The debaucherous tradition of Chase the Ace at West End’s Sundowners Bar & Grill came to a fitting conclusion tonight when Keven from Anthony’s Key Resort drew the winning Ace of Spades from the three remaining cards to win over $1000 from the total pot. As sad as it is to see this weekly gathering of local drunks come to its end, at least we are satisfied in knowing that it was one of us— the few, the proud, the intoxicated— who took home the prize.

I’ve started back part-time at Coconut Tree, partially because the cost of designing ThisIsRoatan.com is slowly making me broke, partially because my lovely girlfriend comes here in just over a month, and mostly because I’m bored of writing code every freaking day.

In a crazy twist of irony, two Kazakhstani divers showed up for their Open Water course just because I listed “Chucky,” Coconut Tree Diver’s rescue dummy mascot, on the website as being from their home country. Honestly, I never expected to meet two Kazakhstanis as a result of this little Borat-related joke, but they’ve been great divers as we’ve had a great laugh about the situation.

Diving has been weird. The top layer is running at 88F, though at 40ft it drops off to 84F. Around 100ft or so the temperature drops again to 81F. Thick thermoclines run along each of these layers. With such a drastic temperature gradient, the currents have been running wild. Yesterday I drifted from Moonlight Reef to nearly Grape Escape, a distance of at least a mile, in less than 35 minutes. It was one helluva rollercoaster, to say the least.

I know the little restaurant over Coconut Tree Divers very often gets overlooked in the evening hours, but if you were to pay attention over the last month you may have noticed Vincent Bush Jr. hard at work over the giant smoker in front. While I’ve had the odd samples of his food and certainly have enjoyed his “quick eat” lunches of fajitas and hamburgers, I never really had a chance to appreciate his cooking until tonight.

I stopped in for just one quick Salva Vida, but fortunately (I can’t believe I’m saying this) RECO cut out just as I was about to leave. I certainly didn’t want to sit at home in the dark and make baleadas over the propane stove, so I decided to stick around and give Junior’s delicious-smelling grub. I was well rewarded.

The salad of delicious tomatoes, cucumbers, red onion, cantalope, and lettuce, all covered in a sweet papaya-based dressing, was quickly devoured. The main meal came with smooth-whipped mashed potatoes, coconut rice and red beans, and fresh-cut steamed vegetables. As tasty as these sides were, it was the bacon-wrapped steak fillet marinated in a sweet sauce, slow-cooked over the smoker, and served with a perfectly complimentary red wine reduction. To top it off, Junior served us some of his hand-crafted flan topped with Kahlua.

At a time when I’ve been growing increasingly sick of West End’s food (no offense, Shark Cave— you have fantastic pizza, but not after the umpteenth consecutive night), to taste something as refreshingly delicious as Junior’s meal reinvigorated my taste buds. Furthermore, Junior put such genuine passion in his cooking, constantly asking me for suggestions and improvements, that I know that the dining experience will continue to improve.

If you haven’t tried a nice meal out at Junior’s above Coconut Tree Divers in West End, give it a shot!

Dive Site: Turtle Crossing
Bottom Time: 1 hour, 6 minutes
Max Depth: 102ft (34m)
Visibility: 40ft (12m) in the shallows, 70ft (21m) at depth
Air Consumption: 210bar - 90 bar

After spending the morning in jail with Dan, I decided that a peaceful dive was much-needed. I did a modified solo dive (solo dive plan, but around a group a most times) focusing on my buoyancy control. I started in 20ft (6m) of water fine-tuning my body position relative to my breathing cycle based on Marc Cruciani’s Pivot Point Theory: that, because our body pivots on a fulcrum between our center of gravity (our weights) and our center of buoyancy (our lungs), our buoyancy is optimized when these two centers are as closely aligned as possible.

After getting a feel for how my gear responds with respect to this theory (conclusion: I need a backplate), I hovered around 30ft (10m) for the next ten minutes while I swam out to the wall. Once over the abyss, I pitched headfirst and plunged down to my maximum depth of 102ft (34m), passing a hawksbill turtle on the way down. Rolling under Jose’s group, I gradually ascended up to 45ft (14m) and trailed the group back towards the mooring.

The highlight of the dive was when a tiny Hawksbill turtle darted past another larger Hawksbill turtle, just in time for Jose to capture some excellent video footage. Marco also got some nice photography of yet another (yes, my fourth) Hawksbill turtle in the shallows. Knowing that both Jose and Marco were testing out Will’s camera, I brought my sunglasses along to get some cool shots of me underwater for the Coconut Tree website. I hope to have some copies soon.

Procrastination is like masturbation: you only screw yourself.

I’ve been putting off posting version 4.0 of TheScubaGeek.com for some time. Why? Partially because I was experimenting with new layouts and blog editors, partially because I was busy busting my bum on a slew of other websites, but mostly because, quite frankly, spending more time on the less-than-speedy Honduran internet updating my blog wasn’t something that I felt too keen to do in the evenings.

Just call it real-time development on island time— who wants to look at more code when there’s a sunset to watch and a ron y piña to drink? Not this beach bum.

So what have I been doing? After returning to Roatan (tiny Caribbean island off the north coast of Honduras for those of you geographically challenged) following a six-week stay in North Carolina surrounding my little bro’s wedding, I’ve been coding like crazy to finish up my web contracts. I’ll have a portfolio page up here soon, but as for now here’s a list of my completed projects.

• Coconut Tree Divers (www.coconuttreedivers.com): The site that made my mark on Roatan got an upgrade to version 3.5, adding some nice layers of graphical polish to this already beautiful site. Version 3.6, which is only a few more manhours away from completion, will bring this iteration of the site to a close just in time for the coming high tourist season (and just in for me to start teaching diving again!).
• Stanley Submarines (www.stanleysubmarines.com): I was never satisfied with the layout of version 2.0, so I designed a completely new look for the site in version 3.0. Featuring the stunning photography of Lia Barrett, this site lets you go face-to-face with truly alien creatures living over 2000ft (600m) underwater as viewed through Karl Stanley’s homemade submarine Idabel.
• Anemona Divers (www.anemonadivers.com): Sophie and Mari Paz, two wonderful scuba diving instructors from Spain, saw their lifelong dream of owning a dive shop come true with the opening of Anemona Divers in West Bay. I worked with these ladies and an Italian graphic designer named Luca (Luca: please email me!) to create the online presence for their operation (currently in version 1.2).
• Villa Royale (www.villaroyaleroatan.com): When “Big” Lauren asked Lia Barrett and I to journey to Roatan’s East End and photograph the Gonzales’ Villa Royale estate in Port Royal, we had no idea of the sheer luxury and enormity of the place. Seeing is believing: take a look at the photos on the site (currently version 1.0) and you’ll understand too.
• SOL International Foundation (www.solsite.org): I partnered with photographer Lia Barrett and graphic designer EJ Proctor to create this site (currently version 1.0— amazing photo galleries coming soon in version 1.1) for the amazing children’s charity of SOL Foundation International. Your donations are crucial to the future of Roatan’s children, so please visit the site and make a difference!
• Go Pro Caribbean (www.goprocaribbean.com): While technically designed and operated by Will Welbourn, the PADI Course Director at Coconut Tree Divers, I worked as a code consultant and graphical layout designer to create this site, which promotes the outstanding career development opportunities available through Coconut Tree Diver’s PADI professional development program. Start your professional dive career today with a visit to this site!

Of course, I’m always working on something new. The following contracts are currently in development:

• Keyhole Bay (coming to www.keyholebay.com): Call it version 0.99+. This site, which features excellent photography by Lia Barrett with local model Robyn, has been languishing for the last month awaiting final approval by the business owner. It really shows off the amazing condominiums and home sites being developed in the Keyhole Bay Community in West Bay, so I hope to receive the thumbs-up very soon so I can show the site off to the world.
• SOL Excursions (coming to www.solexcursions.com): Currently in version 0.8, this site will feature the outstanding graphic design of EJ Proctor as will promote the volunteer-based adventures offered by the founders of SOL International Foundation around Roatan and Belize.

Lastly, there’s my big projects. The culmination of nearly three years of living on Roatan and working in the dive industry. These two projects will (hopefully) serve as my magnum opus and help usher in a new era for Roatan’s web presence.

• This Is Roatan! (coming to www.thisisroatan.com): Promote the tropical paradise of Roatan. Encourage responsible business practices. Bring the local community together. Let the island sell itself. It’s no small set of tasks, but this is no small project. Currently in version 0.52, the project has already been generating rave reviews from the select members of the beta testing community. Look for the beta to go online by early October (around version 0.70).
• Diversoft: Coconut Tree Divers’ PADI Course Director Will Welbourn wrote version 1.0 of this project two years ago to help manage the day-to-day activities of the dive shop. I will be taking the robust business logic behind Will’s design and applying my programming and design expertise to create a marketable dive shop management suite. There will be no version 4.0 of the website for Coconut Tree Divers; instead, the business and website will run on Diversoft 2.0.

Check back to this site frequently to find out how my projects are coming along!