Weather

Abril, aguas mil y lodo, lodo everywhere

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The Ecuadorians have a saying ‘Abril, aguas mil.’  (And lodo=mud.) The direct translation is roughly: April – a thousand waters (and I added the part about the mud). You get the idea – it’s basically the same sentiment as ‘April showers bring May flowers.’ True to form, the atmosphere has delivered us aguas mil this month. For that matter, March was also a month of aguas mil. I have become accustomed to donning rain gear, boots, and marching out of the house with my giant umbrella (mi sombrillo gigante!) that I purchased on a street corner in a moment of soggy desperation sometime back in March. Everyday I wish we could send some of this deluge off to California, where people actually need the water.

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A Cuenca city bus about to cross a bridge over the muddy and raging Tomebamba river not far from my office at the satellite campus at the University of Cuenca.

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Into the Misty Mountains

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There is something about a windswept, lonely place that draws me in. It’s the escape from the bustling crowds and the diesel. Living in Ecuador’s third largest city is sometimes a challenge simply because it is a city. When I first arrived, I thought I was suffering from culture-shock. I think a lot of the shock was simply adjusting to city life. I’ve adapted, but I still need to escape regularly – to breathe fresh air and wipe the grime from my face.

New Zealand has the Middle Earth claim-to-fame. But the Andes could have easily played a starring role as the Misty Mountains in Lord of the Rings.

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Holy Anemometers, Batman!

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Just in time for Easter, this post has a little religion and a little science all in one! Not that I ever mix the two, but sometimes it’s interesting when they stand side by side.

Last Thursday I took my first pilgrimage up the mountain with colleagues to check out one of the weather stations. We drove about 30 minutes up toward Cajas National Park, west of Cuenca. I was excited to get out in the countryside, having been cooped up from all the rain these past couple of weeks.

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The anemometer is an instrument that measures windspeed – the little cups rotate in the wind.

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El Niño is here!

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(A post for the science geeks! And for anyone who’s curious!) After a very hesitant start, the folks at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made it official earlier this month: El Niño is here!  If you remember back to my post on Why Ecuador? I’ve always wondered, what would it be like to be in the tropics, in a country heavily impacted by El Niño, during an El Niño event? El Niño is one of the reasons I’m interested in weather and climate in Ecuador.

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Three storms on the move in the warm waters of the Western Pacific in March 2015. This image was taken two days before Pam plowed through the island nation of Vanuatu . Warm tropical waters fuel storms like this. During El Niño, the Central-Eastern Pacific has a greater chance of seeing these types of storms (NASA image from 3/11/15).

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Afraid of ghosts? I’ve got something scarier.

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In honor of the spooky time of year, I thought I would share with you a little spookiness from a trip to Scotland awhile back.

Ardvreck Castle sits on a lonely spit of land in the middle of gloomy Loch Assynt in the northwest Scottish Highlands. If all you know about Scotland are scenes from Rob Roy and Braveheart, and descriptions from books such as Outlander, whatever you imagined the Scottish Highlands to look like, you would find it here at Ardvreck.

The ruins of Castle Ardvreck on the shores of Loch Assynt in the northwest Scottish Highlands

The ruins of Castle Ardvreck on the shores of Loch Assynt in the northwest Scottish Highlands.

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