BYOF Featured on Adobe Youth Voices Community

I don't think I ever blogged about the recent visit by the King and Queen of the Netherlands with the Bonaire Youth Outreach Foundation (BYOF), back on Rincon Day, April 30.  Dennis asked me to take some photos of the event, so I got a rare insider's view of the proceedings, which I inexplicably failed to share with you all.

Fortunately for us all, Adobe Youth Voices has posted a nice write-up of the Royal Visit, and some of the activities of the BYOF.  Check it out.

The BYOF has their headquarters/training center/youth hangout room in what used to be known as Master Control, here at the TWR - Bonaire studios.

Excuses Excuses

So we had our monthly elder's meeting at the International Bible Church last night, and Kees-Jan wasn't there.   Grrr....

Turns out he had a good excuse though.  He and Eric de Jong were in The Netherlands hanging out with the royal family and accepting an award from the Orange Fund for the work Krusada is doing on Bonaire.

Kees-Jan is on the right in the upper photo.  foto's Bert Homburg - Oranjefonds ©

Southern Cross

The Southern Cross is perfectly placed during the evening hours, here on Bonaire, at this time of the year.  Unfortunately, the winds and haze have made it hard to see much of the time.  There is a great article about the Southern Cross on SPACE.COM, and a nice photo as well.

The Southern Cross is at the lower left side of this photo I shot a few years ago.  The eta Carina nebula is towards the upper right side.  I've been hoping to redo this image this year, but time is running out...

Late Night at the TX Site

Benny and I were at the TWR transmitter site 'till about 9pm last night.  We were helping store four giant spools with the feedline for the new transmitter.














We also got to see a really nice crescent Moon and the planet Venus hanging out with towers three and four.

AmazonSmile Update

I buy quite a lot of stuff at Amazon, particularly because they are good about shipping to the two freight and package forwarders I use to get stuff shipped to Bonaire.

When i buy stuff, i actually go to www.smile.amazon.com because the AmazonSmile program donates .5% of the purchase price to charities, one of which is TWR.  $140 was donated to TWR during the first quarter of 2015 because of people's AmazonSmile purchases.  I don't think everything on Amazon.com is eligible for the Amazon Smile program, but most of the stuff I buy seems to be.

To shop AmazonSmile on behalf of TWR, simply follow this link.

Thinking Outside the Box (jellyfish)

I've heard a lot of good things about Dr. Allen Collins from Sandra's cousin, Bud Gillan.  So when I learned that he and his wife, Jennifer, were here on Bonaire, and that he'd be giving a Jelly talk at the CIEE, I just had to be there.

We probably should have buckled our seat-belts because of all the polysyllabic Latin sounding words, like medusozoan cnidarians, that were soon bouncing around the room.

 Dr. Collins' presentation was quite interesting and informative, and despite his calling cousin Bud a "jellyfish nut," Dr. C seems to be every bit as nice a person as Bud said he is.

Planting Churches by Radio

TWR - Americas ministry team leader, Joe Barker was recently presented with an interesting plaque by the Baptist convention of Cuba.  It seems that when they accept a new church congregation into the convention, they also award a certificate to the parent church.




In this case the new member church was a direct result of the TWR ministry from Bonaire, so they presented the certificate to us!   This photo shows Joe Barker delivering the certificate to Bonaire Station Director, Dick Veldman.

Wild Winds

Bonaire is outside the path of most tropical storms, unlike our Guam station that just took a direct hit from a typhoon.


But this has been a windy year here, with sustained winds frequently above 30mph.  This is great for sea salt production and for windsurfing, but not so good for antenna tower climbing.  We are somewhat behind in our annual tower repairs and painting work this year.







They guys have been busy on the ground though.  New trenches have been dug to the four antenna towers.













A new STL (studio transmitter link) tower has been installed too.  There is a lot more concrete in the ground that you can't see in the photo.  Think "Iceberg."

New Feature on TWRBONAIRE Web site

We’ve added a new feature to the www.twrbonaire.com
web site.

Under WHAT'S NEW, on the main page, you’ll find a short blurb about what we’ll have on the air each evening on 800AM.

For example, tonight, May 12, Andy Napier interviews Greg Harris of Thru the Bible, for a behind the scenes look at that ministry, on Footsteps.


Salome had today’s blurb up first thing this morning.(see Salome and Jonas on the "Staff" page.
Check it out and tell your friends.


 If you don't live in our sizable listening area, you can find Footsteps here: https://www.twr360.org/ministry/88/