Living in Grand Cayman

As many of you probably read in the media, there was a rare planetary occurrence on Tuesday.  In fact, Venus passed directly between the earth and the sun.

The Cayman Islands Astronomical Society  (CIAS) setup a series of high powered telescopes which were equipped with special filters so that anyone who was interested could see this event. (and not go blind in the process)   They set up shop on top of one of the buildings at Camana Bay.  Below are some of the telescopes in the setup.  Amazingly, organizers estimate that over 1000 people showed up.  I went early, so got to spend some time looking in some telescopes before lineups formed. By the time I left, the place was packed, so 1000 people is very plausible.  I think the CIAS can label this event a huge success.

This occurrence is quite rare.  The last one was in 2004 but was not visible from North America.  The next such event will be in 2117 … 105 years from now.  The actual fact that a planet passes in front of the sun is quite neat, but I have to admit that the fact that the next one will occur when I (and 99.9% of people alive today) will not be around to see it was definitely not lost on me.

Interestingly, the organizers of the event were also giving out “sun glasses” that allowed you to look at the sun without fear or ruining your eyes.  With these glasses, one could see without any magnification the small spot on Venus against the sun.  Definitely not as cool as looking though the telescope, but also quite nice to see without any assistance.

Below are some pictures taken by a good friend of mine who allowed me to put some of his pictures on my blog.  Great shots Rob! 🙂   Venus is the dark spot at the top right.

To anyone reading this blog in 2117 … hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed it in 2012.

As part of the Queen Elizabeth II’s 60 anniversary Jubilee, the Cayman Turtle farm came up with a lovely idea.   They chose to release one of their eldest residents, who is dubbed “Sir Thomas Turtleton”.  He is estimated to be approximately 60 years old and has been at the Turtle farm for 30 years.

Before the release, we had a short talk by the CEO of the Turtle farm, Tim Adam (very nice guy)

Mike Adam, the Cayman Islands Government,  Minister of Community affairs was looking on!

Here the big fellow is being lowered down as he nears his return to the wild.

Massive turtle!!!  Immediately after, a few guys turned him towards the water and he instinctively moved towards it with surprising ease and speed.

… and he is swimming away.   Note the GPS tracking device on his back.  The staff at the Turtle farm will be tracking him to see where he is going.  Should be interesting to see if he sticks around or if he goes elsewhere in the Caribbean.

On my way back, I spotted this house next to the golf club.  WOW.  Talk about maximizing the solar potential of your roof.  I count 60 panels.  Assuming 200w each, that gives a whopping 12,000w of power at peak which would make a massive dent in Cayman utility bills. (or possibly 0 if they have batteries to stock the power)

Last week, in the space of 48h, Grand Cayman received 12 inches ( inches …) of rain.   That is quite an epic amount of rain in such a small period of time.  Needless to say there is water everywhere.

To give you an idea, here is the end of the runway (no danger to planes …)  Where normally there is only a few very small ponds, there is now a very large lake!  The first picture below is the state after the rain.  The second one is the satellite view of what we normally have.

That being said, all the long time residents were surprised by the quantity of water so early in the “season”.  Rain like this would usually be associated with a tropical storm or the likes.   This weekend is gorgeous, so at least we got the rain during the work week.

Finally.  The storm “Alberto” died out at sea.  However, right behind that storm we now have “Beryl” which is as I type this a Tropical Storm and hitting the coast of northern Florida, Georgia and South Carolina.  Quite a start to the 2012 active hurricane season, that is officially not ever started.

I also added a link (top right) to James Grandage’s blog which is similar in nature to mine.  He posts some interesting stuff so invite you to take a look.

Reminds me of the shampoo commercial for when I was a kid! 🙂

A system is active north of Cayman, and not on course with us at all.  Its Tropical storm Alberto.  Interestingly, Hurricane season only starts June 1st and we usually don’t see much (if any) action until August.

I guess what this makes us think is that it will be an active season.  Lets hope not.  We must however note that the last 3 summers we have had 0 storms in Cayman! Last one was Paloma in 2008.

More posts soon.  The Flowers Sea swim is coming up soon … cant wait for that one.

Well .. not sure what to make of this news, but I found it amusing and also revealing at the same time.

Today’s front page news is a piece of an Ariane rocket that was launched in Guyana and that washed up in Bodden Town a few days ago.    How cool is that?

Photo: Elly Wray (on Caycompass.com)

Here is the full article.

http://www.compasscayman.com/caycompass/2012/04/27/Space-junk-found-in-Bodden-Town/

What I found to be revealing is that this made 1st page in the local paper today.   Things must be pretty good for this to be the headline. At least that’s my take on it.  Next time I am out diving on the southern side of the island, I sure hope to find some space memorabilia!

In continuing with the “slow news day” theme … it has been really quiet here.   Lots of rain recently though, good for the grass and people with cisterns.  I also had a visitor to my office … this fellow stayed for a long while on my window sill.  Not afraid at all ; my camera was mere inches away (separate by hurricane glass of course)

That’s it for now … all is well in the Cayman Islands.   People are starting to think (already) about hurricane season, which officially starts in just over 1-month.