Dive Review of Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving/Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget in
Caribbean (General)/Utila, Bay Islands, Honduras

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Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving/Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget: "Diving with the Lodge", Jul, 2023, by Elasmobranch, TX, US ( 2 reports with 1 Helpful vote). Report 12842 has 1 Helpful vote.
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Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Accommodations	N/A	Food
Service and Attitude		Environmental Sensitivity
Dive Operation		Shore Diving	N/A
Snorkeling
Overall Rating
Value for $$
Beginners
Advanced
Comments	Utila Lodge, is built to accommodate about 16 people at a time and provides all inclusive room, board, and diving. [utilalodge.com link] The rooms are island nice, rustic on the outside and well furnished inside. The Lodge is built on piling and stands over the shoreline and shallows of the bay and each room has a screened porch that faces west with a hammock and a ceiling fan. If you like the sound of small waves as you go to sleep, ask for a lower level room. You can check in here and never go off the property except to ride a dive boat and get in the water, but you will miss out on the local culture and all of the characters that make up this island if you do. Utila Lodge and the dive operation and school are owned and managed by the Engel family, led by Kisty and her daughter, Rebecca with son Shawn working behind the scenes. Look for Queen Ann in the bar, Ceasar waiting tables, Annie, Daisy, Leslie and Vanessa in the kitchen and Brittania, at the desk. Diving is with Lodge guests or Bay Islands College of Diving students or both. There are three primary boats. All are inboard, single screw, diesel drive vessels. All have emergency equipment, rinse tanks that are dedicated to cameras and computers, and overheads that provide shade to at least 40% of the main deck. Utila Lodge, like most of the dive shop/dive school operations on Utila, has a mix of long term employees that serve as crew, including some divemasters, plus plenty of dive teachers and students. Most of the divemasters are recently certified graduates and divemaster students working with their teachers. The boat captains are island natives, in almost all instances, and are highly skilled, having been on the water since before they could walk. At Utila Lodge, look for these captains: Bootsy, Gringo, Albert. All of these guys are good at finding the sea mounts and making sure the boat drifts to drift divers without any motor involvement. Gringo has blessed me by taking dive site suggestions and is an excellent spotter of dolphins, pilot whales and whale sharks. I have seen him gently manage a boat with mechanical problems and maneuver a vessel that was crippled to a feather touch on the dock in a crosswind. and these divemasters: Marcos, Hanna plus these long term employees who have shown themselves to be better than the general group of dive service workers: Arjen (highly skilled), Vicki Utila sits in an area of prevailing easterly trade winds. A large part of the island in the western part of the land mass, is still undeveloped rain forest, swampland, mangrove mix that the locals call the bush. There is very little current most of the time. Most of the time, the current is east to west. Visibility is mainly good, 80 to 100 feet and more, especially on the north side of the island and on dive sites near the east end of the island, which is upcurrent. Visibility diminishes at sites near the mouth of the harbor and down current, meaning just west, of the mouth of the lower lagoon during outgoing tides. Visibility is also affected by rainwater runoff, with the south side of the island affected more than the more aside due to greater development and population on the south slope of the island. The south side of the island and west end of the island are sheltered most of the time. These are closer to town and to the bay and these dive sites see the most use. The south side dive sites are typically characterized by shallow reef, 5 to 15 feet below the surface of the water, that have a sharp drop off to a sand slope that may start at 35 to 40 feet or may open up down to 90 feet. The north side of the island is mostly iron shore, some of which has sand or coral shelves that may protrude from the wall at 45 to 50 feet or at 80 to 85 feet or at 110 feet, or at depths beyond recreational level. Some of the walls on the north side have caverns formed in undercuts. Some areas have caves that go into the wall and dead end. Some caves have the potential to allow dives entering one opening, looping into the island and exiting from another opening. These caves are dangerous and should only be accessed by well trained, knowledgeable divers accompanied by a knowledgeable divemaster. The reef is stressed and suffering coral bleaching and the stony coral tissue loss disease. These stressors have significantly damaged the brain coral and other hard corals and almost wiped out the pillar coral. There is still a fair amount of soft coral in most places and huge swaying fields of soft coral in others. The dive operators are doing their best to protect and replenish the coral using antibiotic paste and growing gardens of cultivated choral for transplantation. The locals eat the fish. Consequently, there are more critter dives than fish dives. Almost every large sandy area holds pipe fish and their relatives. Seahorses are common in some areas. The dive operations to a good job of eliminating the invasive lionfish at the frequently used dive sites. There are still large schools of fish resident on some of the reefs around the island and on and around some of the seamounts. Utila is also a waypoint for migrating schools of fish that constantly replenish the reefs and form bait balls in open water just off of the shoreline. These boiling schools of fish attract several different species of dolphins, pilot whales, occasional whale sharks, and even passing small pods of orcas every now and then. The larger creatures make for spirited surface intervals when they can be anticipated and divers can drop into their path on snorkel. Specific Dive Sites Here is a small sample of some of the dives available around the island. Lighthouse Reef – Because this site is at the end of the fringe reef that protects the harbor, the clarity of the water at this site suffers some due to the silting. There is patchy reef on the sand just off of the main coral structure. The main reef structure has coral covered slopes inside and outside of the harbor and you can dive this area shallow or deep, day or night. On one dive of the site, higher maximum depth was 70 feet. On another dive, on the inside reef, our maximum depth was 41 feet. On our last dive here we found mantis shrimp, small translucent shrimp on green wire coral, a large scorpion fish, and a couple of large green morays. The Haliburton – This is a small, open hull cargo ship sitting upright, pointed easterly on sand that is 95 to 105 feet deep. The stern mounted house is open with some remaining cables inside. The railing around the house is deteriorating and falling away. A memorial plaque honoring Jim Engel was mounted to the rail facing astern and, at my last visit, was laying on the aft facing bridge deck. The top of the house is approximately 60 feet below the surface. The wreck is just outside of the harbor, so visibility is typically 45 to 50 feet. The wreck attracts a variety of fish. We typically see queen angels. There is a small colony of bristle worms that chase each other around the house. Moon Hole –This dive is best done after dark. If it the the hole is a sand patch between the wall and the shoreline of the island. The sand patch is between 20 and 30 feet deep, almost perfectly circular, and rimmed with sloping coral sides, making this an easy dive in a defined area with a hard bottom. Sometimes stingrays lay in the sand. Occasionally, a seahorse will take up residence here. You can generally find symbiotic shrimp and gobies and pipefish. At night, you may see if octopus and lobster. Ron’s Wreck -- There is a small, steel hull boat with its bow pointed into an elbow of the reef. The boat sits on the sand and about 55 feet of depth. The hull and what remains of the deck of the boat are mostly encrusted with small bits of coral. A mantis shrimp built an igloo type home on a patch of the remaining deck near the starboard bow. Swimming from stern to bow (basically North) and continuing into the L of the reef, you will ascend a gentle coral slope. If you fade a little to the left, you will go over a ridge of coral and into Moon Hole. If, instead, you go from bow to stern and then follow the edge of the reef, you will find yourself curving to the left to a short wall on your left and patches of coral on the sand to your right. Because there is a hard bottom at just over 50 feet, and the shape of the reef makes navigation easy, this dive is appropriate for day or night. Airport Caves – This dive site is close to the harbor and east of the protective point that shields the harbor, putting the site upcurrent. Consequently, with easy accessibility and almost assured great visibility, lots of divers pass through this terrain. There are plenty of swim throughs without approaching any coral formations that pose any entrapment hazard. Look for giant tunicates. This is one of the sites that typically holds a seahorse. There are commonly eagle rays and spotted morays here. Ted’s Point/Jenny’s Wreck – There is a great story about how Jenny and Ronnie came to live on Utila of and have Jenny’s concrete sailboat came to rest on her starboard side in about 75 feet of water on sand surrounded by swaying soft coral. Ask your divemaster to tell you the story before you dive this site. More than half the time, you can find eagle rays on this site. The soft coral collects file fish. Barracuda, scorpion fish and passing tarpon are also common here. Start at the mooring and swim away from shore until you reach 55 feet of depth. Kick out from shore a few more times until the sand is about 75 feet then look to your right and see the bow of the sailboat. Circle the sailboat once or twice and then swim back toward shore until you reach the wall. Turn right and follow the wall back to the boat. Black Hills – This seamount is covered with swarms of fish. There is typically a large school of spadefish swimming around. Occasionally, you can find larger predator fish staying off the mound and sometimes at the edge of visibility, including wahoo and mahi. Look for small golden moray and swimming green morays. When approaching and leaving this site, look for dolphins. Iron Bound – This beautiful area of the reef starts from a mooring that is tied through two holes in a lip of reef that protrudes away from shore. The reef top is relatively shallow, around 35 feet. Swim through one of the holes and drop down the edge of the reef to a sand bottom at about 50 feet. The sand is dotted with small patches of coral and barrel sponges. Turn right and follow the wall to several open undercuts that hold juvenile angel fish, barracuda, spotted drum, and small schools of other Caribbean fish. About 20 minutes into a slow swim along the wall you will find an undercut that goes into the wall and around a large coral post such that you can swim around this pillar and back out to the wall and you will see the light throughout your swim. Jack’s Bight/Rock Harbor – Drop in at Jack’s Bight and swim west across fingers of coral and valleys of sand. The coral tops start at around 60 feet of depth and then get shallower – 40 feet and then 35 feet. Out further from the wall, there is a ridge that runs east and west across the ends of some of the coral ridges. Finish by moving closer to shore and shallower and you can easily spend an hour or more on a beautiful reef and never exceed 60 feet. Last year, we came up to see schooling fish in a bait ball just offshore from our dive and a whale shark tail breaking the surface. The whale shark stay away from us when we got close to the bait ball, but a small hammerhead came in from our right, looked at us, and turned around to disappear into the blue. Duppy Waters – This is one of my favorite dive sites. There is a rimmed, oblong sand patch at 50 to 55 feet of depth on top of the reef. Roll in on top of the sand patch and immediately go over the rim and drop off of the dramatic wall that attracts and holds large schools of fish. Look down and you will see a ramp of sand that tops off at just over 100 feet of depth and descends down and to the left paralleling the wall the and falling off beyond the reach of ambient light. A slight fog of sand hovers over the ramp. Local legends and superstitions tell of ghosts that walk up the sand ramp from the depths and stare hauntingly at divers before turning and walking back into the deep. Play along the wall in either direction, being careful not to exceed your planned maximum depth. Roll up on top of the wall and over the reef on your way back to the boat to spend a little time in the sand patch and at the top of the coral that rims the sand patch to stage the dive shallower toward the end. Pinnacle – Plan to dive to at least 80 feet at this site. The pinnacle stands out from a horseshoe shaped underwater cove of coral. There is a hard bottom at about 45 feet on the side of the pinnacle closest to the reef wall. The sand at the outside of pinnacle starts at more than 100 feet and drops down below recreational diving depth. There is a hole in the wall inside a branch of the horseshoe shaped cove at about 55 feet. Take a flashlight if you plan to swim into the hole because the hole shifts horizontally as you swim vertically down. You will emerge from a large open cut in the reef between 110 and 130 feet deep, dropping onto the deep sand slope on the outside and beside the pinnacle. This site attracts larger fish, old turtles, and big barracuda. On one dive, we counted at least 14 barracudas. Don’s Quickset – We last did this site is a drift dive and swam all the way to the West End. From the entry, we swam at approximately 240°. We dropped in on top of a nurse shark. Even though you can dive this site deeper, we chose to stay above 50 feet. The reef is formed into ridges and cuts that make looking for the animals and critters more interesting. We found grouper, barracuda, and several varieties of parrot fish. Raggedy Cay –This dive can be done from a mooring or as a drift dive. You will dive a reef plateau that starts at about 25 feet of depth and you can work your way over the edge and treat the plateau as a wall by going west from the mooring buoy. In addition to general critters, this area collects spotted drum and squirrel fish, and, on our last dive here, there was a school of yellowtail snapper. Big Rock – This site holds a unique place and some of the wall is prettier and more populated than some of the other sites on the south side of the island. The wall has some undercuts that form small caverns and there is a memorial plaque in one of them for a man who frequently visited the island and who volunteered his time and contributed a considerable amount of his wealth to projects that help improve the community. Some time ago, this section of the reef held clusters of bluebell and frilled tunicates. These were missing last time I dove this site. There was plenty of new growth, green leather coral repopulating the reef, several lobsters, a large spotted drum, and arrow blennies. You can extend the dive to the east, cover Madeline’s dive site and see more of the same if you watch your depth. It is easy to go deep on this dive. Jack Neil Beach/Point – This site is one of a few beaches that opens to a widening sand chute in a protected area on the south side of the island. Jack Neal Point is the east margin of the San shoot where the shallow reef drops to a mini-wall that, itself, lands on sloping sand that descends below recreational levels if you swim south. Like most of the large sandy areas around the island, it is easy to find pipe fish and Peterson cleaning shrimp on this site. On one dive here, there was a small Nassau grouper. Following the bottom of the mini-wall and controlling depth, a typical maximum depth is about 75 feet. If you look closely, you can find small burrowing crabs in the sand and mantis shrimp in the sand and along the bottom margin of the reef wall. There is a school of squid that stays over the sand and around the ends of the sand chute. On the way back to the boat, we were befriended by a yellowhead wrasse that we named George who followed us most of the way to the safety stop. Jack Neil Mound and Twin Peaks – These are seamounts located off of the south shore of the island. Twin peaks is farther out and deeper. Both have large fields of tall, swaying soft coral. Dive these as if you were Peter Pan going to Neverland. Set your buoyancy at the surface. Take a deep breath, kick toward the peak of the seamount and exhale. Relax, clear your ears, and quietly drift down as if you were flying. Angle either right or left. Set your maximum depth along the slope of the seamount and slowly spiral around the seamount and up to the peak and the end of your dive. Little Bight – This site has several mooring points over a wide sand chute that starts at a beach and extends to depths beyond recreational level. On each side of the sand chute there is a coral field with a short wall near the shoreline that becomes taller and deeper as you swim out to sea. The sand holds damsel fish, yelling had jaw fish, small peacock flounders, and sometimes squid. There are garden eels where the sand chute opens up to the main coral wall. We also found a small black pipe fish and a swimming ghost pipe fish on and over the sand. There are also upside down jellyfish here. Black Coral Wall/Laguna Beach – You do not have to go deep to see black coral here, but the wall extends deep if you want to dive there. The plan can take you almost to the opening of the lower lagoon and back. Because of the proximity to the lagoon and the mangroves there, outgoing tides can wash tea colored water across this reef. This site commonly holds at least one green moray. You can also commonly find spotted drum and small Spanish lobster.
Websites	Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget
Reporter and Travel
Dive Experience	Over 1000 dives
Where else diving	Bonaire, Honduras, Gulf of Mexico, Florida, Australia, Caymans (each of them), Bahamas
Closest Airport	San Pedro Sula or Roatan	Getting There	Any carrier to San Pedro Sula: From there by CM Airlines to Utila or by arranged driver to La Ceiba and across to Utila on the ferry. OR Any airline to Roatan and from there to Utila by ferry.
Dive Conditions
Weather	sunny, windy	Seas	calm, choppy, no currents
Water Temp	83-84°F / 28-29°C	Wetsuit Thickness
Water Visibility	75-120 Ft/ 23-37 M
Dive Policy
Dive own profile	yes
Enforced diving restrictions	One hour per dive, not consistently enforced, to keep the kitchen on schedule.
Liveaboard?	no	Nitrox Available?	yes
What I Saw
Sharks	1 or 2	Mantas	None
Dolphins	Schools	Whale Sharks	None
Turtles	1 or 2	Whales	None
Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):
Corals		Tropical Fish
Small Critters		Large Fish
Large Pelagics
Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):
Subject Matter	N/A	Boat Facilities	N/A
Overall rating for UWP's	N/A	Shore Facilities	N/A
UW Photo Comments	I will send the broader report via email and allow you to edit as you see fit.

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Dive Review of Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving/Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget in Caribbean (General)/Utila, Bay Islands, Honduras

Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving/Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget: "Diving with the Lodge", Jul, 2023,

Photos Submitted with this Report

Ratings and Overall Comments 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Overall Rating

Reporter and Travel

Dive Conditions

Dive Policy

What I Saw

Ratings 1(worst) - 5 (best):

Underwater Photography 1 (worst) - 5 (best):

Dive Review of Utila Lodge; Bay Islands College of Diving/Stay at Utila Lodge, if on a budget in
Caribbean (General)/Utila, Bay Islands, Honduras