Living in Grand Cayman

While in Las Vegas last week, I had the opportunity to go for a (quick) road trip to Death Valley, California.  If you like heat, this is the place for you.  Think “opening the oven to look at your pizza” type heat! Its extremely intense.  However, its an easy and very enjoyable drive.  The roads are in great condition and the views are spectacular.

On the road there ; some great mountain views

This is the spot.  It is the lowest place in North America ; 282ft below sea level.  There is a rectangular sign about 1/2 way up that mountain (difficult to see on the picture) where shows the sea level.  Its a looooong way up!

Out for a walk on the salt flats.   The temperature was a crazy 117f  (+-47c) when we did this walk. I have to admit that walk was not one of my brightest ideas.  When we left the car, we had cold drinks in our hands.  I kid you not ; when we walked back about 15 minutes later, they were piss warm, yuk!  Only good thing is that the humidity is so low that you don’t get all sweaty like in Cayman.

My high school friend Mathieu joined me on this road trip.  He is getting married in a few weeks and thought it would be great so spend some time with him so he flew down to join me!  Very wise of her, Julie did not come to Las Vegas with me.  There was not a day below 105 while I was there, so staying inside in the A/C was the way to go.   Note, we are not holding hands in this picture! 🙂

The temperature gauge in the rental car!

On the way back, we saw this fellow on the road.  He seemed lost.  We tried to give him some water but that was a failure. Anyway, coyotes have survived in the desert for thousands of years, so I assume s/he will be OK.

The trip!  We started out in Las Vegas, then took the northern route (top) and then after Death Valley, went south (down) and back to Las Vegas to complete the loop. +-330miles/550km from Las Vegas, to Death Valley and back in one afternoon!  If you plan on doing this trip on your next trek to Las Vegas, get a comfortable rental car, bring lots of drinks and a GPS is quite useful.

I had the opportunity recently to go (again) to the Bahamas. While in the Bahamas, we went for a Powerboat tour to the Exuma cays (aka: small island) which are +-1h away.  It was definitely worth the trip!  The boat leaves from Paradise Island, right next to the Atlantis hotel and heads immediately out to open ocean.  Soon no land is in sight.

Our first stop is at a small island with many, many Iguanas.  Very fun.  We are all given a few grapes.  They loved them.  All I had to do was put one on the end of a small stick and they would come running to get them.

Next up, the “base” of the powerboat company which is on another nearby island.  Amazing place on a perfect day weather wise.

As soon as we get there, the sharks show up.  They know that a feeding is soon at hand.  At the peak, I estimate that there were +-10 sharks swimming around.

Plenty of stingrays also.

The sharks get fed! They received a few large groupers and other stuff.  The best part of this day (for me at least …) was that less than 30 minutes later we went snorkeling right from that beach.   The reef sharks were still swimming around and a good number of them followed us around during the snorkel. I had one near me (< 20 ft away) for a good amount of time during the snorkel.   If anyone on that snorkel though that sharks were “man eaters” or whatever, I am sure their perspective has now changed. The sharks, just like when I go diving in Cayman could not care less about us.  My guess is that they just followed us in the hope we had some food to give them.  It was great.

Later on in the afternoon, one of the highlights of the trip.  What is that in the distance?  Its a wild boar taking a dip in the ocean.

We were told not to approach him, but the animal lover in me could not resist.  Here is this guy closer up.   Actually very friendly.  He came to give me the “sniff test” and I guess got his approval since I still have both of my hands.  Pretty cute if you ask me.

Later on, got another shot of him chilling on the beach like the rest of us 🙂

After that, the boat trip back to Nassau!  Good thing i put on loads of sunscreen lotion.  A few people on the boat with us on the tour looked like boiled lobsters.  Must have been painful to sleep that night!

I recently had the privilege of going to Ireland for a quick business trip. I was not to sure what to expect since Ireland was never on my radar screen for potential work and/or visit.

I must admit I really liked my visit.  I had some time for some sightseeing around town and also a quick trip in the countryside.

First stop, the most important place in town (or so I was told) The Guinness Brewery.  Very interesting.  The founder (Mr. Guinness …) sure had a good feeling that the business would be successful.  In fact, he signed a 9000 year (yes years) lease for the brewery @ £45 per year. (+-75$US as of writing) Impressive and the current operators of the brewery must be laughing to the bank every time they show a profit at the end of the year.

Here I am testing the product at the Gravity bar at the top of the Guinness Brewery.  The bar gives a 360 view of the city. One thing you notice right away is that there are very few high buildings.  In fact, the bar where I was seemed to be the highest point.

Now off to the countryside. Getting there was half the fun.  Rental cars in Europe are generally with manual transmissions.   In Ireland, the wheel is on the right, so … the stick is on the left.  That took some time to get used to.

When driving around, I found Dublin’s surrounding areas to be very pretty. The pastures (or whatever …) are of a crazy green.  The pictures does not do justice to the color I saw.  I also saw countless sheep in the fields that day.  Seems to be pretty big business.

Another lovely sight on my trip.  Isn’t this is just the kind of stream where you wish you had a fishing rod and some worms?

The final picture could really be somewhere in the Caribbean.   The water is not as blue, but the scenery reminded me of some of the places I have visited, especially the British Virgin Islands.  I found the coastline to be very pretty.

Now back to Cayman … next post very soon!

Been travelling lots … next post is about Cayman, I promise!

So I was in Los Angeles for business and in the past trips did all of the “standard” LA stuff such as Disney, Hollywood, etc.   Since I had a day to kill, I decided to go out for a drive to the Mojave desert.   What a great day it was.

First off, out from Grand Cayman.  An unusual flight path, taking off towards the West and banking over Seven Mile Beach.

Close to the LA airport (LAX), I saw this.   Fans of CSI: Miami will recognize this building.  So the Miami-Dade police station is not in Miami! Its actually in Los Angeles.  This is the actual building they use in the show.

Now off from my road trip to the Mojave desert.  I left the hotel before 8am on Sunday.  Virtually no one on the road.  It was great.  Here I am, less that 30 minutes out of town and already some snowy mountain tops.

First stop: Victorville.  Here is where major airlines store their decommissioned or surplus aircraft.  They like storing them here because of the dry air.  In the first picture below you can see a Cathay 747, a United 747 and a Delta 767 and a 737.

Now an hour or so down the road, I got to Hinkley.  What is Hinkey? Well, movie buffs should already have picked up on this.  It was the subject of the 2000 movie “Erin Brockovich”.  This city’s water was contaminated by a company.

As I was about to take the exit to go North/West, I saw this.   I seriously considered it.   Las Vegas was only 150 miles away at that point.  Maybe next year.

Next stop: Edwards Air Force base.  There is a large B-52 bomber on display.  Very impressive.  In the foreground, my lovely rental Volvo C30; great car for a road trip like this.

Next up, the Mojave air and space port.  This is the place where they store old aircraft (like Victorville) but is also the base for many space projects such as Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic.  A tour of the premises are available, but you unfortunately are not able to take any pictures during the tour of the hangars and old aircraft. The tour is in an econoline type van and the guy who does the tour is the guy who refuels the planes. On that basis, no reservations are possible.  So if he is out refueling a plane,  you are essentially out of luck.

Here is the link for visits if anyone interested.
http://www.mojaveairport.com/visits.htm

In the boneyard section (where planes will never fly again and are usually sold for part), lots of Hollywood history. That white tail section just behind the red “wind direction” thing on the left is the Oceanic plane from Lost. In there there is the 747 used in “24” for when the President was shot down. There is also an old Delta plane with a big hole where the Mythbuster guys did the shoebomb test, etc.

This is the storage section ; aircraft that could technically be brought back into service.  The airlines basically put them here during the recession when they have too many airplanes. The black tailed aircraft are all Air Canada 767’s. The second one from the right is the infamous “Gimli Glider” for any airplane buffs reading this blog. However, out of the 7, a few of them look in pretty rough shape so I suspect that Air Canada will sell these for parts of they will become beer cans at some point 🙂

Last stop … Palmdale airport. I had not planned this stop , but Ron, my “guide” at Mojave suggested I go. Lots of military aircraft on display.  Here I am with the SR-71 Blackbird stealth aircraft.

So here is the map of the day.  +-320 miles in all.  7:30 – 4pm.  Great time! Start and finish is downtown Los Angeles.

Just kidding.  That’s just the slogan that I am sure many of you have seen in TV commercials. I was in Nassau last week.  Very nice place ; similar in many points to Grand Cayman : quite developed, flat terrain, nice beaches and a very quick flight from Miami.

While in Nassau (which is on the island of New Providence – pop +-300,000) I had a little bit of time to tour and see the sights.  My first activity on the week-end was to do a Segway tour!  Oh what fun that was!

Its essentially a 2h trek on an abandoned  lot that leads to a very pretty beach.  The real fun is riding the Segway. Its easy to learn and you have a smile the whole time.

For those who have never been on a Segway, here is a video.  Its probably a bad idea to film while driving this device and you will  see/hear near the end of the movie I hit a bump and almost had an accident 🙂

This island along the Segway tour apparently was in a scene in the James Bond movie Casino Royale.

Back in town, there is a HUGE mound of sand that can be seen ; see picture below.

I wondered what is was an asked the guy who does the Segway tours.   Well, to be able to accommodate the largest cruise ships (Notably the “Freedom of the seas”) the Bahamian government had to dredge the harbor. Apparently the project cost 3M$. I guess with the number of tourists that come to town on those mega-ships, its probably an investment that will pay off relatively fast.  Wonder what they will do with all of that sand.  I assume they will move it in relatively short order since any hurricane would put all of that sand right back where it came from.

While walking around town, I noticed an oil tanker coming towards port. Man-o-man, this ship must have been 100% full … notice how high the water line was.

I am sure this cruise ship setup is the envy of many people in Cayman!  There were 5 cruise ships in town on this particular day and they are all lined up at the dock.  Quite an efficient system if you ask me.

View of the beach!  All in all, Nassau is a very nice place.   A bit more crowded than Grand Cayman, but a great place to visit.

Here is the URL to the company that operates the tour. I highly recommend it.  Its definitely different that just staying at the beach, reasonably priced and lots of fun. On the tour I did, there were even two people who were doing it for a second time in as many weeks.

http://www.bahamassegwaytours.com/