Captain Cook in Hawaii

Captain Cook performed the first Christian ceremony on the Hawaiian islands, a funeral service for a crew member.

Later he was killed across the bay in an altercation with the native Hawaiians. The monument placed a hundred years later marks the location.  It's only reachable by a strenuous hike or by boat.

In our travels we have followed Captain Cook across the Pacific to Easter Island and to Hawaii.

I missed a solar eclipse on Easter Island

Apparently there was a total eclipse Sunday that was only visible across large swaths of the uninhabitated Spouth Pacific (yahoo coverage). It was visible for Chile, and Tahiti and Easter Island. I have been to Easter Island! Given how tiny that island is it is a surprise that an eclipse would catch it, though I suppose almost everywhere on the globe has them sometime.

With the baby and the expense and so many other places to travel to we wouldn't have gone back to see it, but a solar eclipse and Moai in the same shot would have been awesome.

Telegraph.uk has the pictures.

I am holding out for the United States eclipses of August 21st 2017, and April 8th 2024. They will be close together and there is a spot in Southern Illinois near Kentucky including Carbondale, Cape Girardeau, Missouri, and Paducah, Kentucky which will experience both solar eclipses, two in seven years.

(sketch via Dan Falk at flickr, another hot off the presses flickr photo)

The best view I ever had from a toilet

The Mail online ran an article on the toilets with the best views in the world. Many are on the peaks of mountains or the edge of beautiful ocean vistas. Most would be worth visiting.

It reminded me of one outdoor toilet on Easter Island. It was at the ranch where we stayed the night during our horseback riding trip around the entire island. This ranch was within walking distance of Terevaka which contains Rana Raraku, the volcanic crater and quarry where the special stone for the moai (the stone heads) comes from. You could see the volcano dotted with moai that never made it to there final locations. Unfortunately some of these pictures were only taken with the old crappy Treo camera, so they'll never be in a glossy magazine.


The Toilet


The View.


The Moai on the volcano closeup.




Mostly carved but unfinished moai in the quarry itself.




The view of camp and the toilet from the volcano. The toilet is next to the red house. Click on the picture for larger.

Hardy Palms for Delaware?

I always wanted to grow a palm tree in my garden. However I live in Zone 7. As nature would have it there are a few palms that are hardy to this zone. This is not an isolated phenomena and there are a few websites devoted to the topic. I have complied a list here for future reference of some choices I am seriously considering.

• Trachycarpus fortunei or Chusan Palm is a palm from China that is hardy to -15C to -20C. There is one that has grown since the 1980's in the Brooklyn Botanical gardens so it seem like it might survive Delaware. It likes sun to part shade. This is an honest to goodness palm tree that can grow to 45 ft.
  

• The needle palm (Rhapidophyllum hystrix) is native as far north as South Carolina, but is hardy all the way to Zone 6. This clustering trunkless palm likes the summer heat but can survive to -23C. They don't get much large than a few feet.
  

• The Butia palm (Butia capitata) has apparently been grown experimentally in Delaware, but technically is only hard to Zone 8 or 9. I am wondering if having the creek in the backyard and being down in the valley next to it might mediate the lower temperatures in our yard and allow me to stretch the zone limits. It's hardy down to -12C. It also produces a fruit that is made into jelly in the South.
  

• The dwarf palmetto (Sabal minor) is native to the Southeastern United States which I could claim Delaware to be in if I needed to stretch it. It's hardy down to -18C and is a fan palm that grows to 3 to 4ft. The McCurtain strain grown in Oklahoma is one of the sturdiest strains of this palm. Wikipedia says (without citation!) it has been grown as far north as Rhode Island.
  

• The Chilean wine palm (Jubea chilensis) can survive temperatures down to -12C but does not like hot humid climates. I am not sure if that means that it cannot survive a humid Delaware summer. It would be cool to have this one because it is a close relative to the extinct palms of Easter Island, and that would be a good story to tell on a garden tour. The leaves are pinnate and it grows to 70ft tall. Probably too tall and too hard to get for the garden, but one can dream.
  

As to things that look like palms trees and are hardy to Zone 7; I already have some yucca growing in one of the beds, as do the neighbors. I am hoping that this year they flower. Ailanthus altissima (Tree of heaven), which looks like a palm and grows everywhere, I root out and destroy every chance I get, even in other people's yards, because it is invasive and nasty. My across the creek neighbor has a big stand of bamboo that I can admire from across the creek. I won't plant that in the ground because it can go crazy as well.

I am also torn between having these palms and going against the local and native plant philosophy we have been trying to stay closer to as the theme of the backyard. I think the them will hold as long as it doesn't stop us from getting a really cool plant or tree. No invasives though, that is a hard and fast rule.

Some other links with others trying to grow or find cold hardy palms and similar plants:

This Canadian site sells hardy palms.

Pennsylvania cold hardy palms

Hardy ferns and palms around Washington, DC.

Zone Denial, a blog devoted to this task.

More examples of growing plants north of their regular zones in the Delaware Valley are on this page and the following pages.

Does anyone out there have any experience growing hardy palms or trying to grow palms outside of their "regular" zone? Drop a suggestion in the comments please.

Coral Castle

Coral Castle south of Miami, Florida is known for its huge pieces of coral in strange shapes. Ed Leedskalnin, a Latvian immigrant built it for his lost "sweet sixteen" sweetheart who spurned him and never saw the place. It is a wonder with huge stones quarried and moved by one man, with some huge stones, a nine ton door, balanced perfectly on pivots.

Since no one ever saw him work there is some mystery of how it was done. He said it only needs the same knowledge of weights and leverage that the Egyptians used to build the pyramids. Some suggest he used mysterious electromagnetic forces. Thus it was featured on an "In Search of" episode. This and Easter Island make two phenomena featured on "In Search of" that I have personally investigated. Perhaps a Bigfoot search or Bermuda Triangle cruise should be next.

Are there plans to land the Space Shuttle on Easter Island?

I just finished reading the book Shuttle Down by Lee Correy. This 1981 story of an emergency landing of the Space Shuttle on Easter Island definitely has many of my favorite things all wrapped up into one.

It has the Space Shuttle, an exciting emergency landing, Easter Island (or Isla de Pascua or Rapa Nui or Te Pito O Te Henua), heroes that are engineers and finally a little Cold War intrigue.

When we were on Easter Island we learned that the Mataveri International airport runway had been widened and the airport modernized by the United States for NASA as an emergency landing site for the Space Shuttle. This was in November of last year and there wasn't a Shuttle mission until December. How cool would it have been to see the Shuttle land on Easter island? While there are emergency landing sites all over the world, one is in Dover, Delaware. If that ever happened I would be in my car driving south to see it as soon as I could.

The book takes place long before the airport on Easter Island was prepared to take a Space Shuttle landing and the story revolves around getting the airport upgraded to allow NASA to get the Shuttle off of the island and one of the true heroes of the book is Red Richardson the NASA engineer who is in charge of getting it done. The book is credited with getting the NASA emergency procedures changed to take into account these situations and may be responsible for getting Easter Island its long runway, which allowed us to honeymoon there in the first place. Thank you, Lee Correy.

In great Cold War tradition the Russians even try to make a grab for the Space Shuttle. Do you remember the Cold War, when there was a right side and a wrong side? Even the CIA's release of the "family jewels", the embarrassing illegal activities from the height of the Cold War 50's, 60's and 70's, makes some folks think that the Cold War was the good old days compared to today's international situation. Those parts of the book were a nostalgic trip down memory lane.

While the book seemed to portray Easter Island fairly authentically the one critical mistake is that it repeatedly described the Moai as pointing out to sea and watching over the part of the world towards which they faced. Any Moai standing on Easter Island that are not in the quarry are restored, since every statue was knocked down during the wars on the island and when they were standing or when they were restored they faced inland, not out to sea. Our guide on the island pointed out that the Rapa Nui people believed the Moai concentrated the mana of their ancestors and watched over the part of the island they faced.

Jack Chick parody staring Tiki vs. Moai

Humuhumu posts a clever Jack Chick parody tract about the dangers of the Tiki. I am a fan of Jack Chick parody (the cthulhu version is discussed here). I was struck by the similarity of some of the poses of the tikis and some photos I took while we were on Easter Island.

vs.

It's almost as if they were there. I should point out that, technically, the statues on Easter Island are called Moai.

More disturbing is that the tract warns against the dangers of delicious tropical drinks. While we were on Easter Island and also in Chile we learned about a liquor made from grapes called pisco. Pisco is really good in the traditional Chilean drink called a pisco sour. (I am sure some Peruvians will claim it is their drink, but we should all have one and get along). I spite of the dangers to my soul (maybe if it is a sour that will save me) I will relate a good recipe that has worked for us.

Pisco Sour
1.5 parts sugar
2 parts lemon juice
3 parts pisco
shake with ice and pour into a champagne glass.

You need more sugar than any recipe will tell you on the bottle. It is very tasty.

(The pictures of the Tiki Jack Chick parody are nicely scanned in here.)

tags: Easter Island, Rapa Nui, Te Pito O Te Henua,

Bellas Artes alive and well in Santiago

As is usual when we travel to foreign capitals, we visited the Chilean National Art Museum in Santiago (this visit was on November 17th). The "Museo de Bellas Artes" wasn't as large as in some cities but it was very enjoyable and had a good and appropriate focus on some South American artists.


The statue out front says "Unidos en la gloria y en la muerte" - "United in glory and in death",







very dramatic.









Here I am appreciating art, just before we were told no flash photography. Lucky my trusty Treo, though crappy, is a lot less conspicuous and is perfect for secret, though crappy, museum photos.







I like a little irony in my art. For instance, the piece depicted above by Alexandro Reid entitled "Maquina Burocratica" is an engine of people carved in immovable wood. I believe this reflects what good bureaucracies, governments and congresses do. Usually the only thing worse than when they do nothing is when they do something.

These pieces were part of a modern art exhibit in the first large hall of the museum. A picture of the horse head sculpture is required as it ties into the trip theme with horse back riding part of the vacation on Easter Island.





This sculpture is just creepy yet interesting.












The large puffy horse sculpture behind the museum is simply called Caballo (by Fernando Botero). Unfortunately it is covered in graffiti. Perhaps we should think of it as public participatory art, or art on art. Caballo is one of many similar sculpture and paintings throughout the world.

tags: Santiago, art, museum

It's a long way to Easter Island from here.

On the way out to Easter Island from Philadelphia we had a number of stops.

Philadelphia to Miami - 1021 miles
Miami to Bogata, Colombia (we did NOT get off the plane there) - 1519 miles
Bogata to Santiago, Chile - 2637 miles
Santiago to Easter Island - 2337 miles

On the way home we went straight from Santiago to Miami - 4136 miles.

So we went 7514 miles out and 7495 miles in. Over 15,000 miles for our honeymoon trip.


tags: Easter Island, Rapa Nui, Te Pito O Te Henua, travel

Fences, gates and ingenuity on Easter Island

This one is for the Virtual Ranger. We found much ingenuity in the use of materials on Easter Island. Everything must be shipped in from the mainland (2000 miles away) with the consequent markup in cost, so they try to get all of the use they can.
I wonder if the Virtual Ranger can tell me if this gate is hung correctly (hinges on the right).

Note the use of inexpensive eucalyptus tree branches from the island, even as hinges.





Another part of the wall had a gate made of an old bed frame. You should clearly be able to see the rusty springs that give away the provenance of this piece.




Other folks use a lock to hold the toilet paper holder closed, on Easter Island a simple twist of wire will do.




Even the hotel we stayed in right before and after the horse back riding portion of the trip didn't waste money on fancy materials when simple particle board with varnish would do. You can even see the green dye that marks the edge.

Kudos to the Easter Islanders for their ingenuity and reuse of materials.


tags: Easter Island, Rapa Nui, Te Pito O Te Henua, gates