Living in Grand Cayman

Just a quick post to mention that  we are monitoring a system forming near Panama. It looks just like Paloma did almost exactly one year ago.  See the comparison below.

Paloma last year …

The new system we are watching and potential paths.

Its been a very quiet season so far, lets hope it stays that way!

In the last few months, I have really taken to scuba diving.  Recently, I had the opportunity to dive on the east end of Grand Cayman. The diving is great.  Less dive boats, great coral reefs and lots of fish/wildlife.

We also saw two medium sized reef sharks.  These animals are gorgeous.  They were not at all interested in us and just gracefully swam by us.  No aggression or any hint that it would want to harm us.  So beautiful.

Here are some pictures. To be honest, most of these I have no idea what they are.  They sure were pretty though! 🙂

This was amazing!  There was a school of thousands of small fish.  When swimming though, I was basically blinded, since all I could see were the fish. I could not see at all where I was going. Very cool.

This shark is about 7ft long by my estimates. It is a Caribbean reef shark. It was about 30-40ft away from us.

Unfortunately shark populations around the world are being depleted. Here in Cayman I have not seen many.  In many parts of the world, they are being caught and “finned”.  I have not heard/seen any of this here, which is good.

Basically their fins are cut off and then they are tossed back into the ocean to die at the bottom since they are no longer able to swim. Quite barbaric 🙁  Their fins are used to make … soup! I recommend you watch Sharkwater. Its a documentary that I watched recently and that moved me a lot.  I promise you will never see sharks in the same light once you see this documentary.  The official site is www.sharkwater.com. On the main page you will see the trailer which will gve you an idea of what this is all about. The entire documentary is available on Youtube (in 9 parts) The first part can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vog3z1NsMYU

Here in Cayman, it is no secret that the sun is abundant. In fact, we get over 300 days of sunlight a year.  If one were to think of the best way to produce energy, solar seems like a no brainer!

However, its not that simple. Due to costs of importing the hardware and installation, solar and other renewable energies have been slow to catch on.

Here are some great examples of generating energy without burning any fossil fuels that I have found while driving around and in the local media.

Here in South Sound, this person has setup a large array of 84 solar panels. According to an article in the local newspaper, this setup can generate enough power for 3 homes.  Here is the link to the article for further reading:

http://www.caymannetnews.com/article.php?news_id=17293

Now in West Bay, this new condo building, which also houses DiveTech, a local dive shop has solar panels and also a lovely Skystream windmill.  This complex boats that excluding the use of air conditioning, it is completely self sufficient for power. In the picture below you can see the solar panels on the roof.

Here is the skystream windmill, which sits right next to the ocean.  When I went there, it was turning at a medium pace.  It was very silent.

Gotta admit, it even looks great!

Now if only the cost of these panels & other equipment could go down!  Would be amazing if every house had panels on the roof.  Lower utility bills and cleaner air for everyone.

I recently completed the Advanced Open Water diving certification.  It’s basically the second step after the Open water certification.

The class was a blast ; it’s basically reading a book and doing 5 supervised dives. Each dive has a different objective.  We did the following : Deep (100ft), wreck (saw the wreck of the Oro Verde), Night (dove after sunset …), Navigation (swimming around with a compass) and observation (swimming around and looking at stuff). I highly recommend this class to anyone considering it.  I also met some great people and now have some new dive buddies.

During one of the dives, someone spotted a Lionfish and it was captured.   In a nutshell, Lionfish are an invasive species and they are infesting reefs all over the Caribbean.  It is widely believed that a ten years ago or so, a handful of these fish were accidentally released into Biscayne Bay in Miami and have since reproduced and migrated all the way to Cayman. Apparently, the lionfish are a huge problem in the Bahamas.

The problem is that they are indigenous to the pacific and have few Atlantic/Caribbean  predators. Also, they are voracious eaters ; they eat three times their weight daily!  Thus, a campaign in ongoing to cull them.  Although eradication is impossible, minimizing the spread is the key.

Here is a baby that was caught while on one of the certification dives.

Unfortunately, these fish are spectacular!

Here are some pictures taken by a dive buddy (thanks Dean) on a dive we did this week-end.

A friendly turtle.

A small but mean looking Morey Eel.  Great colors in this picture.

Finally, here is a very interesting article that was published in the local paper about the Lionfish problem.

http://www.caymannetnews.com/news-9444–1-1—.html

Last week I had the opportunity to use a jetski (waverunner)  I had never tried one and was definitely curious about them.
Well, let me tell you, its a whole lot of fun!  Along with three work colleagues, we did a “snorkel jetski safari”. Its basically riding around on a jetski and stopping at various places to snorkel.

The activity started out at the Westin hotel (pretty much right in the middle of Seven Mile Beach). Initially we went all the way to West Bay and stopped for about 25 minutes of snorkeling.  Then we rode all the way to George Town, and stopped at the “Cheeseburger Reef” near town for some more snorkeling.  Then rode back to the Westin.  All-in-all, about 1h30 minutes of fun.

Here I am on my ride ; a quality Bombardier product made in Valcourt, Quebec!

The jetski’s all tied up while we snorkel a few hundred meters from shore.

Snorkeling at Cheeseburger reef. Its called like that because its straight off shore from the downtown Burger King!   Patrick H. : Notice the new swimsuit! 😉

Plenty of friendly fish.  Many people snorkel here, so they are not afraid of humans and hope for a handout.

Here is a little video I made while we sped back to the Westin.  Considering there was a good amount of surf, I am not sure that driving & filming at the same time was the most brilliant thing to do!