with the Red Devil, selling her to Mister Arnie Grant from Coxen Hole, who named her the Morat Queen.

Then for decades, nothing. Until his son, Howie Jr., who had grown up with the stories about the Red Devil and had seen the photographs, set out to track down the speedboat. She was found ashore, a total mess and abandoned for at least a decade in Calabash Bight.

Howie Jr. and a friend or two set out to renovate the Red Devil, with advice and assistance from his father available whenever it was needed. They did the renovation in French Key and once completed she was christened Tequila Sunrise. Today she carries a 300 horsepower Suzuki motor and tops out at 62 miles per hour.

Cecil Kern Hyde Elwin was born on January 16, 1942 in his French Harbour parent’s home. Mrs. Dora Cooper, of Oak Ridge assisted with the birth. Little Kern was the third of four children. He had two older brothers: Mead and Allan, and a younger sister Judy Ann.

Kern, like other students, would walk barefoot to Mrs. Vera’s school, where he completed five grades. He would also attend the Honduran government school in the mornings. At 13, little Kern was sent to study in La Ceiba at “Los Hermanos Unidos en Cristo” that would later become known as Bethel Institute.

Mr. Kern spent time in La Ceiba when the town was thriving as a banana company town, one of the biggest such towns in Honduras. In the 1950s, La Ceiba was small, colorful and full of life. Standard Fruit company created its own self sufficient world with schools, churches, and a bowling alley.

Wednesdays and Saturdays were the mail delivery days.

At the time, the only link between La Ceiba and the rest of Honduras was the narrow gage Standard Fruit railway that weaved its way to Tela. Travelers venturing further would spend the night there and continue via the narrow gage of United Fruit railway to San Pedro Sula. These railways offered first and second class seating.

Back in Roatan, young Mr. Kern started helping his father with the family business – sea fright. The family’s workhorse vessel at the time was Judy, an 85 foot schooner built by Hersel Elwin. She would sail loaded with coconuts from French Harbour to Bonacca, pick up more coconuts there, and continue on to Miami. Sometimes the boat would go only seven miles an hour, arriving in the US after four or five days. On the way back Judy would bring US produced supplies for supermarkets in the Cayman Islands and finally return to French Harbour. The cycle would repeat itself every three weeks from August to January, when coconuts were most plentiful.

While working on Roatan Mr. Kern enrolled in a correspondence course at the American School in Chicago. He completed 16 educational units and received a coveted high school diploma.

The postal system was the lifeline for islanders back then. The mail offered a way to stay in touch with family in the US and communicate with businesses on the mainland. In the 1950s, the important title of French Harbour postmaster was carried by Tyson McNab. He had a room in the back of his home that would serve as the post office, available to weigh letters and sell stamps. Wednesdays and Saturdays were the mail delivery days, when a boat would arrive from La Ceiba. Mail was both efficient and affordable. An airmail letter mailed on Monday in Florida would arrive on Saturday on Roatan.

Mr. Kern’s passion and adventure with a video camera began when he was on a visit to Tampa in 1960. He purchased an 8mm Bell & Howell movie camera. From then on he began documenting the family and island life.

At 19, in 1961, Mr. Kern was appointed a captain on Judy. Not long after Mr. Kern switched to captain, the 120 foot long boat Altier that was both bigger and faster than Judy.

Young and handsome, Mr. Kern married Ruby Nood, a young lady he met at the Blue Wave bar on the Bonacca Cay. He was 21 years of age. The couple built a home in French Harbour and had four children together: Lisa, Jed, Joni and Jenna.

At 23, during Christmas 1964, Mr. Kern found himself with Altier in the Bahamas delivering a cargo of yucca. His crewmen were using gasoline to clean an area when a spark ignited a fire. The fire quickly spread through the entire ship. As the floor of the burning Altier gave way, one of the shipmates caught the arm of Mr. Kern and pulled him up to safety. The young captain almost lost his life.

The Hyde family was always looking to expand their family business. The year 1965 provided an opportunity to get into the shrimp business that was booming in Western Caribbean, and the family purchased two shrimp boats to get their feet wet. Their business peaked in 1978, when the Hyde family managed a fleet of 23 fishing boats.

Mr. Kern remembers the first investors who saw their future on Roatan: Roy Anderson on the far East end of Roatan, Harvey Mayer who opened an ice plant in Oak Ridge, and Mike Hold bridge in French Harbour.

As an energetic octogenarian, Mr. Kern spends his time between Roatan and Florida. Since 2010 he has worked at Hybur, the Hyde family business, in an advisory capacity. Mr. Kern feels most proud to have worked with his family.

In July Roatan Turned into a Fashion Runway Again

Several local families took part as models in the fashion event. First on the catwalk were Alejandra and Guillermo Colindres and their two children. “We decided to participate because we thought it would be a great opportunity to connect with the community and for our children to start experiencing how amazing the Roatán community really is,” said Guillermo Colindres.

Another modeling pair was Gary Chamer and his daughter Emily. “What surprised me most was how challenging modeling actually is and how much confidence and courage it takes,” said Emily Chamer. “It’s not just about walking down a runway, you have to focus on your posture, facial expressions, poses, and overall presence.”

It’s not just about walking down a runway.

Honduran fashion was represented by Dave Bodega, Abraham Pacheco, Bélgica Suárez, Rosyl Mejía, Vanessa Vallecillo, Kiandra Dixon and Roatan Vibes Boutique. There were also clothes from abroad — several Colombian fashion houses: Quimera, Eriko, Bless and Dulce Menta.

The catwalk took the models around the large infinity pool. All in all, 38 models participated in the two-day event.

The organizers of the Roatan Fashion Show were Patricia Valle Guilliams, the founder, and its director Margarita Gardeazabal. Guilliams organized the first edition of the event last year after moving to Roatan with her husband to retire in 2021. “My background in fashion is going shopping to the mall,” says Mrs. Patricia, who was born in San Pedro Sula and had a career as an educator in Missouri. “I love Honduras, I always wanted to move back,” said Patricia.

About 300 people attended the show at Watercolors, a 25-acre condominium and villas development on a property of rolling hills facing the Caribbean sunset coast at West Bay beach. “It was a first-event at Watercolors,” said Matt Cameron, owner of the development.

The following day, Sol y Mar became a fashion venue. The theme of the show for 2026 was “Fashion with Purpose” as it raised awareness and funds for Bay Islands Wings Foundation. The theme of the first edition of the event in 2025 was “Fashion Dressed in Solidarity,” raising funds for Clínica Esperanza.

Island Housing Development’s Past and Future

The business of developing housing units on Roatan is booming. Roatan is already dotted with housing developments, as from the tip of West Bay to the end of Camp Bay there are over 70 housing communities. While the biggest ones like Coral Views Village, Parrot Tree Plantation and Lawson Rock have over 100 house lots each, there are plenty of small developments with as few as three houses.

Housing developments on the island come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. Mostly they are residential housing communities, but there are also condominiums, residential resorts and subdivisions. The construction trend is picking up. According to Steve Hasz, owner of Roatan Life Real Estate, there are approximately 12 new developments that broke ground since 2023.

While many of those are luxury and high-end projects, many are affordable and middle income. In general, gated housing communities in Honduras are not only for the wealthy and foreigners. In large urban areas like San Pedro Sula, Tegucigalpa and La Ceiba, all sorts of housing developments are surrounded by walls and their entry points are guarded. Roatan now has several affordable gated communities that were developed over the past few decades: Roatan Uno and Los Sueños are examples of some of those.

Henwood’s project didn’t provide underground utilities and didn’t have Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions (CC&Rs), a Home Owners Association or gated access. Brick Bay Colonia served as an example for others that came later.

These days a housing community being “gated” could mean many things on the island. A couple dozen communities indeed have a gate and a guardhouse at points of entry. Many, however, just have a watchman, or a watchman who doubles as a gardener, a pool boy and a beach cleaner. “Often a gardener would also clean the beach and take care of the pool. I’d call those ‘gated’ communities,” says Steve Hasz, owner of Roatan Life real estate brokerage.

The reality of living in Honduras is different than in the U.S., but increasingly less so. “In North America, I wouldn’t live in a ‘gated’ community. Here I have and do,” says Hasz, who has been living on the island since the mid-1990s. “Since the taxes are so low, the municipality doesn’t provide the same level of infrastructure and security that is provided in North America. Having good services and someone keeping an occasional eye on the neighborhood is a good thing and gives me peace of mind.” What attract people to the island is the climate, nature and culture, but what makes them build a home is the security.

In the mid-1990s Roatan was a different place. The beaches were virgin, forests unspoiled and plentiful. What were not so plentiful were paved roads, or heavy equipment and materials to construct them.

It took a few years for things to fall into place, but the island gradually became an attractive place not only for adventurous home buyers, but for more mainstream foreign and mainland homeowners. Roatan got its daily ferry connection with La Ceiba in 1994, an airport was opened in 1995, the road to West Bay was cut in 1992, and around 1996 Honduras’ National Port Authority (ENP) inaugurated a dock that could be used by cruise ships.

The mid-1990s was also the beginning of the housing boom for the island, and the first movers had an uphill battle. Housing developers that came to Roatan at that time were American, Honduran and Canadian. Those development pioneers were John Edwards with Parrot Tree Plantation and Mayan Princess, Ricardo Maduro with Big Bight Resort and Villas, David Sellon with Lawson Rock and Kent Owenby with Palmetto Bay Plantation.

Historically, many Roatan developers were not professional developers but people from all kinds of different backgrounds — doctors like Dr. Henwood and Dr. Don Goin, a retired surgeon; architects like David Sellon and Gary Chamer; Herb Morici, a telemarketing executive; and Kent Owenby, a banking executive. Hasz says that developers on Roatan come from many different backgrounds. “You have a mix of North Americans, Europeans, Guatemalans, Salvadorans, and mainland Hondurans,” says Hasz.

Historically, developers have financed their projects themselves, with family capital or savings. They would start with their own money, then look for a Honduran bank to loan them additional funds. Subsequent phases of housing projects would be financed by sales of lots and condominiums. “Lawson Rock Phase 1 is an example of that, where all the first amenities were put in place at the developer’s cost, and then 40 of the first lots sold in less than two years,” says Hasz, who also lives and works in the development. “That system works much better because a buyer is not waiting on promised amenities like underground power, paved roads, pools, docks, etc.”

Mid 1990s was the beginning of the boom.

Hasz says that housing developers on the island can be divided into three groups: landowners trying to monetize their land, hospitality operators adding residences, and investors reacting to demand. Developers thrive, or fail because of financing. Many times, developments are financed by the developer initially putting in some funds and starting the development, then proceeding in phases and making improvements based on income from sales of lots and condominiums. Some developers who arrived on the island in the last 10 years are better funded and build infrastructure prior to first sales.

Over the last 30 years the success of developers of gated housing developments on Roatan depended on several factors. Sometimes it was just the timing of the project as far as the economy in the U.S. or a political events in Honduras. The 2008 economic crisis in the U.S. and the 2009 Honduran coup put a nail in the coffin of several housing projects. The government-imposed lockdowns of 2020 weren’t much help either, and many developers struggled. So it is sometimes luck, and often the skill and determination of the developer to handle adversity and stress over the long process of developing a project.

One of the more successful longtime Roatan developers is Henrik Jensen, a Dane who has lived and developed projects in Cayos Cochinos, Utila and Roatan since the mid-1990s. With Adam Gram, a fellow Dane, he developed Coral Views Village, a gated community that launched in 2014. His 120-acre, 240-house-lot project overlooks French Key and is by far the biggest such project on the island. Coral Views lots were originally sold for between $39,000 and $150,000. “First year alone we sold 80 lots,” Jensen recalls of the sales boom. He believes that the key to his success was not taking bank financing for the development.

Jensen is currently developing the Sanctuary project near Crawfish Rock and Sea Cliffs, a 120-lot development on Utila’s northern shore. As one of the veteran developers on the island, Jensen sees housing developments on the island evolving to offer a different product. “It will be smaller land lots, but high-end facilities,” says Jensen. “The infrastructure costs are too expensive.” Roads, culverts and underground power cost much more to bring to lots that are 0.15 acres than 1 acre.

Over the last 30 years a typical house lot in a development has gotten smaller. Since the 1990s land prices have risen dramatically, and that is reflected in the size of lots offered by developers trying to make a profit and keep lot prices affordable. There are some island developments that offer lots as small as 0.1 acre and as large as one acre. “Realtors typically recommend not going below one-fifth of an acre (0.2 acre), since lower density puts less pressure on our infrastructure,” says Hasz. The smallest lots barely leave enough room for a septic system.

While location is very important to the success of a development, island developments vary greatly in this regard. Some housing projects have been built on beaches at a considerable distance from main roads. Other projects are bisected by the main island road and are built on steep 45-degree slopes. Some offer sea views from home sites while others are more urban and offer limited views.

From a homeowner’s perspective, “a successful development will foster an environment of peace with little conflict and a sense of community for the neighborhood,” says Hasz. To attract home buyers, larger projects provide a host of amenities: beach access, community pools, a restaurant or a gym.

Many housing developments, to keep things orderly and preserve home values, have organized themselves into homeowners associations. “In general, developed HOAs here are not a profit center, but are a way for the residents to share costs to get better services,” says Hasz.

The basics, such as community wells, paved roads and underground electric power, come at a price, and homeowners have to pay a monthly fee — somewhere between $200 and $350 — to pay for security, water and maintenance.

There are also many island developments that have very low HOA fees, or even no fees at all. The homeowners in a community pay to fix roads or make improvements by contributing to a fund as those expenses arise.

After the initial wave of developments in the mid-1990s, a second wave of developers came to the island in the mid-2000s. The island was already on the map of international airlines, and cruise ships were starting to come as well. These included Keyhole Bay, Oceano, Westin and Nikki Beach. In some ways those projects struggled more than projects that were started in the 1990s. The 2008 financial crisis and the 2009 Honduras political upheaval took their toll on the island economy.

One issue that proved to be the downfall of several large housing developments on the island was almost predatory lending practices by some Honduran banks. The high interest rates, quick repayment requirements and use of land as collateral created a situation where half-built projects were taken over by the banks that made loans that were almost repaid. Those banks are under little pressure to sell those assets, and after decades without proper maintenance, several once-luxury projects deteriorated to the point of being uninhabitable, leaving investors who had purchased units with nothing.

Developers thrive or die because of financing.

Banks like Atlántida and FICOHSA now own large failed developments such as Big Bight Resort, Oceano and Westin in Neverstain Bight. These parcels of land, sometimes partially developed, tie up the best seafront land on the island. They temper, for better or for worse, the development of the island. The banks hold on to several hundred acres of some of the best land on Roatan and don’t feel much pressure to sell, holding on to them for decades.

The key to his success was not taking bank financing.

Maduro’s Big Bight

There were a handful of Honduran developers associated with the Big Bight Resort and Villas, but the most famous was Ricardo Maduro, president of Honduras’ Central Bank at the time and future Honduran president.

The north-side project broke ground in 1996 and sold 11 lots before going bust. Lot prices started at $35,000 and were generous in size — from a quarter-acre to two acres. The project had a boat harbor, a marina restaurant and a tennis court. Two homes were constructed, but Honduran politics had an impact on the project. When Maduro became the country’s president in 2002, the project took a back seat to his other priorities.

A quarter-century later the wooden structures fell apart or were taken by locals as building materials. The asphalt tennis court and the harbor are holding on, however. FICOHSA bank owns the property and is currently looking for a buyer.

A quarter-century later the wooden structures fell apart or were taken by locals as building materials. The asphalt tennis court and the harbor are holding on, however. FICOHSA bank owns the property and is currently looking for a buyer.

Lawson Rock

The original 133 acres of Lawson Rock was purchased for $2.5 million by developer David Sellon and his Colorado Springs associates Jon and Scott Campbell of Campbell Homes. The project took off in the late 1990s, and by the 2000s Lawson Rock was considered one of the more exclusive developments. Lawson Rock is set in Sandy Bay’s rolling hills on 107 acres. It has 103 land lots, eight sea lots and 23 condominiums. Many people consider it to be the best-designed development on the island.

Palmetto Bay

In 1996, Palmetto Bay was called Plantation and was developed by Kent Owenby. Bill Brady, a North Carolina architect who has lived on Roatan since 1972, laid out the community’s first roads and designed several of the first homes there. “I’ve never seen so many snakes and scorpions in my life,” Brady recalls his initial work in Palmetto. In 1998, a group from Denver, Colorado, headed by architect Gary Chamer bought out the 14-acre project and things picked up even more. Chamer purchased two adjacent land parcels and the community gradually grew in the 2000s.

Palmetto Bay’s remote location, at the end of a dirt road accessible from Sandy Bay and French Harbour, was marketed as ecological and authentic. That location also filtered and attracted potential home buyers. Those who did purchase the large, minimum half-acre lots there were people who had a sense of adventure and pioneering in their hearts. There was a British polar explorer, a windsurfing pioneer, retired Vermont farmers and a rock-and-roll musician who was arrested following the Jan. 6, 2021, events at the U.S. Capitol.

Since 2019 the community has had a paved road and is thriving. Currently Palmetto Bay has 61 house lots and 27 bungalows, with another 14 bungalow homes planned for a total of 102 residences.

Developers on Roatan come from many different backgrounds.

Las Palmas

Las Palmas was developed by Kent Owenby in the late 1990s. Eventually Banco Atlántida took over the project, and for a decade or so it lay in limbo. Now, like Roatan Uno, the property is owned by Italian businessman Massimo Mazzone. Mazzone is based in San Pedro Sula and owns Central American Consulting & Capital. Las Palmas also has a small hotel, is an almost daily cruise ship destination, and 50 luxury homes are being planned for development.

Mazzone is also the person behind Honduras’ second ZEDE project — Ciudad Morazán, a manufacturing and housing project outside of Choloma, Cortés. It was the second of three ZEDE projects set up in Honduras, after Roatan’s Próspera and before Orquídea, an agro-industrial ZEDE located in Choluteca.

Keyhole Bay

When it broke ground in 2003, Keyhole Bay joined some of the first gated communities. There were only a handful of those 20 years ago. Dan Taylor was Keyhole Bay’s developer. “A lot of people come here and are looking for like-minded people. People of similar interests, someone who can help them,” said Taylor. Keyhole Bay had 23 roughly one-third-acre lots and Taylor eventually built 20 of a planned 56 condominiums.

As developer of Keyhole Bay, Taylor had to ensure that standards of design and construction were being met. “The first house was so poorly built that it was torn down before it was finished,” says Taylor. “It was condemned.” This decision ensured that the following homes were built well, and their owners had confidence in preserving value of their investment.

The 2008 economic crisis and the Zelaya presidential coup of 2009 hit the island hard. Things got difficult financially for many developers. In 2012, Keyhole Bay was taken over by Atlántida Bank.

Looking back, Taylor, an owner of four engineering service companies on Roatan, thinks he made some key strategic mistakes that cost him his development. “I was foolish,” says Taylor. “I put in my money and kept reinvesting every bit of profit instead of taking money out as profit.” He feels he overexposed himself in one investment.

Santamaría

This housing community was launched in 2004. While never meant to be a gated community, it was nonetheless a tight-knit neighborhood with its own consensus built rules and ethos. The originator of the project was Elmer Santamaría, a teacher and currently a municipal councilman at the Roatan Municipality. Santamaría contacted FUNDEVI, a nonprofit that helped finance low-income housing on the Honduran mainland. He found a 10-acre piece of land in Dixon Cove, and the site was divided into 138 home sites. The 10-meter-by-12-meter lots with a small house structure were sold for $3,000. Now some of them cost almost that much per square foot.

Pristine Bay

Roatan’s first golf course community was developed by Guatemalan-based North Shore Development Company, headed by Victor Enrique Toriello and Luis Pedro Toriello Passarelli.

While initially the development was going well, it stumbled and was taken over by Atlántida bank in 2018. A couple of years later it was purchased by Próspera. Even with those changes, house lot prices in Pristine Bay have not held up well. The original million-dollar house lots from 2008 are sometimes selling for around $300,000.

Flowers Bay, too

There is one gated housing community in Flowers Bay and it is unique on the entire island. Los Sueños is an affordable income housing development that provided an opportunity for working-class Hondurans to own a piece of the island.

The community is a project of David Dashner, a Texas entrepreneur who developed the Kimpton Grand Roatan. In order to launch the project, 180 families were interviewed for the first 25 houses. While the 500-square-foot houses were appraised at $30,000, the families only had to pay a fraction of that sum over 20 years. The project formally opened in 2022.

Los Sueños has its own gated security and is also a good neighbor to the people of Flowers Bay. It offers them free access to a children’s playground, a basketball court and a library.

Northview

NorthView is an example of one of the new projects that have launched on the island in the last couple of years. The plan is to create a community of 250-300 homes on 100 acres centered around a beach and a nine-hole, par-3 golf course. The project is being built by Grupo Innovar, a Siguatepeque-based development and engineering company. Innovar is one of several mainland developers that have come to Roatan since 2022.

In 2026 there is plenty of room for developing housing communities on the island. Roatan offers an environment that more developed Caribbean destinations don’t have. They either never had it or lost it. Some became overdeveloped like Cancún, others lack authenticity like the Cayman Islands, some are politically untouchable like Cuba or Nicaragua, or unsafe like Jamaica. “Typically, our buyer demographic is people who are moving away from areas like Cancún and Miami and are looking for a more old Caribbean island experience,” says Steve Hasz.

There are some obvious opportunities and large niches in housing development. One local developer is looking to create a “Blue Zone” development — a housing project that integrates ideas of longevity, active movement, community connection and purpose. “This development could be a type of eco-development with solar power, native landscaping, passive cooling, and low-maintenance materials,” says Hasz.

Roatan is ready for more and better-planned communities that fit the island’s geography and demographics. There is room for several niche housing communities — people of similar interests, similar value systems, and older adults who want an alternative to what they can find in the U.S., Canada or Europe.

Developers on Roatan come from many different backgrounds.

Another niche still unexplored on the island is an assisted living housing development. As the level of health care and health services for the elderly has improved, the island has become a place where people in their late 70s and 80s can consider living.