Susan Solo – Photographer | Traveler | Adventurer

Tag: kayaking

Moving Pictures: Honduras

Speaking of flying a drone in Honduras, I also took some video with the DJI Mavic Pro! (And also the GoPro and my point-and-shoot.) Granted, I’m still learning about video filming and editing, and I’m definitely still learning to shoot video with a drone, but I’m pretty excited about how this little video turned out.

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June 28, 2018
Flying a Drone in Honduras

Our trip to Honduras in April was my first opportunity to travel with the DJI Mavic Pro since I purchased it, so I thought I’d write a little bit about the process of traveling with a drone and share some of the images I took with it. (All photos in this post are from my trusty little Mavic.)

I actually bought the drone before we left for our trip to Peru last summer, but I didn’t yet feel confident about flying it at home let alone in another country, so I decided not to bring it despite all of the amazing photo opportunities we would have had with it. And then our next trip after that was to New York, where my understanding is that drones are pretty much a no-no in the entire city. The whole reason I settled on the DJI Mavic Pro, though, was for its highly portable design, so I’ve been itching to take it somewhere scenic. Enter Roatan, Honduras!

So my first order of business before packing the drone was to research the country-specific guidelines and laws for entering the country with a drone and for flying an unmanned aerial vehicle, or UAV. I have no interest in breaking any rules and ending up starring in an episode of Locked Up Abroad. I’m a very law-abiding traveler.

Simply doing a search on “drone laws Honduras” provided enough sources to verify their general drone laws, such as not flying over people or large crowds, respecting people’s privacy, and stay out of areas like airports and military facilities. We follow their same guidelines here in the United States plus some additional laws, so after some thorough reading I felt comfortable packing the Mavic in my carry-on camera bag and heading off to Honduras.

Law review, check. Next up: general safety. The Mavic operates on Lithium-ion Polymer batteries and since they can (very rarely!) be hazardous, I purchased a LiPo safety bag and port covers for extra safe transport of the batteries. For anyone wanting to travel with a drone, keep in mind that LiPo batteries are not allowed to be packed in your checked baggage, so you’ll need to plan to carry them on with you. The fire resistant safety bag keeps the batteries contained if they should short-circuit and spark. I also read that the batteries travel best if they’re partially or mostly discharged, so I let them drain before the trip.

Going through security at our airport, Dulles International, was a breeze, or at least as much as it can be these days. I took my Mavic out of my bag along with my other electronics that are larger than a cell phone, and everything cleared the security process with no issues. And just a quick note on going through security, Chris and I have been using CLEAR for almost two years and we absolutely love it. We’ve never had to wait in line, and that gives me plenty of extra time to unload my electronics for the x-ray and re-pack afterward. If you sign up through my link, you’ll receive two months free (and I will, too)!

When we arrived on Roatan, we didn’t have to do any paperwork or processing on the drone like I’ve heard some other countries require. For instance, in Peru you need to apply in advance to receive approval and there is a tax assessed and charged that gets refunded as you exit the country. Bringing the Mavic to Roatan was easy breezy! But since drone laws are constantly evolving, we’ll check the laws again if/when we return to Honduras someday in case anything has changed.

Our rental villa in Camp Bay was the perfect spot to practice flying without disturbing a soul. The last thing I want (besides breaking laws) is to make anyone feel like I’m being a creepy spy, or to bother people with the noise. Once the Mavic is up in the air you can’t hear it, but the take-off is a little loud.

We even had plenty of time and resources to get a little creative with the aerial photos. I had a version of the image below in my head ever since we planned this trip and I had a blast executing my vision! Now I just need to learn how to take images with the Mavic on a self timer so I don’t have to be holding the controls.

This area just down the beach from our rental home was also a fantastic spot to fly. We had the beach all to ourselves one afternoon! I’ll never get over how gorgeous it was from all angles – on the ground and from the air up above, Camp Bay is simply stunning.

I’m really looking forward to traveling with the Mavic more in the future! I also brought it with me on a recent trip to St. John, USVI, with no issues at all and those posts are coming soon. If you are a drone pilot and have any good travel tips or recommendations, please let me know in the comments or send me an email!

Note: This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase something through one of my links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you so much for reading and for your support!

June 25, 2018
Off the Beaten Path in Camp Bay, Roatan

You know when you find an unspoiled, incredibly special corner of the world and you sort of want to keep it a secret, but you know you probably should share it so as not to be a completely selfish human being? Camp Bay, Roatan is one of those places. Chris and I fell pretty hard for it, so I’m doing the right thing and spreading the word about this Caribbean gem.

While the west side of Roatan is a popular Caribbean cruise destination, Chris and I generally love to get away from the crowds and find spots that are less developed for tourism. So once we honed in on the idea of visiting Roatan, we looked away from the cruise ship ports to see what else we could find. I discovered information about Camp Bay and immediately decided we should head all the way east on the island to find our peaceful paradise. Plus, once I saw photos of a villa called Living Waters, I was sold. You’ll see what I mean.

During my trip research I read several mentions about how tricky it is to drive to the east end, but Chris and I are always up for a bit of adventure. Undeterred, we decided we would rent an SUV and hit the road toward the more undeveloped part of the island.

The roads were indeed bumpy since they are unpaved about 1/3 of the way, and even the paved roads are a bit of an obstacle course with some pretty serious potholes, but we took it slow (there’s no need to hurry on island time anyway!) and we had zero issues getting to and from Camp Bay.

Once we arrived, my jaw hit the beautifully tiled floor of our home-away-from-home for the week. If you’ve been following our travels, you may have noticed that Chris and I usually tend to favor staying in a private home rather than a resort or hotel. Living Waters ended up being our favorite villa to-date!

On top of being spoiled with such a fantastic house in a stunning location, it never rained once during our entire stay. As many times as we’ve endured some pretty bad weather situations while traveling, I’m truly grateful for these trips where it all goes off without a hitch.

(I hope I’m not jinxing ourselves for next time.)

When we weren’t in the pool listening to our beach mix playlist and enjoying a cold drink from the comfort of a pineapple-shaped float (how is that for an idyllic relaxation combo?!), we made use of the kayaks to paddle ourselves around the crystal clear waters behind the house. Kayaking here was one of my favorite activities of the week!

Chris also did some snorkeling near the house. We originally intended to take the kayak all the way out to the reef (you can see it in the distance in the picture below, where the water breaks into a small bit of white) and do some snorkeling there, but the lure of lounging by the pool overtook our desire to do anything strenuous. I’m sure you can understand. And besides, mid-week we were treated to a boat ride right up to the reef on another island for some really great snorkeling – more on that in an upcoming post!

If I haven’t fully convinced you to take a trip to Camp Bay yet, take a look at Camp Bay Beach.

Did you book your plane tickets yet?!

If a private villa isn’t your cup of tea, Camp Bay Lodge is situated a few lots down from where we stayed. The rooms look comfortable and charming, and the Lodge offers kite surfing lessons! We ran out of time to try it, but after watching the surfers behind the house all week, we decided we want to go back and give it a go (but we’ll definitely be staying at Living Waters again). Camp Bay is also home to Dive Pangea, owned by one of the nicest women you’ll ever meet, Chrissie. If you’re into scuba diving, I implore you to get yourself out to the east end and dive with her! She is a wealth of knowledge about the island and the reef.

Unspoiled beach, tranquil accommodations, and adventure in the form of water sports – what else do you need? Food? The east end of Roatan has that, too.

We did a big grocery store trip in at Eldon’s in French Harbour before arriving to the house so that we could eat several meals there, but we went out to eat several times, too. A few steps down the beach sits La Sirena, where you can drink the best rum punch on the island while watching the sun set.

After a short drive along the main road one evening, we found ourselves at The Crow’s Nest in Coxen Hole for delicious margaritas inspired by local flavors including island plum and mango. Anywhere I can feel like I’m in a jungle treehouse enjoying good food and drinks is fine by me!

And in sticking to our tradition of finding food with a Mexican flare while traveling (seriously, we end up eating Mexican food pretty much anywhere we go), we hit up Temporary Cal’s Cantina for some fish tacos. Cal’s is located mid-island and it took us over a half-hour to get there, but we’re always willing to drive a distance for chips and salsa.

We ended our week with a spectacular King Crab feast at a French Harbor restaurant, but more on that in a future post. And all of that is to say we didn’t go hungry by situating ourselves in Camp Bay. We never felt isolated (at least not in a bad way; we did feel blissfully far from the crowds), or like we couldn’t get out and explore.

Need more ideas for what to do around Camp Bay? Before you think we just sat around in these hammocks all week, up next is a post about our adventures on neighboring Bay Islands!

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April 29, 2018
Kayaking on a Bioluminescent Bay

This post is going to be a bit of a departure from my typical photo-heavy entries because when I signed up for a bioluminescent bay kayak tour on Vieques, I decided to leave my camera behind for once and enjoy the experience without documenting a single moment. I knew that properly capturing the bioluminescence of the dinoflagellates would require the low-light capabilities of my SLR, and there was no way I was going to attempt balancing on a sit-on-top kayak with the 5DMIII in my hands. My waterproof point-and-shoot doesn’t have manual controls so I opted to be completely present and out from behind a camera for the tour.

This is all to say that I have no photos to show you.

After failing to see a bio bay two times on previous trips, I had my fingers crossed that the third time would be a charm. The first attempt was in 2000 when my friends and I took a Caribbean cruise and signed up for a bio bay kayak tour at the Puerto Rico port of call. Sadly, a storm made the waves too choppy for kayaking and the tour was canceled. The second time was in 2013 when Chris and I stayed in San Juan for a week, but the exact same thing happened: storm, waves, choppy water, canceled tour. I was determined to see the bioluminescence this time, and I even consulted the moon phase chart to ensure we picked the darkest night to see the bay. Astronomy for the win!

On the night of the new moon with no storm in the forecast, Stephanie, Arne, Chris, and I took the 7:30pm Bio Bay Glass Bottom Boat Kayak Tour with Fun Brothers located in Esperanza. We met our guide near the bamboo hut shown below (photo taken during the day) where we boarded a very small school bus for some off-roading on a narrow dirt path through the dark forest.

After the bumpiest ride I’ve ever experienced, we arrived at the sandy entrance to Mosquito Bay. Despite the name, I don’t think any of us felt any bug bites that night, but we might have been lucky with a dry day and a good breeze. Here’s the part I didn’t expect – we were instructed to remove our shoes and leave them on the bus. And here’s the other part I didn’t expect – we walked in the dark through shallow muddy water to enter the kayaks.

Bare feet + darkness + black water with mud and other things in it = me shrieking uncontrollably.

I managed to make it into the kayak right away without capsizing, but it did take me a good five minutes on the water to settle down and feel comfortable. I’ve only been in a kayak one other time (in Alaska) mind you, and that was in the middle of the day. Our guide, Nelson, set out paddling ahead of us and we followed him. Our tour group of ten people met him in the middle of the water for a brief overview of the dinoflagellates before free time to explore. We stayed together for Nelson’s briefing by holding onto his kayak, which meant we were all clustered together quite close. I didn’t get to enjoy his information and jokes because I was concentrating on not tipping over while the other kayaks bumped into mine.

Once he gave us the green light (no pun intended!) to go off on our own, we paddled away from the group, noticing a faint glow as our oars dipped into the water. I’ll be frank: at first I thought, that’s it?! I walked through creepy sludge and paddled my way out into the darkness just to see a bit of light when I paddle?! But as we let our eyes continue to adjust, we started to see other things happening: glowing bubbles under our glass-bottomed kayaks, the luminescent outline of each gentle wave forming and breaking, and shimmering schools of fish darting past. I noticed that the farther we paddled away from the lights of the town nearby and the more I stared at one dark spot in the water, the better I could see the glow. Something pretty big and glowing swam underneath me and gave me a startle, but I managed to stay in the kayak or else this post would have a very different it-was-the-worst-thing-ever tone.

We spent at least thirty minutes on the bay experiencing this natural phenomenon, and in the end I decided that it was definitely worth the unpleasant barefooted moments. If you’re planning a trip to Vieques, this really is a neat experience and you’d do well to book with Fun Brothers. They kept us safe and informed, and we all had a great time. Plus the glass-bottomed kayaks do add to the experience. If you are on the fence about this tour because you’re not crazy about the idea of being on the water in the dark, we’re in the same boat (pun totally intended!) and I had fun so you can absolutely do it, too.

July 1, 2015
Kayaking with Southeast Sea Kayaks

When we arrived at our first port of call, Ketchikan, it was a drizzly day, but since we planned to be on the water most of the day kayaking with Southeast Sea Kayaks we figured a little rain wouldn’t bother us. We brought our waterproof jackets exactly for this occasion and for the unpredictable weather in Alaska. It turned out to be the only rainy day of the whole trip, but we were glad we packed them!

We met the Southeast Sea Kayaks van at the famous liquid sunshine gauge in town outside of the visitor center, about 10 minutes before our 9am tour start time for the Orcas Cove tour.

The van took us to the office where we were outfitted with spray jackets, rain pants and life jackets. We opted to wear the spray jacket for the ~~fashion~~ extra protection – the wrists sealed better and tighter than our own jackets. Underneath, we were each wearing a light hoodie and a t-shirt. Chris wore hiking pants and I wore jeans, and both of us were comfortable the whole time for a June morning. We were also given a large dry bag for our camera, which worked great. The only other thing I wish I had brought was bug spray. I ended up with some really itchy bites on my hands and one above my eyebrow since my hands and face were the only skin exposed!

My head-to-toe blue outfit reminds me of a certain scene from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. “Violet’s turning violet!” Points if you remember that moment.

From the office, we boarded a boat for a scenic 20-minute ride to a larger boat moored at Orcas Cove. Once on board, we listened to instructions on sea kayaking and paddling. Of course at that point, I began to get nervous. When I peered over the side of the boat, I could see tons of medium-sized jellyfish bobbing about in the water (later I learned they are a non-stinging variety), and I thought for sure I was going to tip our kayak and end up going for a swim with the jellies.

It wasn’t terribly difficult to get into the kayaks (our guides provided assistance), and I was relieved to be safely in the water in a sturdy tandem kayak with Chris. Our guide, Alex, took us around the cove to get used to the mechanics of paddling (for those of us who were new to kayaking), and then eventually he gave us free rein to explore the area. He also offered to take photos of us, which was such a nice gesture, especially for two photographers who don’t get to be in the photos very often.

After a few minutes on the water, I relaxed and became comfortable with the kayak enough to take some photos. I didn’t pack the waterproof housing for this trip, but the wrist strap on my point-and-shoot provided enough security that I felt like I could use the camera without accidentally flinging it into the sea. And actually, I could have even brought the SLR for this trip – the dry bags were certainly large enough, and my camera’s neck strap would have been plenty secure for shooting on the water (unless we tipped over!).

We enjoyed exploring for a couple of hours. I was even brave enough to paddle up to these sea stars for a closer look and a photo. Alex kept plucking random sea creatures out of the water (including one of the non-stinging jellyfish) and asking if I wanted to HOLD one. Um, no? Clearly he just met me.

We didn’t see any Orcas or Humpback Whales, but I was actually a little relieved not to – I imagined being capsized either by my own excitement over seeing them, or because one of them accidentally tipped me over. We did see a Bald Eagle though! It was really far away and of course my little point-and-shoot doesn’t quite do the job for telephoto images, but it was neat to see the eagle in the wild.

After we worked up an appetite kayaking, we were treated to a little snack picnic back on the boat where we sampled smoked salmon on crackers and cheese. It was nice to relax and chat with the guides and crew for a bit before returning to the dock. The whole tour from booking to return trip was awesome and wonderfully organized and I can highly recommend Southeast Sea Kayaks! I hope we get to explore on the water with them again someday.

Oh, and just a quick side-note – if you need a lunch idea for after the tour, try the little Alaskan Surf Fish & Chips stand in Ketchikan. It was one of our most favorite (and least expensive) meals of the whole trip! There is always a long line apparently, but it’s totally worth the wait. Our food was hot, fresh, and so yummy. We tried the fish & chips and the coconut shrimp and shared everything. I wish we could have eaten there more than once! Also, there’s a fantastic candy store just a short walk away called Ketchicandies where we happily stocked up on sweets like chocolate-covered Oreos and pretzels for the rest of the trip.

July 2, 2011