Living in Grand Cayman

Wow .. already in November and almost December.  For long time readers of this blog, that usually means a flurry of running posts.  This year is no different 🙂

The 10-10-10 race, which is a 10km x 3 runners relay is, as always, in the East End of Grand Cayman on the last week-end of October.  It’s also dubbed the “Halloween race”.  I have to admit I really like going to the East End.  In my opinion its often forgotten by tourists and locals alike.  So quiet and peaceful – lots of neat things to discover.  The race is in its 5th year and I am pleased to say that I have participated every year so far.  From a very small race, it has grown nicely and this it had record participation.  Bravo to the organizers.

So I got the last leg – which is also the hottest since the race starts at 6am and the last runner, depending on how fast his teammates are, starts to run only around 7:30-8am.

So here I am, running along the road with my “construction cone orange” shirt.  Good to be seen by motorists.  Gotta love running early in the morning, very few cars (even though there are two in the picture …) and seeing the ocean at the same time.

Here I am with my teammates after the run.  Once again with two other Canadians, Jesse and Dan who are both work colleagues.  The best thing about this race, after the fact that we finished 2nd Corporate team (out of 5) is that I beat both my teammates.  You see, yours truly had the hottest leg and is the oldest of the team – those guys are still in their 20’s and yours truly is above 40 now, so quite pleased 🙂

On my way back towards town I noticed this construction site at Bodden Town.  For those who know the area, it is not far from the Police Station.  Someone is building what looks to be a massive house.  Even though the trees hide part of it, note how wide it goes.  Ill make sure to post more pics of what may be an epic property in the next months.

Cayman Islands Marathon coming up soon ; really looking forward to it.  The temperatures in the morning have been dropping so should make for a great event once again.

I recently had the opportunity to go to Amsterdam for business.  Amsterdam is a city I had never visited and was quite pleased to be able to go to.  Now that I have been, I can say its a great place to visit; very “Old Europe”.

Here is what would be a view you would expect from Amsterdam and can see plenty of.  Canals and bridges.  Lots of this to be seen.  I was glad I did not have nor need a car.  I am usually quite good with navigation, but during the few taxi trips I took, I found the streets to be very confusing.  Also, streets are very narrow.

My first sightseeing stop was the Anne Frank House. As someone who is very interested in history and WWII, this was No. 1 on my list of places to see.  I very much enjoyed my visit.  I found that the museum does a good job putting us in the context of what happened and how Anne Frank and her family were hiding.   The actual house is the one which is center- left, with the black bottom level. The two to the right are part of the museum.  Note the queue to enter the museum. I waited 45 minutes ; apparently that was a fairly short wait since lines can be very long some days.

This is the bookshelf that hid the entrance to the “Annex” where Anne Frank and her family were hiding.  Photography was restricted in most parts, so no other pictures.

One evening, I was invited for a river cruise/dinner.  Below is the boat we took.  Note the very low profile of the boat.  The bridges have very little clearance, so the boats need to be very low.  On a few occasions, I wondered if we would not hit the bridge.

From the see-through roof of the boat – this is how close we were to buildings and the side. Very tight fit. The cruise also included a meal and lasted about 2h – very nice.

Another nice visit, was to the founding place of Heineken – the world famous beer.  One nice thing about Amsterdam, is that many of the top things to see/visit are either walking distance or a short taxi ride away.

Here are some old & decommissioned, yet still spectacular brewing vats.  The overall visit of Heineken takes about 1h and is very worth while, even if you are not a fan of beer.  Each ticket includes 2-beers at the end.  Since I was alone and it was early morning, I decided that drinking alone was kind of strange.  To remediate, I started chatting with a lovely couple from Manchester, UK.   Problem solved 🙂

The infamous “Coffee Shops” of Amsterdam.  For those of you who don’t, know, the licensed Coffee shops are where one can legally get some cannabis.   There are lots around and when walking by, the strong odor is a give-away of whats going on in there.

There is a definite culture around the cannabis, since you can find all kinds of products made of cannabis. Here is a great example.  For those of you wondering … its no!  I don’t smoke cigarette, so whats the point? 🙂

One thing I found interesting about Amsterdam is how many electric cars are present, especially the lovely (and very expensive) Tesla model S as below.  Last time I checked these were over 100,000$US each.  However, plenty of taxi’s and regular folks drive these.  I was told that the Dutch government offers large tax incentives for the use of electric cars, which likely explains their popularity, not to mention no need to buy gas.

So there you have it, Amsterdam in a few pictures. I very much enjoyed my time there.  I found it to be a very clean and safe city to visit, even when walking around after dark.

Some new Cayman posts coming soon 🙂

About a year ago, I went fishing with guys in my team from the office.  This year, for our group activity, we decided to … go fishing again! YAY.  Last year we had a whale of a time (pun intended) so we decided we had to go again.

Brilliant day to be on the ocean.  Fairly calm and of course nice and sunny.

Here is what was used to catch the fish.  A large hook, some “decoration” and a sort of fish used at bait.  There are about 5 lines out in the water behind the moving boat.  Most are following behind I estimate at 400-500ft back ; so not too close to the boat.

We actually snagged a Marlin at one point … it jumped twice but got unhooked.  The Captain estimated that it was +-150lbs in size.  Would have been great to see it up close. Oh well, that’s fishing.

At one point we came upon a floating piece of foam with some netting.  Turns out it was the “home” of many, many fish.  There were numerous fish swimming around it.  It was its own ecosystem.  Quite amazing actually.  Anyway, with small fish come larger fish.  There were a whole bunch of “Triple Tails” hanging around.  We managed to get 3 of them.  They look like (see pictures below – the brownish colored fish) a cross between a Bass and a Crappie if you ask me.  Taste delicious!

Here i am reeling in one of the Triple Tails.

The catch so far.  A mix of Tuna, Triple Tail and Mahi Mahi.  Cool picture taken by the captain from the up top wheel house.

The total catch of the day.  Fairly successful I must say.

Last team picture after a full day (7am to just after 3pm) at sea.  Lots of fun. Once again we went with Slackem Charters (www.slackem.com).  A great bunch; we had lots of fun.  I highly recommend them for Deep sea fishing.

Last year our captain took us out of the North Sound and along the North Side and beyond East End (up and right)  This year we went West, all the way out to “12 Mile Banks”.  So 12-miles out, almost straight out from Seven Mile beach there is a another Cayman Island.  In fact another Cayman Island that did not make it to the surface millions of years ago when the islands were formed.  The ocean goes from 3000-6000 ft deep to just over 100ft deep. That place is now called 12-Mile banks and is a fishing favorite.  Not many boats around and plenty of fish.

Another successful day on the ocean.  Cant wait to go again, maybe next year 🙂

If you are in Cayman and want to do something really fun, cant go wrong with this type of activity.  You can also book 1/2 days.

I recently discovered a new and awesome snorkel site.  Its right in George Town and to boot is accessible from a great place to have a meal and/or drink on a hot day.

The snorkel spot is the “Wreck of the Cali”.  The story of this wreck is that the boat was not designed for the large diesel engine.  With the vibration, it sprang a leak and the water got to the 30,000 bags of rice, which “bloated” and essentially sank the boat in the 1940’s.   It now lays about 300ft from shore in very calm water which is +-30 feet deep.  Although there is generally little current and its an easy swim, i’d recommend that you don’t go there alone.  Its just a bit too far out if you get into any kind of trouble.   From Rackhams restaurant is probably the best place to go see it.  After a nice cold Caybrew, you swim out and can get to the wreck within 5-7 minutes of swimming.  There is a marker (a white buoy) so its quite easy to find.

The great thing about this snorkel is right close to the restaurant, there is tons to see if you dont feel like doing the short swim to the wreck.

Plenty of small colorful fish.

Here is a school of Blue Tangs – there must of been 100 or so of them.  Always one of my favorite sights.

Two colorful Angels. Also love to see these

A stingray passing by.  No touching though … this is not Stingray City.

And of course the Tarpons.  All around George Town harbor, there are many of these harmless, yet quite large fish.  Some of them easily 4ft long.  But they are harmless to humans and never get too close.

Ok now for the wreck.   I was initially expecting something rather small.  WRONG.  This was a very large ship as you shall see.  There is an enormous amount of wreckage to see; one could easily spend 15-20 minutes looking at the wreck and possibly not see all of it.  Its a bit scattered around, likely due to the hurricanes since the time of sinking. Of course plenty of fish swimming around to see also. I can imagine lots of divers would also enjoy this site to get a closer look.

I think this is the engine. Its difficult to get a sense of the size, but the length was probably 7-8 ft long – so not a small diesel engine.

Some other large engine part.

Here is a link detailing this wreck and the location (Note: the Google Maps location in that link shows the wreck closer to shore than it really is.) I recommend you ask at Rackhams restaurant for them to point out the location to you if you are not sure.  If you are looking for a different type of snorkel (aka not coral) and have some time one afternoon in George Town, this should be on your to-do list in Cayman.

http://www.dive365cayman.com/wreck-of-the-cali

I recently had the opportunity to go to Ireland.  Readers of this blog may recall I went about 3-4 years ago and made a post about it.  It was mostly about Dublin and a short drive to the nearby countryside.

Fast forward to 2015 ; I needed to return for some work.  This time Julie came along and we made a vacation out of it.  The plan was to do a loop of Ireland (and Northern Ireland – which is part of the UK) starting in Dublin and roughly following the coast in a counter clockwise direction.  It required a good deal of planning, but I think the result was an awesome road trip.  This post is quite “picture heavy”; we had a great time and I hope to give you an overall idea of the things we saw and did.

First things first, the car. Its a Skoda Octovia diesel.  Since Skoka belongs to Volkswagen, this is essentially a VW Jetta.  I am used to driving a car with the wheel on the right, but since it was a manual transmission, the stick (gears) are changed with the left hand, which is a bit different, but was a lot of fun of course.

Ok and we are off! We immediately headed north to Northern Ireland to the city of Belfast. Did you know that the Titanic was built in Belfast from 1909 to 1912?  Here is the Titanic museum and visitor center. Quite a spectacular sight which is clearly built to resemble the ships bow.  At the exact spot where I am standing to take the picture is where the ship was built, as in the second (historical of course) picture below.

Even if you are not a huge fan of all things Titanic, I highly recommend a stop at this museum.  A vast amount of information is presented, from the construction to the sinking, beyond and everything in between.

Next stop was at the “Dark Hedges”.  If you are a fan of the TV show “Game of Thrones” you may recognize this place. Its a simple country road with these spooky trees.  The picture does not do it justice ; it was very spectacular.  Julie and I probably spent an hour walking the entire length and taking many pictures.  It is one of the most photographed locations in Northern Ireland.  We got there fairly early in the morning so there were few people.

Next we are now completely on the northern edge of the island.  The coast is beautiful.  Lovely beaches and cliffs.  No swimming here though … water looked really cold.

Along the way there were also many nice castles to see … too many to visit them all.  Some of them we just stopped for a few moments to take a look.  This one is a lovely sample of an ocean side castle. Dunluce Castle.

This next stop was the most anticipated one of the whole trip.  It is called the “Giants Causeway”. Although these stones look man made, they are a some sort of volcanic phenomenon.  Its absolutely spectacular.  All of the stones are essentially basalt columns.  There are an estimated 40,000 of them and they are all interlocking.  I have to admit, walking around on them had something magical.  I compared it to the magic of Stingray City in Cayman while I was there.

Here are Julie and I taking a break at one of the highest points at the Giants Causeway.

One of the next highly anticipated sites was “Cliffs of Moher” which is along the western coast.  These cliffs are +-400ft high over the Atlantic and were an amazing sight of natural beauty.  There are 1000’s of birds flying around which nest along the cliffs.  It was also a great view down to the ocean.

In Limerick, we visited King John’s Castle.  The entire visitor center was recently renovated and the displays were very interesting.  We really liked this visit.  The Castle is right in the middle of town and is quite sprawling, so getting it in one picture was not possible. We found Limerick to be a lovely city even though we were only there in passing.

Along the south west coast, we ventured out onto the “Biera Peninsula”. It was a few hours drive and the last 1/3 of the peninsula was gorgeous but barren landscape ; rugged shoreline, rough ocean and small vegetation.  Great place to take pictures.   Very narrow roads though which made for some interesting driving.  (see comment about the car near the end …)

In Waterford, we stopped by to do a factory tour at Waterford Crystals.  We were glad we did.  The tour, which lasted +-45 minutes, was fascinating. We essentially saw the entire process from blowing the glass, cutting, quality control, the engraving, etc.  I now understand why their products are so expensive. Each piece is done by hand and a lot of time is spent making sure they are perfect.  Below we have a “Master Blower” creating a vase of some sort. If you like factory tours, make sure this place is on your list of things to see in the southern part of Ireland.

Next stop in New Ross was a visit I was not sure about. It was the “Famine ship” experience.  The ship below, the Dunbrody (this is a replica of the original), which was built in Quebec City, was used to bring Irish people to North America during the potato famine.  We all know that the Irish have a huge diaspora around the world.  Well, that is mainly because of the potato blight starting in 1845 where a large percentage of the population was dying of hunger due to much of the potato harvest going bad.  Many Irish left the country in search of a better life (and food).  A very informative visit.  I was glad we stopped here.

Julie particularly liked our visit to “Powercourt Gardens” due to the gardens.  It was a lovely stroll along various paths and with a fabulous rose garden.

Our final visit prior to leaving Ireland was to Malahide Castle and Gardens which is just outside of Dublin.   This was another really nice visit ; the Castle has both a very “old” history dating back to 1185 and then to 2009 where it had been with the “Talbot” family for over 791 years with exception to a few years where the family has been kicked out … Anyway, really nice visit and great for history buffs.

So here is the approximate map of our trip.  Starting and ending in Dublin and going first North and then along the coast all the way back to Dublin.  We did +-2000km in 10 days.  Lots of driving around, but we love road trips.

If you like Castles, history, rugged coastlines, lovely countryside, Ireland is a great place to go.

Just one recommendation for anyone who wants to do a similar trip: Rent a small car.  Our Skoda pictures above is the biggest I could recommend.  In many places, the roads are extremely narrow, so anything bigger will not be any fun.

Stay tuned for a Cayman post soon … just did some really nice snorkeling at a new spot.