Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Annette Huskin in Guanaja and shows the clouds threatening, but never quite raining at Brick Point. Yesterday a few of us got some sprinkles, but not much more. One thing the rain around us did was keep temperatures down. The high at the airport was 87 (31C) and it was noticeably cooler than those days last week when we got up to 93 (34C). The odds are that eventually some of us will get wet this week, the big question is when.

On satellite we can see a large area of showers and thunderstorms well to our east. Unfortunately it is only slowly drifting southwest and will weaken before it ever gets close to here. We have a few broken clouds around us but nothing promising rain. Each day this week we will have a chance of a morning shower, and right now it looks like the chances get a little better toward the end of the week, maybe 40 percent chances each morning.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We’ve been having 10 mph west winds and 2 foot seas in the mornings that switch over in the afternoons to 5 mph east winds and 1 foot seas. That will continue, but as we get toward the middle of the week the winds and seas in the mornings will get slightly higher, around 15 mph and 3 feet, with afternoon winds 5-10 mph and 2 feet starting Wednesday. Today and tomorrow we will continue to be 1-2 feet midday, so a great day for those Jolly Roger Roatan excursions.

It’s a challenge to find a good restaurant open on Monday, because many of them understandably take the day off. So if you want to eat out today, Ikigai by Robby Molina is staying open especially for you, and it doesn’t close until 9 p.m.!

Lowest tide will be 6:15 p.m. Have a great week.

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Cameron Kirkconnell in Utila and shows a couple of youngsters checking out the crystal clear waters on a crystal clear day. We haven’t had crystal clear days recently as we have been dealing with a lot of clouds that have knocked our temperature back from sweltering to just hot. If you have a photo you’d like to submit, please send it with name and location to bookmybio@gmail.com.

Here’s another sad satellite map that shows a storm to our north dying as it moves south over us. This has been a common occurrence the past few days. One of these mornings we will win the rain lottery and many of us will get wet. It’s just hard to say when that day will be.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with winds mostly out of the west at 5-10 mph and seas around 2 feet on both sides of the island. Winds will shift to the east this afternoon around 5 mph and seas will be around 1 foot. Our calm weather continues with light and variable winds and waves 1-2 feet. The only exception will be if we can get a squall, which will create momentary winds and waves that will soon pass.

One week from today is Roa Fest sponsored by Galaxy Wave at Sol y Mar in Sandy Bay. Lots of family fun, entry is only 50 lempira and you can enjoy Ley Seca (In English that is “Dry Law”) and many other performers from the island and mainland and lots of activities for the kids, but most importantly it all benefits the public hospital.

Low tide is 5:30 p.m. Have a great Sunday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Drew Shuller and shows a strategically place urinal in West End. That urinal has seen more moisture than our whole island these last few months.

We start with the radar since midnight and it shows a little squall line passing over the island around 1 a.m.

Here is the result of that squall we saw on radar from around 1 a.m. Several locations on Roatan picked up a measly .01 of an inch of rain, barely enough to get the ground wet.

For the rainfall forecast, I thought I’d start with the one that gives us the most hope. The Euro gives us about an inch over the next week and shifts the dry hole to our east. Over my last five years on the island, I’ve noticed that this time of year, when we start getting squalls off the sea, for some reason we are in a bit of a drier hole. There is generally more rain to our east, west, north and south. This year is no exception. The past few days we have suffered the fate of Tantallus, seeing rain all around but none for us.

Here’s the US GFS model for rainfall for the next week (through Friday) and we are the driest spot in the forecast, with maybe half an inch through the week.

You can see that the German ICON model agrees with the GFS that we will be in a dry hole for the next week.Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: Our winds and seas are quite close to flat calm. Winds will be light and variable through the weekend and seas 1 foot most of the time. Sunday night and Monday night we may get a little wind (10-15 mph) and next week looks SLIGHTLY windier with maybe 2 foot seas and occasionally 3 feet, but all in all the next week will be great on the water.

Mitch Cummins recently let me know he is working on a new process of freeze drying that will extend the shelf life of his Roatan Pets food, but the fact that it HAS a shelf life tells you what you need to know. His food is fresh and made of locally sourced ingredients focused on your pet’s health, not on corporate profit margin sitting on a shelf or on a boat for months on end.

Lowest tide is 4:30 p.m. Have a great weekend!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Katy Pandy in Flowers Bay and shows a cumulus clouds with a flat base teasing her with the potential for rain. Don’t forget. For a chance at a free dive from Sandy Bay divers, send photos to bookmybio@gmail.com with name and location. We’ve been teased a lot by rain and today is no different. A nice storm danced around us last night.

We can see the storm cranking up around 1 a.m. near Puerto Cortes where they picked up about an inch of rain. It passes over Utila around 3 a.m. (I don’t see any rain recorded at any of the three stations.) and moves north out to sea east of Belize. We have some clouds moving over us on the south side of this storm this morning but not a whole lot of rain.

Here are the rainfall totals since midnight. Looks like a few locations midisland got their ground wet around 3 a.m.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: When winds are fairly mild, as they are right now, wind direction will often be variable. Today we are dealing with west winds 7-12 miles per hour, which means that we have 2 foot waves north and west sides of the island. Winds will switch to the east/northeast this afternoon, but will be only 3-7 mph and seas 1 foot. We will continue to have light and variable winds and seas 1-2 feet this weekend.

One of the things I really miss living on the island is really good Asian food. Yesterday I was at Ikigai by Robby Molina and she tried this Shrimp Teppan Bowl. The buttery sesame flavor of the fried rice under the tenderly cooked shrimp was out of this world!

Here is the Shrimp Teppan Bowl along with a lot of other great Asian offerings at Ikigai. I can’t wait to try the Shrimp Pad Thai!

Low tide is 3:45 p.m. Have a great Friday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Jill Haley Wood in Parrot Tree. Her photo shows some rain clouds teasing her and we have some rain clouds teasing us to the north this morning. That’s the problem with being small islands in the big sea. The rain doesn’t always fall in the right places.

On our satellite this morning we see a bank of clouds, mostly to our north. There may be a shower or two in these clouds. We will have mostly cloudy skies this morning and more sun this afternoon. Through the weekend I’m hopeful for some showers across the islands. We will have a 30 percent chance each morning.
Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We awake to 10 mph east winds and seas 1-2 feet. We will calm to 5-10 mph and 1 foot seas this afternoon and will have great sea conditions through the weekend, mostly 1-2 feet southside. Next week we will have slightly higher seas, but only 2-3 feet, so overall a great time to be on the sea.

Lowest tide is 3 p.m. and we have new moon tonight. Have a great Thursday and I’ll see you on the island.

Rainfall (or lack of it) for May 2024. It will not surprise you to know that we are putting 0 inches of rain in the record books for the month of May. It is actually the first rainless May in our records going back to 1995. May 2024 will be one of the more memorable smoke seasons, with the airport closing several mornings due to visibility.

We have had less than an inch of rain recorded since the beginning of March. Looking forward into June, we normally pick up more squalls from the east with an average rainfall of over 3 inches. We have chances of rain, starting this weekend. Let’s hope they come through because the island is very thirsty.

Good morning Bay Islands. This morning we have a photo from Kacee McDonald taken from Ipanema Bar and Grill in West End, a place that’s close to my heart, though I’ve never been there, because it includes the title of one of the best songs ever recorded.

On satellite this morning we can see those high, dry cirrus clouds coming from our west. There are only a few cumulus clouds around and, therefore, very little chance of rain today and tomorrow. As we get into Thursday and Friday we will see our chances of rain increase, but keep in mind, rain will not be likely on any day. Our chances this weekend will only increase from the current zero to about 30 percent.

When talking about rain this time of year, we are talking about squalls coming from our east and, unfortunately, those squalls often die before they get here. Unlike our winter northerlies, when the wind hits the mountains on the mainland and create updraft for rain, we have no mountains to our west, and therefore no mechanism to create updraft. This forecast map from the Canadian model through the weekend shows a hole in the rainfall right over Coxen Hole. With rain showers around, we can still hope for some cooling rains somewhere, but there is no guarantee you will get any at your house. Yesterday we were 91 degrees (33C) at the airport. With rain nearby, I’m still hoping this weekend will be slightly cooler, maybe with a high around 87.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We wake up to winds around 10 mph from the east/northeast and seas at 2 feet. They will calm today to 1-2 feet and get even calmer as we get into the week. If you are someone who doesn’t llke a choppy sea, the next week will be the perfect time to hop aboard the Galaxy Wave to do some shopping in La Ceiba or make that weekend visit to Guanaja you’ve been promising yourself. It will definitely be smooth sailing (or ferrying) through the weekend.

Low tide is 1:15 p.m. Have a great Tuesday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Dawn Diamond on Water Cay in Utila and shows someone holding the sun in his hands. Watch out buddy, that things hot. We’ve been having too much sun and too little sky water. We have a little hope that may change this weekend.

Our satellite shows some clouds, but mostly the high, cirrus clouds that hold no rain moving from west to east. There are a very few popcorn clouds moving east to west that might give someone a shower, but the chances today are very low.

Chances of rain are pretty low this week until we get to Friday. Friday into the weekend the computers are wanting to give us a better chance of rain. This is the forecast from the Canadian model. I’ve noticed that the GFS is a little to optimistic about rain and the Canadian seems to have the right balance. But even the Canadian model is trying to give us a decent chance at rain Friday and Saturday. Let’s hope so.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with 15 mph east winds and seas 2-3 feet on the south side. By midday winds will be 10-15 mph and seas 1-2 feet. Today and tomorrow will be similar, but starting Wednesday we should have quite calm daytime winds and seas around 1 foot. A great time to plan your excursion with Jolly Roger Roatan if you will be visiting our island.

Low tide is 12:30 p.m. Have a great week.

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from James Oden and shows a sun halo, which occurs when the sun peeks through ice crystals high in the atmosphere. It is a good reminder that no matter how hot it gets down here on the surfact, it is quite cold a few thousand feet up.

I had high hopes for morning showers today, but the rain formed just to our southeast, as shown by the red arrow. The majority of the moisture is well off to our east, shown with the green arrow. That mass of clouds will stay to our east, teasing us over the next few days. Every few mornings it may throw a little moisture our way, and the chances, though small, will be better the further east you go.

For as long as I can remember, the airport’s weather observations shut down at midnight and started back at 6 a.m. This weekend I’m noticing that the weather observation is 24 hours. Anyone know what’s changed?

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We wake up to 15 mph east winds and seas 3 feet on the south side. Today will be much the same, but starting tomorrow, we will see things starting to calm down quite a bit with 10 mph east winds and seas 1-2 feet during the day. It will be a great week on the seas.

Just a reminder that Roa Fest sponsored by Galaxy Wave will be two weeks from today. It advertises a Rodeo, and living in Oklahoma so long that got me curious. I learned it isn’t barrel riding and calf roping, but an opportunity for the kids to ride ponies. Still sounds like fun and it benefits the public hospital.

Low tide will be 11:40 a.m. Have a great Sunday!

Good morning Bay Islands and welcome to June. Let’s hope our new month is wetter than our last one. It will almost certainly be clearer. Our photo of the day comes from Deena Kopetzky in Camp Bay. Deena is the first contestant of the month vying for a free dive at Sandy Bay Divers.

We start with our satellite photo and we again have some clouds to our east moving toward us. A light shower is possible but not likely for most of us. We’re really hoping for a morning shower for some of us tomorrow, which looks like the best day of the week for rain chances. Tomorrow’s rain chance is maybe 25 percent, while Monday through Thursday it is more like 10-15 percent. It should go up a little again next weekend.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: Winds this morning are from the east at 15 mph and seas 2-3 feet south side. We will stay there today and tomorrow, but we will have noticeably calmer conditions starting Monday and through next week. It will be a great time to be on the sea.

Today is the official start of Hurricane Season, but there are no storms right now that are good suspects for a tropical storm. This map shows where June storms normally form. you will note the blue area dips close to us to our north, but keep in mind storms in our area typically move northwest and away from us, so a storm in June is highly unlikely for us. But never say never, especially with our strange climate these days.

Don’t forget tomorrow is Lobster Sunday, always a great day to enjoy a meal and a cocktail at Ikigai by Robby Molina in French Harbour.

Low tide will be 10:50 a.m. Have a great weekend!