Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Phil Sikora and offers a view of cumulus clouds through the power lines of Los Fuertes. We enjoyed a day of between a tenth and a quarter of an inch of rain on Roatan, less on Guanaja and more on Utila. Unfortunately our rain will not continue, and we will have mostly dry conditions through the weekend.

Our satellite image today reminds us of what we’ve been seeing the last two weeks before yesterday, with morning rain showers near Belize and well to our east. We have partly cloudy skies over us, but generally those clouds are not rain producers. Through the weekend our best chance of rain will be Saturday night/Sunday morning, but even then the chance is low, maybe 30 percent.

Roatan Weather supporter Megan Mitchell sent along this video of the happy occasion yesterday, along with her measurement of a quarter inch of rain in Sandy Bay.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with pretty typical 20 mph east/southeast winds and 3 foot seas southside. Winds will calm to 15 mph by midday and seas 2-3 feet. Tomorrow looks much like today, but Sunday we look for calmer conditions, with east winds 5-10 mph much of the day and seas 1-2 feet.

By the way, my day today will be mostly sunny, since it is the 21st anniversary of my obtaining the privilege of being married to the lovely Susan Andrews.

June 21 is often the first day of summer, but actually astronomical summer started yesterday with June 20 being the longest day of the year, due to this being a leap year. Nothing says “summer weekend” like a barbecue, and no one on the island produces better raw materials for barbecue than Carniceria Rosita. I recently visited the Rosita in Coxen Hole in the heart of the big city. It is quite a sight, with locals lined up at the butchers’ windows. If you want a taste of “real Roatan.” park your car somewhere and walk to Rosita’s Coxen location and come away with a bag full of goodies for the barbecue.

Low tide is 2:15 p.m. We’re getting close to full moon. Have a great Friday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Amy Knadler and shows folks looking longingly at storm clouds in Utila. I have to say I don’t think I’ve been through such a period on the island where rain was falling all around us and not on us. It looks like that may continue.

On satellite we can see clouds to our east, but they aren’t producing as much rain as I hoped. As the entire system moves northwest, that is bad news for our hopes of getting rain.

Keep your eye on our islands in this Euro forecast map through Monday at noon and you can see the rain dancing all around us. We will keep a 20 percent chance of rain around today and tomorrow. If we don’t get get any in the next couple of days you can see that our area gets drier the first of next week.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with southeast winds at 12 mph and seas at 3 feet southside. Today winds will turn more to the east and get a bit stronger, 15 mph by noon and 20 mph by evening with seas getting up to 4 feet. Overnight winds will be 25-30 mph and seas up to 6 feet southside. Tomorrow will be windy, with east winds 20-25 mph and seas 5 feet. Things calm a bit Friday with east winds 15-20 mph and seas 3-4 feet.

It was great to see Ikigai by Robby Molina and Melissa Dixon supporting the public hospital at Roa Fest. From the looks of things, lots of money was raised. It was truly a community effort.

Low tide will be pretty low at 1 p.m. Have a great Wednesday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Cesar Gonzalez Sr. taken from Pristine Bay looking east. We don’t get many nighttime photos of clouds, but I like this one because it shows first light of dawn coming through wispy cirrus clouds that have no rain.

This is the infrared satellite image, which gives the higher, colder cloud tops colors leading from blue to red. When I first started looking at these satellite images I was fooled into thinking the whole red mass held rain, but in these large cumulus clouds systems, the rain is usually only in the highest cloud tops. We’ve spent a lot of dry time under the lower cloud tops.

Here’s the path of what should be Tropical Storm Alberto. It won’t directly affect our weather, but it might indirectly drag some moisture over us.

This video shows why we have hope for rain tomorrow into tomorrow night. As what should be Tropical Storm Alberto moves ashore in northern Mexico, moisture shown as the X will be dragged behind it over us. It gives us hope, but it’s not a sure thing. The GFS and Euro, usually two of the more reliable computers, say this will happen. The German ICON and the Canadian model keep us drier. Let’s hope it happens, because the weekend into early next week looks dry.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with 15 mph southeast winds and seas around 3 feet south side. As we get to midday that should calm to 10 mph east winds and 2 foot seas. Tomorrow morning will be again 15 mph southeast winds and 3 foot seas south side, but Wednesday evening through Friday morning will be quite a bit windier, with southeast winds 20-25 mph and seas 4-5 feet.

No matter what the sea conditions it’s always a great time to book your excursion with Jolly Roger. They will find the best spot to go in the water and a great time on the boat as well.

Low tide is just after noon. By the way, the airport hit 95 degrees (35C) yesterday. That’s the hottest I’ve seen in a long time. Have a great Tuesday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day is a great sunrise from Colette Grbac in Lighthouse Estates in West Bay Point. If you like Colette’s photo, she’ll have a chance at a free dive from Sandy Bay Divers. We’re looking for a sponsor for next month’s contest. If you’d like to sponsor, please send me a message.

Let me ask you a question. In the area between southern Mexico and Nicaragua, how much rain coverage do you think there is? Maybe 70 percent. It is just amazing that we are again stuck in a dry slot. What you are seeing is a large Central American low that is likely to become a tropical system and threaten southern Texas late this week. As it moves away from us, our chances of rain will decrease somewhat.

Here is the National Hurricane Center forecast, with a 70 percent chance of this low developing into a tropical depression over the Gulf of Mexico but, of course, no threat to us.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with 20 mph south/southeast winds and seas 4 feet on the south side. That should calm by midday to 15 mph and seas 3 feet south side. Of course, Utila is the exception, with a light westerly breeze.

Tonight and tomorrow morning should be calmer than this morning, with southeast winds around 10 mph and seas 2-3 feet. Wednesday looks similar, but Thursday and Friday look windier, with east winds those days 20-25 mph.

Don’t forget. Lots of great restaurants take Monday as their day off, but Ikigai by Robby Molina is here for your Monday cravings, with a great selection of Asian and Central American inspired dishes, as well as some great pasta choices. Or just relax with a few drinks as you watch the sun set in French Harbour.

Low tide is just before noon. Have a great week!

Good morning Bay Islands. Dmitry Nezhny sends us this beautiful cumulonimbus cloud over Lawson Rock. It would be even more beautiful if it would bring actual rain to the islands. It seems we continue to be condemned to watch jealously while it rains out to sea. At least the rain, along with heavier waves, are cooling the waters ever so slightly. The temperature gauge near Big Bight shows the water temp down to 84 (29) after getting up to 86 (30) which is the beginning of coral bleaching temperature.

Our satellite shows a nice thunderstorm over Belize City and some rain over toward Swan Island to our northeast, but none of it is moving very fast. We continue to have partly to mostly cloudy skies but no rain. Today we will have a small chance of a shower, but, as always, I wouldn’t bet on it. Some locations on the Pacific coast of Honduras got close to 10 inches of rain yesterday and more is on the way for them with a tropical disturbance in the Pacific. Looks like it is either feast or famine for Central America.

The Central American low that is bringing these nearby showers will move north/northwest into the Gulf of Mexico, with a 60 percent chance of turning into a tropical depression next week. As it moves away from us, our rain chances should get even less early this week.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with 20 mph east/southeast winds on the east side of Roatan and 10 mph winds on the west side, even calmer for Utila. Most of us have 3 foot waves on the south side. As the day goes on, winds on the west side of the island will pick up a bit to 15-20 mph. Tomorrow winds come from the south 10-15 mph and seas remain 3 feet south side. Tuesday looks a little calmer.

A quick reminder that today is the day for Roa Fest sponsored by Galaxy Wave over at Sol y Mar in Sandy Bay, starting at 11 a.m. it will be a day full of great music, great food and great family fun and all of it supports the efforts get the public hospital going.

Low tide is 11 a.m. Have a great Sunday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Bella Chamberlain from her place between Milton Bight and Politilly. It shows a gorgeous sunrise she calls “fire over ash.” Lots of folks are taking advantage of the dry weather to burn off fields.

Here is this morning’s satellite. We again see rain off the coast of Belize and north of the Mosquito Coast. Those areas are shown with blue arrows. The red arrows shows us, with a few clouds but no rain. This weekend we will have about a 20 percent chance of rain. During the week ahead, I hate to say it, but the rain chances look even less, maybe 10 percent.

I came across this weather story on Twitter. It has the promising headline “Massive Rain Central America” and indeed this weekend and early next week the Pacific coast of Honduras and El Salvador are going to have some very bad flooding. You may have seen video yesterday of street flooding in Tegucigalpa. But what caught my eye is the area where I added the arrow. The one dry hole in Central America is right over us.

Here is the Euro forecast for rain for the next week. Guess where the only dry hole is?

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the day with 20 mph east winds on the east side of Roatan, giving us 3 foot seas southside. Winds are much less on the west side and Utila. Actually they have a light westerly breeze. As the day goes on winds will calm to around 15 mph and 2 foot seas midday, but this evening things will get windier and overnight we will be around 25 mph from the east and 4 foot seas. Tomorrow looks like a 20 mph east wind and 3 foot seas southside. Monday things get a little calmer with 10-15 mph east winds.

I just pulled out a rack of baby back ribs from the freezer and set them to thaw. I have no doubt we’ll be eating good tonight because ribs from Carniceria Rosita can’t miss.

Lowest tide is 10:30 a.m. Have a great weekend!

Good morning Bay Islands. I usually try not to use two photos from the same person in the same month, but I have to make an exception today, because Jeffrey Hill perfectly pictured what our last 24 hours have been like with rain — so close, yet so far away. This is taken from the top of Jonesville Point looking east toward Barbarat and shows a cumulus cloud, likely with a shower at its base.

The green arrow shows the cloud that Jeffrey captured, probably bringing a shower at 6:45 a.m. in the strait between Guanaja and Barbarat. The red arrow shows an even stronger storm to our north. These are sliding slowly to the south/southwest so there is a possibility some of us could see a morning shower. I hate to say it, but after this morning I believe our chances to get rain will start going down. We’ve had something like 40 percent chances of rain the last few days and going forward, especially Sunday into early next week, the chance will be more like 20 percent.

As proof that we had good showers around, notice how quickly the temperature fell at the airport around 2 p.m. (from 91 to 75 degrees) Clearly it either rained there or someplace very nearby. Unfortunately we don’t have a rain gauge anywhere near Coxen Hole to know for certain.

At around 4 p.m. we had two storms lined up to our east, moving west, and somehow they just died before they got here. That’s what our life has been like during this drought.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast. You have another day and a half to enjoy fairly calm seas on all sides of the islands. Winds this morning are around 5 mph from the northwest and seas 1-2 feet. Winds will swing around to the east this afternoon, but remain pretty calm. Those calm winds last through tomorrow morning, but starting tomorrow evening we get our strong east winds back for the weekend. Next week looks to be around 15-20 mph east winds.

Just another reminder that the day after tomorrow will be Roa Fest, sponsored by Galaxy Wave, a day long extravaganza of music, food and activities at Sol y Mar in Sandy Bay that will benefit the public hospital. Admittance is only 50 lempiras so go have fun!

Lowest tide will be at 10 a.m. Have a great Friday!

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day comes from Jeffrey Hill who captured these island black iguanas, also known as washy willies, in his yard above Jonesville Point. They were sunning themselves in the sun. Even though they are cold-blooded, I wonder if they ever get hot, because it was 93 degrees yesterday at the airport. We really hope to get some rain this evening and tomorrow morning.

On our close-up satellite we see a few clouds around, especially on the west side of Roatan and over Utila, but these are unlikely to hold any rain, except maybe that cloud just east of Guanaja. These are very slowly moving to the east.

This map shows the moisture overhead, and you can see what they call the Central American gyre (or Central American low pressure) spinning and slowly moving north. The computer models give us our best chance of rain this evening through tomorrow morning. Let’s hope it happens.

In the Atlantic, there is a disturbance that brought South Florida flooding rains yesterday. In the Bay of Campeche, the Central American low that is bringing us this chance of rain has a 40 percent chance of tropical development next week.

On the Pacific side of things, there is a low percentage chance that low pressure will create a tropical storm. In any case, the Pacific side of Honduras and El Salvador will get flooding rains the first of next week.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We wake up to very mild winds and seas around 2 feet this morning. Winds will remain light and variable today and tomorrow with seas 1-2 feet. Saturday and Sunday, winds will be brisker, 20 mph from the east during the day and 25 mph at night with seas 3-5 feet.

I wrote last week about how Ikigai by Robby Molina had the best Asian food around. But don’t sleep on their Mexican food either. These Two Amigo Fajitas were more than enough for lunch. I ended up taking half of them home and having dinner as well.

Lowest tide is 9:17 a.m. Have a great Thursday!