I pretty much dislike that term, ‘rainy season’, in that it becomes ‘all encompassing’ giving the impression that when it is the ‘rainy season’ here that all it does is rain. That is not even close to being accurate. A better word for the season really would be ‘winter’ The only difference is that it is ‘better wet than white’.
I am heading into my 14th ‘rainy season’ here and although there is no doubt it has the ability here to have very heavy rains, the fact of the matter is that it does not rain 24 hours a day during ‘rainy season’. Just like ‘there’ for winter, we have precipitation. Normally starting in October and going through a good part of January, the likelihood of rain is far greater than the rest of the year when often it can be very dry.
For people who live here it often can be a time of the year that that is partly cloudy and even mostly cloudy on some days that becomes a welcome relief from the bright tropical sun. Cooler temps here get down to about 65º. Some of the local people start wearing sweaters and even jackets.
Weather reports are often very inaccurate in that the island being 35 miles long and only a couple of miles wide it easily can be raining in French Harbor and sunny and bright in West Bay or Camp Bay, (opposite ends of the length of the island).
My experience with it in that time line is that you start to experience rain in the middle of the night with days often still sunny and bright. Gradually the time of rain can encompass much of the night then moves into daylight hours. We may get a couple of weeks during that timeline that we have rain much of the day and if you plan a vacation trip here expecting sun bathing or a day off of the cruise ship, you may be disappointed but Roatan with it’s elevations and plush green needs the rain. The time it does rain fills our underground aquifers and many, many cisterns that people use, sometimes exclusively, for drinking and sanitation supply.
We like winter here It may get a little wet but it certainly is pleasant and better than the ‘white’ alternative 🙂
