In 2026, around 11 million Hondurans live in the country, and another 900,000 live abroad, primarily in the U.S. and Spain. About 154,000 Catrachos are born each year, and while the Honduran median age has fallen drastically, it still stands at 25. Both Honduras and Roatan have a youthful, energetic population.

Several demographic models project that by 2050, Honduras will have around 17 million people. That population increase, especially in an aging developed world, will give Honduras significantly more clout and geopolitical influence.

With 2.4 children per Catracha, Honduras stands in stark contrast to the collapsing native populations of Europe, the U.S., Japan and South Korea. South Korea now has a birth rate of 0.8 children per woman. The average in Spain is now 1.1 children, and U.S.-born women have an average of 1.7 children. These numbers are well below the replacement level of 2.1 children per woman.

Also the divergence in birth rates dynamics is staggering. An average age of a first time mother in Spain is 32, while in Honduras it is 20. Western World birth rate implosion phenomena created an opportunity for Honduras and Roatan. At the same time the island grew, developed and has become an attractive place to live.

The definition of a “native” Roatan islander has evolved.

Roatan has relied on migrants and immigrants for economic growth and to maintain the skill sets necessary to do so. The proximity to mainland Honduras, with its 11 million people, created coast-to-island migration from departments of Atlántida, Colón and Yoro. The higher-skilled management positions on the island are filled by natives of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba. That is where the majority of the island’s service-sector managers, doctors and lawyers hail from.

While historically islanders have been looking for job opportunities in the U.S. or at sea since the early 20th century. Many have left the island and settled in the U.S. or worked for banana companies on the mainland. That has changed. Roatan will likely continue demographic trends that have appeared here over the past 25 years and have strengthened in the past five.

Given wage disparities and job opportunities, mainland Hondurans have been moving to Roatan in significant numbers since the 1990s. The boom in the construction sector, tourism and service industries, security companies employing thousands of workers, and even seafood processing plants has attracted mainlanders to Roatan with the prospect of a better economic future.

What Roatan’s population will look like in 2050 is starting to emerge. The growth will continue, or more likely, it will oscillate, much as it has over the past 25 years. Roatan had three periods of stagnation this century: the 2008 U.S. financial crisis, the 2009 Honduran presidential coup and its aftermath, and the 2020-21 COVID-19 lockdowns. It also suffered under some incompetent, corrupt mayors in both Roatan municipalities who made many poor policy decisions and practically brought the island economy to a standstill.

I estimate that around 115,000 people live permanently on Roatan for six months or longer. This estimate is based on observations of RECO peak power demand, overall business trends and population shifts. The estimate is not scientific, but it is meant to be an educated guess. Since the government does not conduct such surveys, and its once-a-decade censuses are tragically inaccurate, I did my best to provide a rough estimate.

The island population will likely continue to grow by around 2.5%, or 2,870 people a year, or eight people a day. That would put Roatan’s population at 190,000 by 2050, assuming growth barely one percentage point above Honduras’ national average of 1.5%. If that percentage rises to a realistic 3%, we are looking at 210,000 people living on Roatan, Santa Helena and Barbareta. By that time, the currently uninhabited island of Morat might even have a few residents.

The ethnic demographic trends will likely continue as they have over the past years. The number and percentage of mestizo mainlanders will continue to grow, and they probably account for about 50,000 to 60,000, or half of the island’s current population.

The Garifuna population, now about 4,000, will grow slightly but lose its percentage share of the island’s total population. The Black, English-speaking islander population, currently about 30,000, will likely continue growing slowly. The White native islander population, now about 3,000, will likely maintain its numbers.

Roatan had three periods of stagnation this century.

The populations moving to Roatan in the greatest numbers are from the Honduran mainland. While Hondurans from all 17 mainland departments live here, some departments and populations are heavily over represented. The population of about 7,000 Miskito Indians living on Roatan, also known as Waikna, will likely double. That is due to two factors: Miskito birth rates of about three to four children per woman, which exceed those of other ethnic groups, and continued migration from Gracias a Dios Department to the island.

The Miskito live in Honduras’ most economically challenged and undeveloped department. They are also hardworking, skillful workers. They work in security, service and construction. They do not expect high living standards, as they come from very basic circumstances on the Miskito Coast. They also help one another and readily offer a place to stay to cousins who come to Roatan looking for work. In fact, the Miskito language on Roatan surpassed the prevalence of the Garifuna language several years ago and is now the third-most widely spoken language on the island.

The foreign population residing on Roatan will likely grow due to migration from the U.S., Canada and, increasingly, Europe. These island residents of European descent currently number around 6,000, but that figure will likely double. Their numbers are growing by a couple hundred each year. As life in many parts of Europe and North America becomes increasingly uncomfortable, and life on Roatan more comfortable, that migration trend should accelerate.

The “retirement” and “adventure” immigrants come here in their 60s. The vast majority of them don’t have children on the island and return to their country of origin in their late 70s and 80s. While many will likely eventually return to their country of origin, Roatan will increasingly offer hospice and home hospital care for those who decide to live out their old age here.

The definition of a “native” Roatan islander has evolved for centuries. From about 1,000 AD to around 1650, native islanders were the Paya Indians. Today, most people living on Roatan do not even know who Paya were.

Then, for about 50 years, from 1797 through the 1840s, the “native” islanders were the Garifuna. From the 1840s to the 1990s, Roatan’s “natives” were island-born White, Black and Garifuna residents. In the 1990s, mestizo migration from the Honduran mainland took off, and by around 2015, “native” islanders had become a minority. One thing that never changes on Roatan is that the island constantly evolves.

I jumped at the chance to write about Bay Islands history, of course, when Chas Watkins asked me to write a foreword to his latest book. Besides writing, I derive great pleasure from researching and sharing my findings. Many academic papers have been written about our anthropology and geology, but much remains unknown or unsolved thus far.

We don’t know exactly when the Bonacca Ridge was formed, and we still don’t know if the Paya Indians were indeed the only Indians to have lived here. Besides being a longtime resident for the past 17 years, Chas shares my curiosity about our history, among other things. Having lived here since the relative beginnings of the development boom, he has seen much change and has a lot to share from his experiences and local knowledge.

The original inhabitants prior to the Europeans were most likely the Paya Indians. This is a conclusion disputed by many archeologists during the 10 known expeditions to the islands since 1924. There is evidence of the presence of Maya, Lenca and Jicaque aborigines in the Bay Islands; however, the strongest evidence points to the Payas, specifically a group originating south of Trujillo.

Evidence unearthed by Islanders in recent history points mostly to residential sites, but also to offertory, burial and some ceremonial sites (interestingly, the largest and most significant being a 40-acre site on Utila and a several-acre site in Plan Grande, Guanaja). “Yaba Ding Dings” (Indian artifacts) being a common find throughout the Bay Islands drew amateur archeologists as well as looters to the aboriginal sites. Sadly, the first Bay Islander’s idyllic lifestyle of fishing, farming and turtling started its decline with the arrival of the first Europeans and with Christopher Columbus’ fourth voyage in 1504.

Augusta in Port Royal was part of this ‘Royalization’.

Slowly, the Spaniards began to take control of the Indians’ lives, and they were subject to the same treatment as other indigenous peoples in accessible locations the world over for around 136 years, first being raided and enslaved, Christianized and then exploited as laborers.

Their legacy today are the old pieces of pottery jars strewn around the hills of the Islands. There are a few interesting monoliths in Guanaja and their names, which could be where the three island names originated: Wa-nak-ka (Guanaja), the modern Payan word for ‘cloud’; Arroa or Roata (Roatan), modern Payan for ‘Pine’; and Uu-tia (Utila), meaning ‘sand-water.’ It was not until 1638 that another European Imperial power, the English, challenged Spanish control of the region.

It was when the Puritan settlement of the Providence Company under William Claiborne and a group of English and Scots emigrants from Virginia and Maryland settled in what is Old Port Royal today. The colony, however, was short-lived. It lasted just four years, and besides Claiborne’s cousin, Captain Butler, making a nuisance of himself by burning down the four Indian towns in the islands and creating strife with them, England was in the midst of a civil war, and as a result, there was no protection available in the Caribbean.

By the end of 1642, most of the settlers were evicted, and the islands remained sparsely populated, with the only inhabitants being the few remaining Paya who had not died, run away to the continent or had been enslaved. A few English settlers who had remained turned to darker ways and joined in the wave of piracy that was sweeping the Caribbean, filling the power vacuum left by the Spanish and English.

Nelson was stationed in Port Royal.

There is much commercialization of the fact that the Bay Islands were once frequented by buccaneers. The name of the infamous Henry Morgan is used frequently, but it is disputed that the Bay Islands were his base of operations. It is more likely he just passed through to collect water or victuals or careen his vessels on more than one occasion.

Two of the most notorious pirates who were known to have used the islands were Blackbeard (Edward Teach or Thatch), who would careen his vessel Queen Anne’s Revenge at a shallow bar east of the airport called Thatch Point, named after him. The other notoriously violent pirate who made Roatan his sanctuary was Edward “Ned” Lowe, whose ghastly cruelty was documented by Philip Ashton, who escaped Lowe on a victualing and water supply trip to Port Royal and was subsequently marooned, escaping certain death.

The young Ashton spent two years between islands until rescued, and his story is included in Edward Leslie’s, Lost Journeys, Abandoned Souls. Many other buccaneers were rumored to have passed through since the islands were ideally positioned as a refuge after attacking Spanish ships carrying Indian treasure looted by the conquistadors from the Spanish Mainland. Names like John Coxen (after whom Coxen’s Hole is named), Morris, Jackman, Van Horn, Uring and L’Ollonais, who fixed nets, made rope from Macoa and fished for turtles when not pillaging and creating havoc.

The Bay Islands were a no-man’s land at this stage in their history for around 100 years, no more than a victualing station and temporary base for pirates, log-cutters and the odd Paya Indian survivor. At the outbreak of war (the War of Jenkin’s Ear) in 1739, England was looking at bases in the region, and the Bay Islands was one such area.

In 1742, 250 soldiers and slaves landed in Port Royal and started to build fortifications. Later, families of the soldiers were brought in to populate the area, and records show that the population in 1744 stood at 1,000. The town of Augusta in Port Royal was part of this “royalization,” with farmland being cultivated and even a cooperage set up operations.

Some settlers found the red land and oak hills unsuitable for agriculture. With William Pitt’s (the first civilian superintendent and cousin of the future prime minister of England with the same name) blessing, they moved to the northwest coast of the island to Anthony’s Cay (today Key) and began to cultivate 100 acres of flatter, more fertile land.

This occupation ended in 1748 with the signing of the Aix-la-Chapelle peace treaty, and the last troops left in 1749. The island once again remained abandoned with no record of any permanent settlement until 1779 when war broke out again.

Colonel Dalrymple was ordered by Jamaica to once again occupy Roatan and the Bay Islands as part of a larger English strategy to dominate the region, which included attacking Fort San Juan with disastrous results. A young Horatio Nelson participated in this raid and nearly died of malaria. Nelson was stationed in Port Royal for half of 1778 and performed anti-piracy patrols of the Western Caribbean on his first command, HMS Badger.

Omoa on the mainland was also attacked and occupied by His Majesty’s forces for a brief time. English presence in the region was eventually weakened, and the last English stronghold at Port Royal was attacked by a combined force from Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua under the leadership of Guatemalan President Matías Gálvez, who attacked on March 16, 1782. The English, seeing that they were outmanned and outgunned, scuttled their only ship in the main channel to impede the Spaniard’s access to the harbor. The fighting went on for 48 hours, and despite a valiant effort, the Spaniards were victorious. The Spaniards made a few futile attempts to populate the islands after the battle, but were mostly unsuccessful.

The drama that takes place on Roatan each day deserves a movie of its own. Every day there are road and boating accidents, landslides, and fishing drama. If not that, the island could certainly serve as a backdrop for well known and beloved Hollywood classics.
According to Frank Martin, a Hollywood producer who has made Roatan his home, the island has plenty to offer as far as far as movie reshoot locations go. Roatan is picturesque and unforgettable, albeit still a little known place. It certainly has plenty of unusual, stunning, and full-of-character locations. Here are my top eight picks for movie ideas.

1. The Shining – Brick Bay Hotel.

2. The Island of Dr. Moreau – Morat Island.

The Island of Morat lies just east of Santa Helena and is the only uninhibited island in the Bay Islands archipelago. It is also full of crocodiles – and, as some islanders swear – duppies, or lost island spirits. It is certainly worthy of a movie setting, if not the subject of a movie itself.
The one movie that could be filmed here is a remake of the science fiction horror film The Island of Dr. Moreau. The 1996 movie featured some of the best actors of the time in Marlon Brando and Val Kilmer. Yet in the end, the movie became famous not for its quality, but for its legendary production hell, perhaps the most troubled and difficult in Hollywood history. Morat islands, with its duppies, crocodiles, and Honduran legal challenges, could definitely prove a worthy match for the remake of this movie.

3. The Blue Lagoon – Marbella Beach.

This 1980 coming-of-age Brook Shields classic was filmed on an island near Fiji. While The Return to the Blue Lagoon was a dud, The Blue Lagoon III could surely be a hit. It could star actress Kiernan Shipka and take place on Marbella Beach, which is as unspoiled as it ever was. The development of this property has stalled for over a decade and remains one of the island’s last true gems. This north-shore beach is one of the prettiest spots on the entire island, period. The film crew and actors could stay at the soon-to-be-built Margaritaville Resort, just a few hundred meters from Marbella.

Legal challenges, could definitely prove a worthy match.

4. Captain Ron – Fantasy Island.

Roatan’s West End already has a famous Captain Ron, one of its long-time iconic resident. So the remake of the 1991 comedy about a Chicago family traveling to the fictional island of Pomme de Terre to claim a 60 foot yacht would be that much easier to make. The remake could be filmed on Roatan’s Fantasy Island, where many yachts come to spend the autumn months. Fantasy Island sports a great bar not unlike the one featured in the original movie.

5. Lost city of the Mayas – Neverstain Bight.

While a feature film has not yet been made about the abandoned city of “Ciudad Blanca,” it is certainly on some Hollywood producer’s lists. Filming the movie somewhere in Mosquito Coast is a possibility, but why travel that far? The legendary settlement is said to be located somewhere in the Mosquito Coast, but it was once inhabited by Paya Indians when Roatan was a Paya territory. If a Hollywood producer ever undertakes a movie about Honduras’ legendary Ciudad Blanca, they might as well film it on Roatan.
Neverstain Bight would be a great filming location, as it boasts an abandoned resort with a multitude of unfinished, concrete structures that are overgrown with trees and bush. The entire site resembles an abandoned city. This unrealized fantasy began in 2006 when a young Honduran developer broke ground on a project of two-story condos and 40 hillside homes. Westin Hotel was the intended manager of the site, but like most failed developments on Roatan, it is now owned by Banco Atlántida.
Paya called their lost “Ciudad Blanca” Kahã Kamasa, and American aviator Charles Lindbergh once spotted it while flying over eastern Honduras in the 1920s. It was given the name “white city” because the buildings and walls that surround it are white. This would fit the look already achieved by concrete cinderblocks that were used to build the city’s outer walls.

6. The Ghost Writer – Barbareta.

The Ghost Writer is a movie about an eccentric millionaire politician who gets caught up in a political scandal (like practically every millionaire does, apparently). The Ghost Writer takes place on a secluded private property in Martha’s Vineyard, but since director Roman Polanski has an ongoing legal case in the US, the movie was shot in Germany. Barbareta is unlikely to resemble Martha’s Vineyard, but it comes with its own billionaire who’s not a stranger to political debacles.

It boasts an abandoned resort with a multitude of unfinished, concrete structures.

7. Cast Away II – Swan Islands.

If the Honduran government doesn’t get its way and the prison on the Swan Islands isn’t built, the little archipelago could serve as a great location for a survival movie. The one that instantly comes to mind is Cast Away, the Robert Zemeckis film about a FedEx executive who crash lands on a Pacific island and spends four years living like a modern Robinson Crusoe. Big Swan Island, the larger of the two Swan Islands, would make a great site for a remake of this classic. As I write this, about a half-dozen Honduran soldiers are surviving on very little on the Swan Islands. Just so happens to be that the Swan Islands fall under the Roatan Municipality jurisdiction.

8. Mutiny on the Bounty – Crawfish Rock.

The Ghost Writer is a movie about an eccentric millionaire politician who gets caught up in a political scandal (like practically every millionaire does, apparently). The Ghost Writer takes place on a secluded private property in Martha’s Vineyard, but since director Roman Polanski has an ongoing legal case in the US, the movie was shot in Germany. Barbareta is unlikely to resemble Martha’s Vineyard, but it comes with its own billionaire who’s not a stranger to political debacles.

A Perspective at Many Centuries of the Changing Roatan Inhabitant

The last 500 years on Roatan have been especially interesting as far as movement of populations. It has been a roller coaster of different people coming and going from Roatan. There were expulsions, migrations and conflicts. There were dreams, plans and schemes. There were booms and busts.

In the XVI century Roatan evolved from being a self-sufficient island, to a place supporting pirates and vagabonds. It was a base for pirates in religious wars that tore Europe apart for over 200 years.

Strategically located, just off the Spanish mainland and wedged in the gulf of Honduras, Roatan has been a pawn in a geopolitical game for centuries. Spain used it as a place to get slaves for its mining operations in Cuba. Pirates acting in the interest of Protestant Europe religious wars used Roatan and its Paya inhabitants to careen and service its boats before raiding the Spanish armada.

The island changed hands several times between the Spanish and English.

The island changed hands several time between the Spanish and English. Neither power having enough interest, motivation, or resources to build up the Bay Islands archipelago into a viable, lasting out post for their culture, military and economy.

For the past 200 years Roatan was a place where families and individuals escaped oppression and fear. They launched themselves with vigor to begin new enterprises, new ventures and new life. They often replicated and tweaked businesses that were already running elsewhere. Roatanians were skillful ship builders, resourceful coconut farmers and intrepid shrimpers.

‘Homo Roataniens’ keep evolving. They are always looking out for what is the new trend and how to survive in the sea of change and interest. They launched businesses that required much red tape and sometime weren’t feasible elsewhere.

While the Bay Islands has seen influxes of populations in its history it has also seen massive expulsions. There were two expulsions of Paya Indians by the Spanish. The first one in 1642 and the final one in 1650. The expulsion of Spanish military by the British in 1779. Finally, the dumping of the rebellious and inconvenient Garifuna by the British in 1797.

The history of the island is filled with government schemes, religious colonization, wars, raids and flights to safety. Some people have come to the island with great plans and disappeared with little trace. Others came without many ambitions and left a path that has paved a way for others. This is the Roatan history for the uninitiated in a nutshell.

PAYA INDIANS
AD 600 – 1650

According to Spanish records the original Paya called Roatan island Manaua. While there has been certainly accounts of Payas interacting and fighting with Lenca and Maya, that history is unwritten and forgotten. We can only guess, deduct and assume that these events took place glancing at the scattered relics left behind by the Paya through the Bay Islands, and there are quite a few.

According to José Carlos Cardona, a Honduran historian, the Bay Islands became populated by Paya Indians around 600 AD. Around 50 archeological sites have been located in the Bay Islands. What remains of the Paya today are just buried objects of daily life.

There are refuse heaps full of broken pottery shards, yaba-ding-dings, fish bones and stone tools. There are also less common Paya sites – offertories located on hilltops, and a burial site overlooking French Harbour. There is a major Paya residential site on Pulpit Rock on the east side of the Roatan.
The Bay Islands Paya traded with the Mayas who paddled to the islands in large canoes from what now is Belize. Europeans had the first interaction with a New World civilization, that of Mayas, just off the coast of Guanaja in 1504.

Very robust people who adore idols and live mostly from a certain white grain.

The description of the original Bay Islanders came very early in the history of European discovery of the Americas. “Very robust people who adore idols and live mostly from a certain white grain from which they make fine bread and the most perfect beer,” wrote Bartholomew Columbus, about the Paya. Thus he described inhabitants on “Pine Island” or Guanaja island, were not much different than Roatan inhabitants, in 1504.

FRENCH, ENGLISH AND DUTCH PIRATES
1536 – 1741

From 1536 on wards the Protestant French pirates were already raiding Spanish settlements and ships in Western Caribbean. The Bay Islands were located near the sailing route of the Spanish Caribbean fleet carrying valuable goods from Panama and from Santo Domingo. As an additional benefit both Roatan’s Port Royal Bay and Fort Cay offered a good place to careen the pirate boats and restack them with water and provisions.

Roatan offered both shelter and provisions to the pirates and by 1642, the inconvenience to the Spanish became unbearable. The Spanish had to deal with such notorious pirates as Van Horn, Morgan and Tutila.

While the Pirate settlements on Roatan’s Port Royal were ephemeral and non-lasting, they left a legacy of their presence that lingers on today.

One pirate adventure that became a book was written by Philip Ashton. He was a Massachusetts fisherman, Ashton escaped from capture by the pirate Edward Low when he went looking for water in Port Royal. After spending 16 months on then deserted Roatan in 1723 he was rescued and ended up publishing a book about his island adventures.

PROVIDENCE PURITAN SETTLERS
1638 – 1642

After centuries of pillaging and atrocious pirates Roatan had its encounter with a stricter group of people – the Puritanical colonists. In Old Port Royal a settlement of Puritans from Providence Company broke ground in 1638.

Entrepreneur William Claiborne brought Scottish and English settlers form Maryland and Virginia to Roatan and renamed its Rich Island in a marketing effort. The goal of the settlers was “to subvert Spanish tyranny and plant the Gospel” and the settlers planted vegetables and traded with Paya Indians nearby.

The settler relationship with Paya didn’t go off with a good start. In 1639 the Dutch pirates burned the four Paya island towns on the Bay Islands, churches first. The Puritan settlement lasted four years and the settlers were pushed out by the Spanish.

The Paya however were caught between a rock and a hard place. They had to relate to the Spanish who had few resources to defend the islands or develop its economy. On top of that the Paya had to deal with Dutch, French and English pirates who exploited them during their careening sojourns. By 1650 all the Bay Islands Paya were shipped out by the Spanish to Río Dulce in Guatemala rendering the islands desolate.

To subvert Spanish tyranny and plant the Gospel.

BRITISH MILITARY SETTLEMENT
1742 – 1749

In early 1700s, the British authorities in the Caribbean identified Roatan to have the best harbor in the Bay of Honduras and good potential for agriculture. The geopolitical interest of the British crown in the islands was the extension of the war of Jenkins’ Ear. Their presence in the Bay Islands checked the expansion of Spanish logging undertakings in the Miskito coast.

The British sent a mixture of British military, loggers, slaves and Miskito settlers to form a settlement on Roatan. Their settlement at New Port Royal was named Augusta and eventually consisted of around 30 buildings spread across 30 acres. The population of the settlement reached as many as 800 to 1,000 people.

More towns were planned in the Bay Islands and even in the Hog Islands. The seven-year adventure ended with a political check mate when the Britain and Spain signed an agreement that also included relinquishing of Roatan. Treaty of Aix-La-Chapelle of 1748 forced the Brits to abandon Roatan. Only stone foundations of the buildings and wine bottle glass can be found today as testimony to this enterprise.

THE ABANDONED ISLAND
1650 – 1742
1749 – 1797

While the British left, the Spanish failed to move in or even resettle the Bay Islands. Thus the saga of governments treating Roatan with carelessness and semi competence added another chapter.

Englishman Thomas Jeffrerys (1762) described the Spanish inability to settle or develop the islands in a following fashion: “the Spaniards issued several placards, inviting people to come and settle on the island, yet it is uninhabited; and the reason given by the Spaniard of great sense and very large property on the continent… (…) That they would never expect any assistance or protection from the unwieldy government.”

While the British left, the Spanish failed to move in or even resettle the Bay Islands.

UNWANTED GARIFUNA – THE BLACK CARIBS
1797 – Present

The odyssey of Garifuna begun in Saint Vincent where a slave ship from We st Africa run onto a reef and the crew released the slaves who swam to shore and freedom. The Africans received help and soon made alliance with Carib Indians living on Saint Vincent and married their women.

In 1797, British decided to dispose of the Garifuna that were considered troublemakers and on top of that were baptized Catholic by French priests active on the island. Garifuna were not a slave material for the British who waged two wars against them on the island of Saint Vincent.

Eventually a peace treaty was signed between the British and the Black Caribs. More than 5,000 Garifuna were deported from Saint Vincent, but only 2,500 survived the crossing to Roatan.

The island wasn’t considered big enough or fertile enough to support such a large population so most of the Garifuna asked the Spanish to be transferred to the mainland. The commonality between the Garifuna and Spanish wasn’t common race, or language, but the fact that the two were Catholic and their enemy were the British. While most of the Garifuna were given passage to Trujillo a few stayed behind and established a community of Punta Gorda.

INFLUX OF CAYMAN ISLANDERS SETTLERS
1830 – 1859

When the British Government ended slavery in Cayman Islands on August 1, 1834 the White employers could hold their ex-slaves in a four year apprentice ship preventing them from leaving the islands.

Bay Islands and especially Roatan became an option to start anew in a post slavery economy for both White and later Black Cayman Islanders. The Cooper family was the first one to settle in Bay Islands and they chose Suc-suc cay off Utila. Later Coxen Hole attracted many of the families. The first twenty-four White Cayman Island families came to Bay Islands and had the pick at the best land.

The White Caymanians not only came to Bay Islands seeking new opportunities, but also fled the potential upheaval after the abolition of slavery and potential revenge of their ex slaves. They had fresh on their minds the 1804 complete and systematic genocide of White French colonists in Haiti after France emancipated their slaves in 1794.

Just a couple years later the Black Caymanians followed their former masters to the Bay Islands. They usually settled in less desirable, less accessible areas like Flowers Bay, Sandy Bay and the Roatan’s north shore.

Roatan island was divided on racial lines and on religious lines. The White arrived first and claimed the better, more accessible land. Their ex-slaves that fallowed were able to get second best land. The Garifuna who were Catholic preceded the Protestant arrival were pretty much ignored by the British Crown on the east side of Roatan.

Land disputes began to take place and in 1844 and a general meeting took place to resolve those disagreements. The emigration culminated in creation of the Bay Islands colony that lasted for seven years: from 1852 to 1859.

ENTREPRENEURS AND ECCENTRICS
1960 – 2010

As Roatan became a Department in Honduras the Bay Islands attracted an intermittent trickle of eccentrics, vagabonds and entrepreneurs off all sorts. As fishing, seafood packing and eventually tourist industries grew on Roatan in the 1960s, a steady flow of foreigners found their way to the island. Some bought land, others started dive shops, or built their retirement homes.

By the early XXI century the island became an amalgam of eclectic, cosmopolitan mix of Honduran, American, Canadian, British, German and Czech business owners. There were Americans with money, the awkward but hardworking Germans and the melancholic Brits. There were both men and women looking for adventure, second chances and recovering from addictions and starting anew.

In early 1990s several US and Canadian developers came to Roatan via Ambergris Cay in Belize. While they were no longer welcome in Belize they saw opportunities on Roatan. The island still had cheap land, a beautiful reef and an international airport. They created the first gated communities on the island: Parrot Tree Plantation and Lawson Rock. Others bought tracks of land that were still affordable and resold it. The number of Real Estate companies in 2003 went from three to 13 in 10 years.

While they were no longer welcome in Belize they saw opportunities on Roatan.

MAINLAND MIGRANTS
1980 – present

With tourism, seafood packing and construction industries needing skilled and unskilled cheap labor many mainland Hondurans made their way to Roatan. Land remained scarce and several land invasions like Los Fuertes in 1980s and Las Colonias in Sandy Bay in 1990s became their home. The shortage of affordable land or inexpensive housing is still producing new land invasion in Colonia Aldin, Spanish Town and Oak Ridge.

While Roatan has attracted Hondurans from all over the country they also attracted numerous arrivals from the Miskitos from Gracias a Dios department. Also numerous were migrants from Olanchito, Yoro. There were there are many from Balfate and professionals from Tegucigalpa, and San Pedro Sula.

The mainland migrants provide skills, cheap labor and vitality the island needs. The mainland migration was so great that by around 2010 there were more mainland born island residents than native born islanders. The mainland culture overwhelmed the traditional island culture. Baseball gave way to soccer, maypole dancing gave way to Spanish folkloric dances. The Methodist and Baptist Church buildings became outnumbered by Evangelical and Catholic prayer halls and churches.

Mainland migrants provide skills, cheap labor and vitality the island needs.

BABY BOOMER AMERICANS
2010 – present

The baby boomer retirees from US and Canada have been building their dream homes on Roatan in large numbers since the mid-2010s. Oftentimes they worked their entire life to afford to finally retire so he could build a dream house on Roatan.

They move considerable resources here and build houses an average Honduran, or islander could never afford. Their physical and economic impact on the island is considerable. They also bring skills and sometime a will to contribute some of their know how, or ideals to the island.

Since 2018 the infrastructure of Roatan has improved tremendously making the option of living on the island more appealing to much larger portion of retired Americans not willing to give up their creature comforts. The roads, healthcare, power grid and the internet reliability improved dramatically. The private security companies also multiplied in number.

While Honduran have been immigrating to US by the hundreds of thousands, there is a reverse trend as well and Roatan has become an example of just that. American digital nomads are increasingly embracing Roatan as a place to work remotely. They are employed by US businesses while doing their work remotely from Honduras. Some even work remotely without telling their US companies that they are now living in another country.

Roatan started out as a self-sufficient island around 5,000-7,000 BC. There were no industries to speak of and the Paya Indians grew their own food and had enough fish to never worry about hunger. The Mayan traders would sail in their canoes to bring them cacao beans and some metal tools to trade for dried fish, shells, and pottery.

Then in the 1580s the island become a hub of the ‘pillage industry.’ Hundreds of pirates lived here and careened their boats in preparation for raids on the Spanish ships carrying silver and goods from nearby Trujillo and Puerto Bello. That industry came crashing down in 1650, and the Paya were deported by the Spanish to Rio Dulce, leaving the island unpopulated for almost a century-and-a-half.

As slavery was abolished in the British Empire, hundreds of Cayman islanders came to Roatan to begin their lives anew. It took another 140 years of quiet, self-sustaining life before the coconut and banana fruit industry motivated islanders to plant thousands of trees and to sell the fruit to Standard Fruit company ships visiting the island. As that banana boom wound down in the 1960s, the shrimp and lobster industry arrived on Roatan. There were lucrative contracts with Red Lobster plenty of jobs and stressful shrimp-boat loans from Honduran banks to pay.

That fishing industry lasted until about the early 2010s when cheaper, farmed raised shrimp drove down the price of wild shrimp and the lobsters “got smaller” and harder to catch.

The tourism industry on the island began with dive resorts such as Anthony’s Key Resort and Coco View springing up in the 1970s. The sailing industry, created courtesy to Reagan era tax shelters, discovered the island in 1980s. Brick Bay Resort or CSY (Caribbean Sailing Yacht) was hopping and bopping with beautiful sailing vessels. The tax shelters went away and so did the sailboats.

Drug smuggling industry had discovered Roatan in early 1980’s.

The construction industry has been a growing employer on the island since the first bulldozer was shipped to the island in 1970s. There are now a dozen construction companies tearing down hills, filling in gullies, and constructing metal and cement buildings all over the island. The construction industry is perhaps the main driver of migration to the island form mainland Honduras. If you have a heart beat and two hands you can get a job on a Roatan construction site.

The drug smuggling industry had discovered Roatan in early 1980s, just as the Iran Contra cocaine smuggling operation was winding up to the deep state kabaal dispatched CIA Et al to move cocaine to the waterfront condos of Miami and street corners of south LA. The industry brought employment, money, addiction and violence to Roatan.

The smuggling spiked in 2009 right after the coup against president Mel Zelaya. While the ‘War on drugs’ continues, so do the smuggling operations that supply millions of US and Canadian cocaine addicts. At least Roatan’s international airport has gotten too busy to bring in drug planes as it did six or seven years ago.

After the first cruise ship visited Roatan on September 5, 1989, there was no turning back. The Ocean Spirit was the biggest cruise ship in the world: it was nearly 500 feet long, weighed 20,000 tons and brought in 360 passengers, a fraction of the 7,000 passenger behemoths that are bound for Roatan visits currently. On the horizon there is the possibility of a third cruise ship dock in Port Royal.

There is yet another industry player eyeing the island: all-inclusive hotels, much less focused on diving. Sandals, Wyndham, Hilton, and Inter Continental are all said to be exploring possibilities on the island and development is inevitable. This growth will likely require expansion of the Roatan’s international airport leading to additional filling in of the reef. Roatan appears to be, yet again, meeting the supply for others’ addictions at its own expense: European addiction to gold, American addiction to cocaine, and American addiction to cheap, all-you can-eat, holidaying.

The Paya spoke a Macro Chibchen dialect, which was used throughout Central America and as far south as present day Colombia and Venezuela. Into the Paya language hundreds of Nahuatl words from Mexico brought there by Toltec Indians were incorporated.

Many Paya words are still in everyday use in Honduras. The word “champa,” for example, meaning house or hut; the word “Zipote” and “Chiwina,” both meaning young child. “Zacate” meaning grass. The Paya words for mosquito and sandfly are “Zancudo” and “Jejene.” Our word in English, hammock comes from the Nahuatl word “hamaca” as is their word for canoe “cayuga,” and hurricane is derived from “huracan.”

My favorite Paya word still in use today is “Macanazo,” meaning a good beating, which originates from the Toltec word for war club: “Macana.” Other Nahuatl words still in use, are “tomate,” “avocate” and “potato.”

The Paya lived in settlements of 100-500 people, led by a cacique or chief, assisted by a shaman for spiritual consultation. They tended to avoid living close to the ocean as their dwellings consisted of platforms built on poles, with a thatched roof or “manaca” and woven walls. The structures were too flimsy to withstand serious storms.

Paya words for mosquito and sandfly are ‘Zancudo’ and ‘Jejene’

They lived a completely self sufficient lifestyle, using food and materials from their natural habitat. Food was in abundance: beans and corn were cultivated as staples and they hunted wild pigs, “quequeo” a large rodent similar to a giant guinea pig (tepesquintle), deer, armadillos, manatees, coatamundis, raccoons or “mapache,” rabbits and wild turkeys. Fish, lobster, turtles and shrimp comprised other food sourced from the sea.

The Ceiba or Kapok tree was and still is sacred to the Paya. It provided a valuable oil for medicines and a workable, lightweight wood for their dug-out canoes. The tough, fluffy Ceiba tree fiber from the tree’s seed pods was used to stuff Paya pillows and mattresses. While it was very durable it was also unfortunately highly flammable.

The Paya also used the Kapok fiber to pad their tunics when hunting and fighting, making it an early form of Kevlar armor. Upon arrival, the Spanish quickly found their heavy metal armor unsuited for the climate and adopted kapok stuffed tunics to replace it.

Roatan and the Bay Islands were an important stopover point for traders bartering goods up and down the Caribbean coast from Mexico to Costa Rica. The Paya traded in gold, silver, ceramics, conch shells, exotic bird plumes and cocoa – a highly profitable plant whose seeds were used as currency. Until 1680s the Spanish paid their Paya workers in cocoa seeds.

The Paya were also involved in establishing trading routes of over 800 miles stretching to the Pacific Ocean. Apart from the threat of natural disasters such as hurricanes and earthquakes and inter- tribal fighting the Paya lived a relatively peaceful and trouble free existence. They remained in tune with their environment. This all changed drastically with the arrival of the colonizing Spanish, who came to Honduras in 1524.