Morning Moon and Planets

Hooray, I woke up in time to see the Moon, Mercury, and Venus shining brightly this morning at 6am.At first, it looked like there might be too many clouds, but eventually the clouds parted enough for me to see the moon and planets shining among the stars of Capricornus.

Moon and Planet show Wed. AM

Tomorrow morning, about an hour before sunrise, the Moon, Venus, and Mercury will make a nice little triangle pattern in the eastern sky. It was clear this morning and I could see Venus from inside out house, pretty high above the horizon at 6:15. A slender crescent moon was hovering above Venus.
Based on what I saw this morning, it should be a nice grouping tomorrow. I just hope the sky is clear, something that one can't count on this time of year.
I'll probably be observing by 6 am or slightly earlier, because a darker sky will make little Mercury easier to spot. The moon and Venus will be easy. Mercury might require binoculars to locate at first.
The further north you live, the closer to the horizon this grouping will happen. It is high enough to be easily visible from here on Bonaire, hooray.

Starry Starry Nights

It's that moonless time of the month and the stars are shining here on Bonaire. Pierre and I went down to the south end on Tuesday and saw lots of great Milky Way stars and star clusters between the clouds.

Sandra and I went south last night and had absolutely cloudless skies most of the time between 8pm and 11pm.Here is a picture of the Milky Way from last night. These represent three minute exposures at ISO 800 and F4.5. I accidentally shot one 5 min. exposure and it was way better. So we'll be back to take a bunch of longer exposures if we can sometime.

At the lower left corner of the picture is the eta Carina nebula and some open clusters around it.

To the upper right of that stuff, you can see the false cross and a couple open clusters near it.

Continuing to the right, about where the notches are is the area of Puppis, and a number of small clusters.

To the upper right of the middle is Sirius and the stars and star clusters around Canus Major.

Orion can be found at the upper right end of the photo.

I've posted a really large scale version of this picture so you can zoom in and see the details if you want to and if you don't mind a 1 meg file size.

Early Bird Specials

The International Space Station made a pass over Bonaire this morning at about six minutes after six. I missed it, yawn.

But I did get out by 6:20 to see Venus and Mercury close together in the south east. On Monday, Venus and Mercury were exactly sided by side in the sky. Today Venus was to the lower right of Mercury.

I had to use binoculars to sport Mercury. Once I knew where it was, I could then spot it without the optical aid. If I had been out a little earlier, like 6:06, heh heh, the sky would have been just that little bit darker and I probably could have easily seen Mercury.

So have a look soon while Venus is pointing the way to Mercury. One week from today, on the Morning of March 5, the Moon, Venus and Mercury will make a nice little triangle in the sky. They say that an hour before your sunrise is a good time to observe these planets. The further south you live, the higher in the sky they will appear.

Of course one doesn't have to be an early bird to enjoy the Bonaire Sky Park, as the Bonaire Reporter calls it. (by the way, this week's new issue is online as a free sample!) Sandra and I did some back yard observing on Monday evening. There was a high haze and there were lots of clouds scuttling by at great speed. But on the plus side, Monday is barbecue buffet night at the Golden Reef Inn right behind us, so we were serenaded by their live music as we gazed skyward. The picture of Orion's belt and sword is from Monday night. The haze makes the bright stars stand out, which I find technically frustrating, but aesthetically pleasing.

Pierre and I headed out to the desolate south end of the island last night and were treated to some awesome views of the Milky Way running from Orion all the way to the Eta Carina Nebula down by the horizon. We weren't all that sure how the sky would be, but decided to make the "long drive" south just in case. There were annoying fast moving clouds much of the time, and the stiff wind was chilly, but there was an hour and a half or so where the whole sky cleared up and the views in Pierre's 10x70 binos were truly awe inspiring.

Lunar Eclipse

There were quite a few clouds here on Bonaire Wednesday night, so we didn't trek out to a dark corner of the island to view the Lunar eclipse. But it looked quite nice from our backyard. It sounded like some folks at the Golden Reef Inn were observing the eclipse as well. They even had their "killer flourescent lights of doom" turned off much of the time, which helped our views too. At first the eclipsed part of the moon was very dark and pretty much disappeared from view. Later as the sunlit part of the moon got small, the dark part of the moon seemed to get lighter.
This last shot is the totally eclipsed moon. I shot these pix through a Meade ETX 90 mounted on a Vixen Super Polaris german equatorial mount, and we observed the eclipse visually with a Meade LX50.

Science Renaissance on Bonaire

Some of you might remember when, way back in the 80's, the ruins at Karpata were restored and were being used as a center for science research. Does anyone else remember Jules VanRoy and the innovative underwater computer that he used for monitoring the activities of Parrot Fish? I'm sure our son, Richard, remembers when Denise Deering, aka the lizard lady, visited his kindergarten class. (A lizard bit one of his friends.) Sandra's science teacher cousin, Bud Gillan, has maintained contact with some of those bright young researchers over the years.

Well, the buildings at Karpata have fallen into ruins again, but science studies are enjoying something of a rebirth with a new generation of researchers. I think that the turning point may have come in 2005 when a research center with housing facilities for visiting scientists and interns was opened at the Washington Slagbaai Park.

One big success story arising out of this Stinapa/Washington Park initiative is the ongoing research of Sam, Rowan, and the "parrot people" as they study the Bonaire Lora. Like some of the projects in the 80's, the ParrotWatch project has received international media attention.

A giant leap forward for science on Bonaire came in 2006, when the CIEE launched a Tropical Marine Ecology and Conservation study program here on Bonaire. CIEE, in existence for more than 60 years, has 97 study programs in 35 host countries, and summer seminars in 25 countries. A journal with the results of the 2006 studies can be downloaded from this link on the CIEE web site. It is a 50 something page pdf file full of interesting information.

Activities at the CIEE center on Bonaire are still going strong in 2008. A couple weeks ago I attended a presentation given by a team of researchers from NOAA. They spent five weeks on Bonaire mapping our reefs so they can be used as a baseline against which other coral reefs can be compared. According to NOAA: Bonaire, Netherlands Antilles, is arguably the most pristine coral reef environment in the Caribbean. Percent coral cover is the highest and percent algal cover the lowest compared to other Caribbean reefs...

Regular readers of the blog will know that I'm a big Google Earth fan, so you can imagine how excited I was to learn that lots of the data from the reef surveys is being plotted on Google Earth maps. This research project, titled "Bonaire 2008: Exploring Coral Reef Sustainability with New Technologies" has an extensive web site that is itself well worth exploring. Even if you don't click on any of the other links in this post, be sure to check out this one!

At the same time that the big guns from NOAA and other big institutions were here on Bonaire this past January, there were 16 students here from University of Delaware College of Marine and Earth Studies. These lucky students were in the right place at the right time to get a chance to be involved in a cutting edge international research project. The students have written extensively about their experiences on Bonaire, and also posted some video reports. Bonaire lovers could spend some very enjoyable hours seeing their favorite island through the bright eyes of these students. Highly recommended as well.

From Our Radio Audience - Past and Present

We have a pretty good theoretical and empirical handle on where the radio signal is going when it leaves our four towers down on the South end of Bonaire each night. But as I mentioned back in October, we don't always know exactly who is listening way out there, nor how the broadcasts are impacting their lives.

From time to time the curtain is pulled back, so to speak, and we do get an insight into the effectiveness of our TWR programming. Our daughter in law, Nancy, provided us one such glimpse this week. Here is a picture of Nurse Nancy, in her kid - friendly Pediatrics Nurse garb, proudly holding our first Grandkitten, Chloe. The following is an excerpt from an e-mail Nancy wrote us this week:

Today I had an adult patient who I was taking care of because she had surgery. (we have been getting more and more adult patients now a days on pediatrics ever since or new floor opened).
Anyway, I was talking to her and her husband and telling them how I decided to go into nursing, and then I was telling them how my dad is a pastor and what kind of church I go to. So then it ends up that both of them are pastor's kids as well!! So then I tell them that my husband is a missionary's kid, and that he grew up on Bonaire, and that my parents in law work for Trans World radio.
It ends up that my patient and her husband both grew up in Jamaica and their parents and them listened to Trans world radio from Bonaire!! They said that was the only AM radio station that came in clearly. Isn't that awesome!! So they both wanted me to send their regards and thank you all for what you do at Trans world radio. They appreciate it very much.

Nancy's email was a real encouragement to us and tells me that my 32 years on Bonaire have been worthwhile, as well as enjoyable. Of course, we don't always have to wait years and years to hear from our listeners. Here are some comments from a current Cuban listener to our Spanish broadcasts.

"I am 27 years old, a physics and philosophy professor. For a long time I criticized and made fun of Christians but after having read carefully the Bible to try to disprove it, I found the true meaning to life, a love and a light so pure and brighter than the light of the sun, our Savior Jesus Christ.
Today I am a layman in my church and I help other young people to avoid committing the same mistakes I made and be deceived by sin… I want you to know that I have told many people about your program and here in the area where I live many people have trusted the Lord thanks to your program."

Moon and Planets (Eclipse)

The moon was nearby Mars last night. Not so close as to send me running for my camera, but close enough that I could have told someone how to find Mars by looking near the moon. Tonight the Moon will be about seven degrees East of Mars.

Last Tuesday evening, Sandra and I were hanging out on the beach at the Plaza, enjoying the bargain barbeque and the music of the Silver Bullet Steel Band, when I saw an amazing low, slow, bright, lime greenish meteor. My first impression on catching sight of it out of the corner of my eye was that it was terrestial in origin, like a flare or a firework, but after observing it for a couple seconds, I concluded that it was really a meteor. There is no question that if one spends enough time outside on Bonaire; whether under the night sky, or wandering around Washington Park, or in the water; amazing things will happen from time to time.

One amazing thing that is predictible is this coming Wednesday's total Lunar eclipse. The good part starts at about 9:43 pm Bonaire time. Totality starts around 11 pm and lasts until about 11:52 pm. If you live on the East Coast of North America, subtract an hour from those times. If you're on the West Coast, subtract four hours. (Totality begins at 03:00 UTC on Thursday, for those of you in other time zones)

I sure hope the sky is clear Wednesday night. You never know this time of the year. Last March we had fun hanging out near Sorobon and watching the Milky Way come into view as the Moon dimmed to a red glow. I'd like to do something like that again this year.

Oh yes, that picture of the Silver Bullet Steel Band is from a slide I took a long loonnng time ago!

Bigger and Brighter

I've had quite a bit of fun with my "new" 400mm f5.6 lens, and some bird pictures have appeared on the blog thanks to this great glass. In the near future, I also hope to image some of the beautiful pairs of star clusters that Pierre and I have been observing through his binoculars.

But sometimes 400mm just isn't enough. When I need more magnification, there is my trusty Meade ETX 90, which has a focal length of some 1250 mm. But it's pretty slow at f13.8 or so. The moon picture I posted a while back was made with a Meade LX 50, which can serve as a 2000mm, f10 lens. But what if you a want long lens and a fast f stop?

Well, have I got a deal for you. If you are into the "best and the brightest," then you've got to check out this article by BH Photo Video in New York about the Canon 1200mm f5.6 L USM lens that they have. The lead picture someone using the lens, apparently shot with a wide angle lens, is priceless.

The 1200/5.6 lens weighs 36 lbs, is 33 inches long and it's 9 inches wide at the front end. Oh and it is tack sharp, based on the sample pix I've seen. Canon will only say that between 12 and 20 of these lenses have ever been built, so if you buy this baby, you'll be in some seriously elite company.

No, I didn't bother to check the price. You know the saying, "if you have to ask the price..."

Antriol Catering

Here at TWR Bonaire, we've just concluded a great week of training and personal enrichment seminars with Colin and Lorna Buckland of Claybury International. Colin and Lorna are third and fourth from the left in this picture.

Sandra returned, from visiting Richard and Nancy in New Jersey, in time to join us for a great lunch at Antriol Catering on Friday. This unpretentious eatery is somewhat off the beaten path but well worth a visit if you'd like to sample some great tasting, honest to goodness Bonairian food.

This link to a story from the 2002 Bonaire Reporter might still work, give it a try.

Moon, Planets, and Galaxies

I've been watching Jupiter and Venus most mornings for the last couple weeks. I slept in today, and it looks like I really missed it. Pierre Schmidt was outside this morning and sent me this great picture of, from left to right, Venus, Jupiter, and the moon. The new moon will occur Wednesday night at 11:44 Bonaire time. That's Thursday at 03:44 UTC. If you live in Antartica, you can see a nice annular eclipse of the sun at that time. Residents of New Zealand and Southeastern Australia can see a partial solar eclipse.

Back here on Bonaire, there will be an nice total eclipse of the moon on Wednesday, Feb. 20. I hope it is clear that night.

Pierre and I were out viewing with his big binoculars Saturday evening, way down on the south end of Bonaire. We were set up somewhere between the kitesailing area and Red Slave. We took turns looking through the binos and just gazing at the Milky Way with our good old Mark 1 eyeballs.

I noticed a glow in the sky between Canopus and Achernar. Realizing that the Large Magellenic Cloud (LMC) was somewhere over there, I wondered if I might actually be seeing it. Neither Pierre nor I had ever seen it from Bonaire before. After consulting various star atlases, I decided that it must have been the LMC, so I went back Sunday night with my camera. Technical difficulties prevented me from taking any long time exposures, but I shot ten 10 second images at f2.8 and ISO 1600. I combined them with Deep Sky Stacker and then processed them like crazy in Photoshop and shure enough, there was the LMC lurking between Canopus and Achernar.

We are psyched to have seen it. Pierre reports that the top of the LMC never gets higher than 12 degrees above the horizon here on Bonaire and that the middle of it peaks at 8 degrees. So the sky has to be extra clear for it to be visible. I'm still hoping to get out there with a fully functioning mount and take some long time exposures. Tonight is too cloudy, and the moon will be back in the evening sky soon, so it might well have to wait 'till next year. Yikes!

Planetary Pairing on Friday

If you are a morning person, you're in luck. The planets Jupiter and Venus are putting on a great show in the pre-dawn sky.

Back two weeks ago, when I took Sandra to the airport for the early morning American Eagle flight to San Juan, Venus was well up in the eastern sky and Jupiter was shining a little above the horizon. Venus has been dropping towards the horizon rather quickly and now the two planets are close together.

They will be at their closest on Friday morning. This week, I've seen them as early as 5:45 am and as "late" as 6:15. I suspect that they would still be visible at 6:30, so you don't have to get up super early to spot them.

On Sunday morning, Venus will be a little below Jupiter and the waning crescent Moon will join them to make a nice little triangle in the sky. I'm hoping for clear skies this weekend so I can enjoy the free show.

Speaking of clear skies, it was exceptionally clear last night and Pierre and I got in some great binocular observing from about 9 pm to 11 pm. We went to a little parking area just north of 1000 steps to get away from the lights of Hato and Sabadeco and were treated to views of a myriad of jewel like stars set in an inky black sky. We had a couple star atlases with us to guide the way, and star clusters and galaxies would just pop into view in the big binos. The Milky Way passed directly overhead and was very clear to the naked eye.

Friendly Flamingo

After work, back on Jan. 10, I headed outside to the "stink pond" located to the east of the TWR offices, to see if I could capture some Flamingo reflections in the calm water. I didn't get the picture I wanted to get, and I may have to wait until next fall, when the winds die down again.
But after I had been crouching down behind a big boulder at the water's edge for what seemed like forever, this friendly flamingo meandered right by me.

Surprise Visit

One of Sandra's childhood friends, Pam Hogan, paid us a surprise visit here on Bonaire a week or so ago. I was "acting Director for a day" at TWR and couldn't break an appointment at the office that day, but Sandra was able to zoom around the island with Pam and her husband, Doug. Besides going around the north end of the island, they visited Pam's old stomping grounds in Belnem. It has changed so much, that they had a bit of difficulty identifying her old house on the seashore.

Pam and Doug have been to Bonaire a few times over the years. This time they arrived on a cruise ship for the day.

A week after Doug and Pam's visit, we received a Christmas card from Pam's parents, Denny and Pat Hogan, which mentioned that the kids might be coming! We got a ton of Christmas cards in January this year, which come to think of it, is pretty normal for us.

Computer Capers

Back about 10 years ago, Jeff and Glenda Haarer lived just down the street from us in Hato. Then they moved to Miami to help set up that TWR office. And now they are living in the Cary, NC area. Joe Barker and I take care of the day to day computer and network stuff here on Bonaire, but when there is serious work to be done, Jeff is our main IT guy. It is amazing what he can do with our Bonaire systems, through our secure tunnel to the Cary office.
Once in a while, some hands on attention is needed, so Jeff and company took advantage of the American Airlines fall fare sale and came to Bonaire last fall.
As you can see, everyone got into the act. They also had a great time visiting their old stomping grounds and seeing long lost friends.
Although Glenda is conspicuously absent from these photos, she did appear in this one from my Dec. 9 post.

Cluster Maps Display Refreshed

If you scroll down the right side of this blog, you'll see a small map of the world with lots of red dots on it. The dots represent visitors to this blog. The more visitors from a given location, the bigger the dot.

I've had this map on my blog for a year now, so the map host has archived all the accumulated dots, and reset the display. New dots representing visitors since Jan 17 are now appearing every couple days.

You can click on the small map to see it bigger. Once you have the big map, you can click on a link to a finer dot resolution version, or you can click on a link to a small version of the archived map with its multitude of dots accumulated during the first year.

Iridium Flare on Bonaire Tue. am

This post will only be useful to a very limited group of people. Namely people living on Bonaire who know where the stars Alpha and Beta Centaurus are in the sky.
Tuesday morning, Jan. 22, an Iridium satellite will do its "flare" thing to the left of the Southern Cross, smack dab in between Alpha and Beta Centaurus.
From Hato, the satellite will be shining at magnitude -4.5 or so for a few seconds. This is very bright. From further south on Bonaire, it will be less bright. If you are up north, it might be brighter.
The event will happen at 05:25:57, as seen from Hato. The time will be slightly different as seen from other places on the island.
I'm usually very reluctant to get up early to see star stuff, but I might just wake up for this one, because of where it is.

A Great Geeky Gadget

When my dad visited us last November, he brought us a fun gadget that is showing us how to save money on our electricity bill each month. It is the "Kill A Watt" power meter from P3 International.

We just plug the small Kill A Watt unit into a wall outlet and then plug our other stuff into it. It then tells us all about the energy consumption. It displays the line voltage and frequency, as well as information about how much power your appliance is using. There are readouts of amps, Volt Amps, Watts, as well as the power factor. If you leave something plugged in for a while, it also will tell you how many KWH the item has consumed during that time period.

We always notice that our electricity bill goes up in December and figured it was those pretty Christmas lights. This year I was able to see exactly how much power each string of lights was consuming. It's a lot of fun, and educational too.

One thing we learned is that our Laptop Computer uses less power while it is running than our desktop computer/dual CRT monitors/big Cambridge Soundworks speakers use even when they are turned "off." So now, when I'm not using the desktop computer system, we switch it all really and truly OFF at the wall! Equally amazing was how much power that whole conglomeration consumes when I'm actually working on the computer. When that desktop computer dies, it will be replaced by a (powerful) laptop for sure.

Here is an article on MSN about the Kill A Watt meter and another user's experiences. We just looked at a bill from WEB, the Bonaire power company, and our electricity costs about 40 cents US per KWH these days. So really turning off our desktop computer will save us about four times a much as that guy in the article reports.

The next thing I'm going to check is the power strip that our TV, home theater receiver, sub woofer, DVD player, wireless router, etc. are all plugged into. Depending on what kind of readings I see on the Kill A Watt meter, I may separate those devices onto two power strips. The cable modem, wireless router, and maybe the TV could stay powered up so they don' t "loose their brain" and the other stuff will get switched truly off.

We, of course, use fluorescent lights on the ceilings and in all our lamps. I'm also experimenting with a couple state of the art LED lights that screw into a regular light socket. They don't seem bright enough for prime time, but work great for background lighting, and the Kill A Watt says that they must be sipping their electricity through a really small straw.

Big Binos

I enjoyed a new astronomy experience last week. Our down the street neighbor, Pierre, brought over some giant binoculars and an innovative mount that held them steady as we looked at the stars. In this picture, Pierre is checking out Comet Tuttle.

Most experienced observers agree that binoculars are a better tool for beginning stargazers than a telescope. They are easy to transport, set up, and use; which translates into getting out under the stars more often.



Pierre used his binoculars for two years, here on Bonaire, before transitioning to a telescope. I spent my first year on Bonaire learning the constellations with my naked eye, and then a whole year observing with 10x50 binoculars, before getting my first telescope.



I think that the new computerized telescopes that find their way around the sky on their own make it less likely that new astronomy buffs will "pay their dues" with binoculars. But I suspect that it is still a good idea to begin with binoculars, because one will never "outgrow" them. You see, even experienced observers still enjoy scanning the sky with a good pair of binocs.

What I saw in Pierre's binoculars the other night was every bit as interesting and enjoyable as anything I've ever seen in a telescope. We're planning to do some more binocular observing as soon as the moon goes away. I can't wait.

Midnight Madness

If you've never been on Bonaire on New Year's eve. you are missing something truly amazing. People are shooting off fireworks the whole evening. But at midnight the explosions multiply and blur together into a island wide roar. Shortly before midnight, I went to one of the dirt roads part way up the hill between the WEB power plant and Republik. There were full-on professional quality fireworks bursting everywhere I looked: to the North in Hato, to the West along hotel row, to the south downtown, and to the east in Republik. Now I like fiddling around with audio systems, heck it's job related, but I think one would have a tough time reproducing the auditory and physical impact of what I experienced that night.
And then there were the pretty colors and shapes. It's a real feast for the senses, assuming that you have nerves of steel. Our dogs don't like New Years Eve at all. They spent most of the night indoors, slightly sedated, watching TV with Sandra.
I was out in the back yard taking pictures of the stars, because it just happened to be a nice clear moonless night. I also got to enjoy the fireworks bursting all around me!
Above is a picture of the galaxy, M33, located towards the bottom of the picture, left of center; as well as Comet Tuttle, in the upper part of the picture left of center. Comet Tuttle is getting a little brighter each night, but it is still pretty dim. The comet was right by M33 the previous night, but we were completely clouded out here on Bonaire.
This picture of comet Holmes is at the same scale as the one of Tuttle and M33, so you can see how much bigger Holmes appears.

No Loose Lithium Batteries in Checked Baggage

If you are travelling to Bonaire from the USA, you will be interested to know that beginning Tuesday, you can't pack spare Lithium Batteries in your checked baggage. You can pack them in your carry on, however. Make sure the terminals are protected so nothing can short them out.

Here is the full story on the Bonaire Insider web site.

Full Moon Fun

Bob Lassiter and I sallied forth last Friday, Dec. 23, for some full moon foto fun. Bob has been experimenting, for a number of months, with using the natural light of the full moon to get new views of familiar subjects. He's got some great shots of his house, for example. We headed up to Seru Largu to see what we could see. It was pretty hazy that night, so the full moon wasn't as bright as it could have been. So we may need to do this again. In the above photo, shot entirely with moonlight, we see Bob getting his big 100-400 zoom lens ready for action.
I cheated and used a bit of fill flash on this one to fill in the Moon shadows while Bob set his sites on the the lights of Playa.
Here is an attempt to expose for the lights of town, as well as the moonlit areas of the island. I'll probably play with these images some more to see what variations I can come up with.
There was a cruise ship in port that day. Cruise ships often leave shortly after sunset, but this one stayed around until late that night. To the naked eye, it looked like a big building covered with Christmas lights.

Moon and Mars

On Dec. 23, the full Moon passed right by Mars during the course of the evening. This picture, taken at Moonrise, shows Mars well to the lower right of the moon. (to the right of the cacti) By nine pm, the Moon was right next to Mars, and by the time I went to bed, the Moon was to the lower left of Mars.

Now I wish I had taken a series of pictures every hour or so, but this one will have to suffice.

Two Comet Show on Friday Evening

We got to see comets Tuttle and Holmes last night. In the binoculars, Comet Tuttle was about as bright as the galaxy M31 was to the naked eye, that is, we could barely see it.

There was some high haze present the whole night, so we couldn't see the Milky Way. That made it easy to identify the constellations. But there were periods of time when the thick clouds cleared away, so I got about 16 one minute exposures of the sky between the constellations Andromeda and Perseus. You can see both Comet Tuttle and Comet Holmes in this picture. Tuttle is small and aqua colored. The X below Tuttle is where it was on Thursday night, and the X above Tuttle is where it will be Saturday night. It looks like the comet will pass right by the galaxy M33 soon.

I labeled a number of interesting objects in this picture. The first letter of each label is to the lower right of its object.

I drew in some constellation lines. The somewhat parallel lines running off the left side of the image are Andromeda. The triangle above Andromeda is Triangulum. The sprawling set of lines at the lower right of the picture is the constellation Perseus.

I had just started a series of close ups on the Andromeda / Tuttle area when my scope mount quit tracking. I have a bad wire in the cable running between the hand controller and the mount. I've been able to nurse it along for months, but I think it died for good last night. To fix it, I'll have to cut about a foot off of the end of the cable and re-solder the individual wires to the teeny tiny printed circuit board inside the controller. I'm a ham handed solderer, so I'm a little concerned, but I've got nothing to lose at this point. :)

We'll be outside tonight to see what we can see. It's been pretty cloudy and rainy all day, so who knows.... There is an Iridium flare at 19:34, so hopefully we'll get to see that at least. (There were also nice flares on Thur. and Fri. evenings, as seen from our backyard.)

A Green Christmas

Sandra wound lights in and around most of our windows, for a nice ambiance inside, and a little holiday flavor from the outside as well. Bonaire is really green and lush right now, and many of what usually are dry stream beds and ruts in the roads have running water in them. It is a nice change. We had a Christmas Eve service at the IBCB. I was happy to see as many visitors as regular church fold there that evening. Room lighting, except for the platform, was by candles in paper bags with sand at the bottom. I lightened the picture so you could see everyone a little better.
Christmas morning found Sandra doing some last minute Christmas light repairs.
We didn't set up a fill size Christmas tree this year because our six month puppy would have probably knocked it over. So we had a mico mini tree on the table.
We visited with some friends in the afternoon, and then in the evening we went to the Christmas Buffet at the Divi Flamingo hotel. We enjoyed the buffet A LOT and will probably do it again next year. Entrees included baked fish, yummy turkey with all the fixings, baked ham, and rib roast. We tried them all of course.

Long Time No Post

It's been about two weeks since my last post, so I'll do a few tonight. I've got more stuff to share, so maybe I can get to it over the holidays. Life gets busy in December, even here on Bonaire. Then Sandra and I have been pretty sick for about a week, yuck.

But we're both feeling much better now. I might even venture out on an easy bike ride tomorrow. I think it will take me a couple weeks to get back up to speed though.

I sold all my Minolta camera gear on eBay since my last post. My six auctions ended late on a Sunday night, everyone paid promptly, and my dad graciously packed and shipped the stuff right away. By the Friday, everyone had received their goodies. The guy who won my Maxxum 28/2 lens was particularly happy. I'm not surprised. The 28/2 produced cleaner star shapes in my astro photos at F2.8 than my Canon 24/2.8 does at F4! The Maxxum 100/2.8 macro was also better wide open at F2.8 than my Canon 85/1.8 is at F2.8. Bob Lassiter has Canon's 100/2.8 macro, and he says that I can try it out under the stars some time.

I saw the International Space Station pass right in front of the Sun on Saturday morning. I tried to get set up to image it with my telescope, solar filter, lap top computer, and web cam, but didn't get it all hooked up and functioning in time. Now I'm usually so busy trying to get pictures that I don't even see the event at all. Yesterday was a different story and I am happy to report that the ISS looked really great in my ETX 90 and 26mm eyepiece as it zoomed across the Sun's disk.

I was out this evening taking some pictures of the beautiful Full Moon / Mars pairing and saw the ISS pass by at about 18:55. It was too hazy to get any useful pictures of the ISS but it was fun to see that it was right on schedule, ha-ha. The ISS will be also be visible, here on Bonaire, a couple more evenings this week according to CalSky dot com. As I've mentioned before, the Calsky and Heavens-Above Web sites are worth their weight in gold if you want to know what is going on in the night sky at your location.

Flamingo Dreamscape

I like this picture, from my Dec. 8 ride, because of the soft colors and the reflections in the water. Bonaire usually presents a pretty harsh image, but to me this has a softer feel.

Sometimes I really don't feel like carting my camera around as I cycle through Washington Park. A full Camel Bak is heavy enough all by itself, but I see such interesting stuff just about every time, that the camera comes along for the ride after all.

I was recently playing with Bob Lassiter's Canon 20D and found that it was quite a bit heavier than my new Rebel XTi. I must say that I was really lusting after the new 40D, when I bought the XTi, but now I'm glad that I won't have to lug the bigger camera around on my treks to the Park. (I do miss the 40D's astro photo focusing abilities though.)

I also chose the admittedly non-professional looking silver version of the XTi after discovering how amazingly hot my all black Minolta used to get when I was hiking around with it in the hot Bonaire sun. Now I just need to round out my collection of white lenses, ha-ha.

Flamingo Fun

Here ia a flamingo picture that I shot back on December 1. I briefly mentioned this bird in my Dec. 9 post. I was on a dirt road/causeway between two big ponds in Washington Park.

A flamingo suddenly decided to fly from the pond on the Playa Frans side over to the pond on the Brandaris side. I started snapping pictures like crazy as he flew towards me, passed right in front of me, and then curved on past me.

This is the best shot from that sequence, and I like it a lot! The version I posted here is a 429K file, so you might want to not click on the thumbnail if you are using a dial up connection. I don't know if Blogger will downsize it or not, but the photo I uploaded is 1680x1050 and I'll be using it as wallpaper on my laptop.

Starry Nights

It has been quite cloudy and rainy, here on Bonaire, for a couple weeks now. But back on December 11, I got out in the back yard and took a few pictures of the Milky Way running from Cassiopeia over to Taurus. This composite picture runs from Cass. to the Pleiades. The top picture has some labels to help you know what you are looking at. At the top left of the picture is the Andromeda galaxy, which I've incorrectly labeled M33. It is really M31. I could also see M33, the Triangulum galaxy, in the original picture, but I don't know that you can spot it in this downsized version, although it is barely there at the middle of the top edge of the frame.

At the left side of the picture is the constellation Cassiopeia, it is below the Cass. label and is pretty much lost in the clutter of stars. The double cluster between Cassiopeia and Perseus is above the "D" in the label. Comet Holmes is to the lower left of the "C" in its label, and is above the central part of Perseus. Then way over on the right side of the picture is the Pleiades, located to the upper left of the "P" in the label.
The lower picture is a little larger and doesn't have any pesky labels in it. There is another comet in the sky right now, not too far from the site of this picture. It is much dimmer than comet Holmes, but we'll look for it later this week when the moon isn't up.

Big Sailboat

This sail powered cruise ship glided by while we were eating out under the stars the other night. So when it was time to head home, Sandra and I stopped off downtown to check it out.

Bonaire is usually too windy to allow for calm reflective water like this, but this time of the year is the exception, and I hope to take full advantage of it any chance I get.

Christmas Party Time

Our son, Richard, recently drove from NJ to Virginia, for the annual company Christmas party. Here on Bonaire, we had a staff Christmas food fest at Richards Restaurant.

Although we don't eat out much, Sandra and I have visited Richards Restaurant a good number of times during the 17 years he's been in in operation here on Bonaire, and we've been very pleased with both the service and the food each and every time.

Here's a picture of Sandra and friends enjoying the seaside atmosphere and camaraderie. Wish you were here, heh-heh.

Cara Cara - Wara Wara

The names for this bird remind me of the po tay toe - po tah toe song. By any name, these are impressive birds.
During the hot and windy spring/summer months, I often see them soaring on thermals and on wind pressure waves associated with some of the ridges and valleys in Washington Park. One bird, soaring near Yuwa Pass, shot up vertically like he was on an invisible elevator. I definitely was suffering from wing envy that day.
During the cloudy and windless fall months, I usually see these birds hanging out on the ground.

I saw four last week as I cycled through the park. Three of them scampered into the undergrowth when they saw me, but this one flew up onto a nearby cactus. He really has two legs, but spent a lot of time perched on only one.

I saw five Cara Cara yesterday. One was flying and four were hanging out on the ground.
Here is a 100% crop from the first picture.
This is a 100% crop of another image.
Some flamingos performed for me too. A couple were so nice as to fly right past me while traveling from one pond to another. I'll post flying flamingo pix sometime soon. I like the contrasting colors in this picture.

I also saw a bull and a few cows in the park last week, in the same area that I saw them once before. But no bovine pictures in the blog. I didn't stop to dig out the camera from my backpack, 'cause I wasn't sure if I could pedal as fast as the bull could run, if he turned out to be camera shy.

Big Birthday

Sunday was Amado Felix's 60th birthday and a full day of festivities were planned, starting with a small reception following the morning service at the IBCB. If I ever fail to have my camera, I can count on Lucy to get some great shots. Here she zooms in on Amado while Keith and Barb Johnston sing him a special song.
Here we see the birthday boy with his wife Sue.
It looks like a photographer feeding frenzy. Notice the kids waiting in the wings before their own feeding frenzy!

Just Plane Fun

The sky was quite clear last Saturday morning. I really enjoyed the vistas in Washington Park as I rode my bike in there for the first time in about a month. Another Saturday morning regular is Ernie Franke, who often takes out the Bonaire Flying Club plane for a lap around the island. I frequently see Ernie fly by offshore as I ride along the "long route" in the park.

Regular readers of my blog will probably remember the aerial photos of Bonaire that I've posted from time to time. They are the result of Ernie kindly inviting me to join him for his aerial adventures from time to time.

Here is a shot, with my "new" 400mm lens, of Ernie and Janto as they flew by the north coast of the island on Saturday morning.

Visitors from the Cold North

It was great to see Tim Jones and family in church a week ago. Back when I was operating our TWR transmitters out by the salt flats five nights a week, Tim Jones, the son of TWR missionaries Warren and Bev Jones, used to hang out with me from time to time. We probably swatted a million mosquitoes and ate about that many Pringles, urp!

Tim, his wife Dawn, their two kids, and a Nephew all visited Bonaire a week ago. They had already plowed ten inches of snow back home in Pennsylvania before coming here, and it was 20 degrees F. when they returned. It sounds like they took full advantage of the snorkeling while they were here for an all too brief visit. Here is the obligatory "please stand in front of the big map at the IBCB" photo of the happy family.

On a side note, we still tease our son, Richard, about when cow poo splashed on him during a youthful visit to Dawn's family's dairy farm in PA. I can't figure out how we let Mike Rowe and the Discovery Channel series, "Dirty Jobs" run away with that scenerio and have all the fun.

ISS Flybys

The International Space Station (ISS) passed almost directly overhead on Wednesday and Friday evenings. I noticed that the ISS was going to almost "hit" the bright star, Deneb, in the Norther Cross, as seen from our back yard.

I did some playing around and found a spot just North of 1000 Steps where the ISS should pass directly in front of Deneb. Sandra and I zoomed out there. We marveled at how dark sky was compared to Hato, and enjoyed the first cloudless evening in a long long time.

With our naked eye, the ISS appeared to graze Deneb. In this picture, taken with a 400mm lens, it was a miss, but a near miss to be sure. I've labeled the stars with their Tycho catalog numbers. I'm still going to do some checking to try to figure out the scale of the picture.

The ISS went from left to right in the picture. You can see a wiggle at the left end of the ISS trail, probably from when the mirror went up and the shutter opened. My tripod was especially wiggly that night, but I didn' t have time to tighten it up. I generally lock the mirror up and take the picture two seconds later, but in this case I needed to have better control of the timing, in order to capture the ISS passing the star.

Comet Holmes (again)

Now that the moon isn't around in the evening, comet Holmes is again a naked eye object. But it isn't amazingly obvious like is was a month ago.



I took this picture Friday night. It is the first chance I've had to take a "real" astro-phot0 of the comet. Previous images were stacks of 2 second exposures. This one is a stack of one minute exposures, and better shows how rich the central Persius area of the sky is.