Baby Buriku

There is a donkey family that spends its days (and nights) wandering along our street and chowing down on the weeds growing there. The baby donkey is cute, but all the neighborhood dogs bark like crazy when the donkeys are around, so hopefully they will soon decide that "the grass is greener" somewhere else, preferably far from barking dogs and speeding cars.

New Project Hannah Web Site

Project Hannah is a ministry of TWR, offering compassion, encouragement and hope to suffering women worldwide through prayer, awareness, and radio programming.

They have just totally overhauled their Web site. It is quite attractive, as well as being an eye opener to the desperate plight of women around the world.

The three pillars that support Project Hannah’s ministry of compassion, encouragement and hope to suffering women worldwide are prayer, awareness and radio programming.

Storage Shed Fire

As we drove from Hato to the TWR offices on Tuesday afternoon, we saw lots of black smoke on the horizon. It was coming from the workshops / storage sheds just south of the TWR offices. Had us worried for a few minutes. The fire brigade got it under control pretty quickly, but there was residual smoke and steam the rest of the afternoon.

This is an approx. 3000 by 700 pixel image, so depending on what blogger does to it when I upload it, and on whether or not your browser automatically re-sizes images, you might be able to see it full screen and scroll back and forth to get the full panoramic view.

Eventful Bike Ride

We had a great mtn. bike ride Saturday and I shot some new video clips that I've posted to YouTube. Bonaire is really lush and green looking after a week of rainy weather.

Besides all the scenic beauty, Saturday's ride featured a broken rear spoke, a crash when my front tire got stuck in a rut, and a back tire that was going flat, but hung in there just long enough for me to get home.

We're all bummed out that I didn't have my helmet cam running when I crashed. It would have been dramatic for sure. The road rash is healing nicely, for which I'm thankful.

A bunch of guys are working at clearing a trail that goes up over the ridge in the middle of the island. Back in the 60's one could drive a car on this road. In the late 70's, I did it in my dune buggy. Now you can barely get through on a bike, but it is a lot of fun. I've cleared this trail a couple times over the years, so it is really encouraging to see a number of other people getting into the trail maintenance mode. Yippie, the more the merrier.

TWR on Facebook

At last count there are 13 TWR related Facebook pages. The main TWR page is closing in on 2000 fans.
The top city in the world with TWR Facebook fans is Raleigh, NC; followed by Pretoria, Johannesburg, and Fayetteville.
In March a fan wrote, "I was an MK (missionary kid) on the Amazon, Brasil in the 70's and 80's. TWR was our "staple" on our wee radio in the jungle!! Praise the Lord for the work you do!!" That makes me feel good, since I was surely in the studios or out at the transmitter site when she and her family were listening.

Kibrahacha Tree Bike Ride

The "men in black" showed up for the Tuesday afternoon Bonaire Wellness Conexxions group ride. We rode through some of the Kibrahacha rich regions of Bonaire.

Some people were having trouble with the embedded YouTube video clip, so I've uploaded the video directly to blogger. But I think it looks better on YouTube, so you can follow this link to YouTube or watch the blogger version below.

Kibrahacha Update

On Sunday I was wondering why so few Kibrahacha trees were blooming. By Monday afternoon, there were load and loads of trees in bloom. They can go from nothing to full blast in one day. The picture above seems to me to capture the contrast between the bright yellow flowers and the normal olive green Bonaire hues.

If you look at my blog archives around this time every year, you'll see Kibrahacha pictures. The challenge each year is to come up with something different. I have the same problem with October sailing regatta pictures. Here's one result of this year's efforts.

Rain and Kibrahachas

We had some rainy days last week here on Bonaire. It was the first solid rain in quite a few months so we've been watching for the Kibrahacha trees to do their thing. I didn't see much action on my Saturday afternoon bike ride, but a number of the trees had blossomed nicely by Sunday afternoon. I think the trees will look great on Monday and maybe Tuesday as well, and then the show will be over for a while

One interesting thing we noticed is that on many of the trees, only part of the tree has flowers on it. I've seen this other years too, and have noticed that the remaining parts of the tree can blossom later in the year. We'll be monitoring the trees this year to check on that.

While we are happy to finally get some rain here on Bonaire to settle the dust and give the plants and trees some relief; in our neighboring country of Venezuela, this rain is crucial.
A friend there writes, " It is good that it is raining here. In the whole country there were big and small fires. Here everything was full with smoke. A lot of people have been months without receiving water in the pipes to their houses, and we also have the problem of the electricity." There have been rolling power outages and the whole country had extra holiday days during Easter week to conserve electricity, which is produced hydroelectrically, and is in very short supply.

Marty's Tower Top Pix

I just was recently looking at Marty Montour's Facebook page and at the pictures he took while he was here on Bonaire helping with the antenna tower rebuild project. Marty owns a Hydroseeding company in Vermont, and volunteered to help TWR during his winter downtime. Before he left Bonaire, Marty gave me copies of a bunch of his pictures. Here are some that he took while he was up on the TWR towers. Above you can see the TWR transmitter hall and the WEB power plant.

Above is a great view looking south across the salt company crystallizer ponds.

Looking to the west, once can see divers in the water and on the shore. Marty saw dolphins swimming by one day as well.

Looking back towards town, one can see the houses of Bel Nem and a cruise ship coming in to port. Marty shot some video of a KLM plane landing at the airport, too.

Thanks for the great pix, Marty.

More Washington Park video

I've posted some more helmet cam video footage from Washington Park. On Easter Monday, Miguel and I rode the new mountain biking trail number two. This is the longest of the three trails that Joost and I finished, and is also the most challenging, with quite a few steep hills.

The trail runs among the hills in the depths of the park, and then emerges onto the plains of the Slagbai part of the park.

Miguel and I saw a number of Wara Wara near the end of the trail.

Here is a link to part one of the video.

Here is a link to part two.

Conehead - Tubetail

Dog number two is sporting a cone collar these days, and looking quite exotic and mysterious, I might say. The action is at the other end, where minor surgery to clean up a nibbled tail is being protected by some pvc pipe and duct tape. We think that some pesky fleas started the whole problem.

Washington Park Helmet Cam Video

I've posted some helmet cam video from a ride on two of the trails that Joost and I created in Washington Park back in December.
Trail one, in particular, goes through some really scenic areas of the Park. I've clipped off the video at the beginning and end of each trail, because I don't want to make it easy for people to be on these trails until the Park is completely set up to manage their use.
If you want to check out the trails, I'd suggest getting in touch with Miguel, at Bonaire Wellness Conexxions, because he has led tours on these trails.
For these videos, I've ridden the trails backwards from the direction that one would normally encounter them. This put the early morning sun at my back for better lighting. These trails are equally interesting when ridden in either direction.
The videos are labeled Washington Park Trail 1 and Washington Park Trail 3. There is also a trail #2, that Miguel and I plan to video in a couple days. It is more technical and also longer than trails 1 and 3.
Each video is in two parts, because of the 10 minute video length limitation on YouTube.
Here is a link to part one of trail one.
Here is a link to part one of trail three.
Once you are on the YouTube site, you'll be able to find links to the second half of each video.