Prior to this trip to Roatán, neither of us had any desire to do wreck dives. We have been focused on the fish and the beauty of the reefs and could not imagine we’d find any thrill in exploring these sunken hulks. Besides, the scuba courses always warn about the dangers these ships hide.

When we realized that two wreck dives were part of our schedule of dives we decided to give it a try.

Almost by definition, wreck dives are deep dives. The two cargo ships sunk of Roatán were plenty deep at 110′, but are relatively shallow as far as wrecks go. The reason for that is that El Aguila (The Eagle) and The Odyssey were purposely scuttled to enhance the diving experience at AKR. El Aguila is the smaller of the two vessels and more intact; it was the first wreck of our wreck dives.

We did not know quite what to expect from this dive, but when John (our divemaster) entered the opening in the side of the ship we followed, having faith in his judgement. It was all very interesting, but not the highlight of our trip. Deep dives, by definition, are dark and use up more air, so they are also shorter dives. They are somewhat novel, but not as exciting as discovering new species of fish, eels, or other creatures on the reef. Fortunately, exploring the smaller sized wreck took less air and allowed us some time to further examine the nearby reef.

The second wreck dive provided a different experience. The Odyssey was originally the length of a football field, more broken up and 5-stories tall. Its immense size alone made it more interesting. By necessity, we spent more time exploring her exterior and interior, covering her full length and winding our way up her inside stairs. This was more time and air-consuming, so we surfaced (slowly and with a safety stop) directly to our boat rather than doing any additional reef exploration. It was not The Titanic, but it was the more interesting of the two wreck dives we had made.

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