We docked at Roatan Island, Honduras. Seems the cruise lines no longer visit the Honduras mainland. This time we were parked behind Virgin’s Valiant Lady – I didn’t even know that Virgin had a cruise line. Seems it started only in 2021.

This was my first S.A.L.T. themed excursion, which was focused on the Garifuna people, whose ancestry included shipwrecked and/or escaped African slaves and indigenous Central Americans. I love the idea of such theamed trips, but I was not happy with the execution.

After the seemingly mandatory excursion hour-long bus ride we began with a water taxi tour of several villages built along the shore.

Our guide mentioned all the villages now have electricity and thus clothes washing machines, but most do not have electric dryers. The houses that are on extra-tall stilts use that space for storage and handing clothes. Good thing, too. We got absolutely soaked by a rain shower while in our “taxi”.

We then passed the more commercial section of the shore. The shrimping season is not open for a few more months.

As we headed back to the bus, I got a good look at our taxi captain’s decor choices.

We then traveled another 15 minutes to the beach section. I will not post any images of the buy-our-tourist-stuff area, the buy-our-local-beer bar, nor the cultural dancing. All quite generic. A Garifuna professional chef prepared our lunch of fresh caught fish, beans and rice and plantains. All were tasty enough.

In the end I paid extra for a Silversea S.A.L.T. excursion that was not very different from any of the included-with-the-cruise excursions. The irony? Only 24 hours later on a sea day a Silversea chef gave a S.A.L.T.-named demonstration of preparing a Garifuna Honduran meal where I actually got to see the steps. For “free”, without any hour-long bus rides.

I had excursions I was not happy with during my world cruise, so this is not any kind of “deal breaker.” However, the S.A.L.T. events on the ship are so high quality the standard may be too high for some of the local excursions in less-developed parts of the world to match.

Bottom line: my minimum expectation of an event with Silversea’s “S.A.L.T.” tag is to see the preparation of the meals. I’d prefer to be involved in the preparation. I have another such excursion planned for Panama City in a few days. Stay tuned.