My deep connection to Guanaja began in 2011, 13 years after Hurricane Mitch sat on the island for 4 days, destroying the lives and livelihoods of a vibrant island with stable commercial businesses and growing pockets for tourism. I first invested in the then 4-bedroom Villa on Dunbar Rock to develop it into an 11-suite boutique dive resort.

From the very beginning, Dunbar Rock has been fiercely committed to “giving back” to the people of Guanaja, helping restore this remote island paradise, and responsibly sharing it with visitors who would respect and appreciate its uniqueness.

​Over the last decade, our presence on Guanaja has been defined by a deep commitment to environmental stewardship, local empowerment, and proactive community advocacy:

More than 15 years ago, we established Guanaja’s first Library and Learning Center in Bonacca Town. It was built through the "give back" initiatives driven by resort management and the owner of Villa on Dunbar Rock and Clark's Cay.

It serves as a daily gathering place and educational resource for the island's youth and adults, actively promoting reading and lifelong learning. Staff members and guests have stocked the library with over 10,000 books thus far.

We believe the underwater world belongs to the people of Guanaja. To foster a deep, lifelong connection with their native environment, we fully fund and provide professional dive training and certifications to any member of our resort team who wishes to learn. This opens up new career paths and allows our entire team to experience and enjoy the underwater treasures surrounding their island home.

We are deeply committed to protecting the reefs of Guanaja. Beginning in 2015, the dive team reestablished the mooring buoy system on the island that had been destroyed several years earlier by Hurricane Mitch. They began by locating and installing about 50 moorings at various dive sites around the island. Our Dunbar Rock and Clark's Cay dive teams, along with the team from Clearwater Paradise, continue to volunteer time and resources to add or maintain moorings.

With the help and persistence of the Guanaja Municipality, we also established a no-fishing Marine Park zone funded by a marine park fee charged to all diving and snorkeling tourists on the island.  We continue to work with the local government to expand Marine Park zones around the island to further control commercial fishing within the protected areas.

Through aggressive, ongoing lionfish containment initiatives, our dive teams work diligently and proactively engage guests to control this invasive species and protect native marine life. Furthermore, utilizing Marine Park fees supported by our guests, we actively fund the maintenance of mooring buoys that preserve over 50 pristine dive sites surrounding our island.

We have on-site sewage facilities (OSSF) at both resorts. Nothing untreated is dumped into the sea. We use Eco-friendly detergents everywhere possible. We recycle glass where possible and use returnable bottles. Kitchen waste is minimized and captured as animal feed.

Guanaja has banned single-use plastics, a drive that we initiated. The island recycles all plastics.

In 2017, through a grant from DAN and with generous contributions from the owner of Dunbar Rock and a close associate, we purchased and donated a hyperbaric chamber, and Guanaja’s first hyperbaric chamber and clinic (Clinica Hiperbarica) opened.

Through the combined efforts of many people and agencies, Hyperbaric oxygen therapy is now available to the people of Guanaja and the surrounding areas. Equally important is the reassurance that the availability of a chamber has on visiting divers.

When a devastating fire swept through the neighboring cay of Bonacca in October of 2021, displacing hundreds, we immediately sprang into action alongside our incredibly generous guests. We facilitated a massive relief drive, significantly contributing to the funds raised to ensure our beloved team members and their families could restore their lives. Beyond financial aid, we directly coordinated the complex procurement and logistics required to replace the vital home goods that were lost.

For more than ten years, we have coordinated with our incredibly loyal, repeat guests to bring educational supplies to local schools, while partnering with global diving networks and repeat guests to consistently supply medical resources and technical medical know-how to the island.

For more information on the projects we support and how you can help, please visit www.dunbarrock.com/pack-for-a-purpose/