OK I deleted the Post Cayman blog because I just was not posting. I am now going to be on my new blog 'Jonathan Webb Fort McMurray Edition'. This is because I am heading out to Fort McMurray to work.

New blog

OK since my Cayman experience has ended I probably will not have much of a reason to post here. So I have started a new blog 'Jonathan Webb Post Cayman Edition'. It can be found at http://68thomas.blogspot.com

Fin!

Well it has all come to an end. I am back in St. Catharines and will not be returning to Grand Cayman. For a number of reasons that are difficult to explain, like work permit renewals, work shortage and nepotism my employment in the Caymans has ceased. 

It was certainly a great experience that I do not regret. I had alot of fun and I would certainly do it again. Which reminds me there is still a remote chance that I could gain some employment in the Turks and Caicos islands. It is still quite a longshot, but so was the Caymans!

My not so great trip back

The trip started out reasonable enough. The flight out of Buffalo was good. It started rather humorously with the little boy beside me. His mother gave him some gum and told him to chew it for his ears. He chewed it all right. Then he put it in his ears! I could hear him asking his father all perplexed, 'why does mommy want me to put gum in my ears?' His poor father had a really hard time containing the laughter.

We landed OK in New York City. I will tell you that the JFK airport leaves alot to be desired. It is not the easiest airport to navigate. Either way I went through security and made my way to my gate. I got some food and tried my best to entertain myself for my 3 hour layover. Then I noticed that we were boarding and got all the way up to the check in point and the girl says that I needed to go back through security. I was mortified! So as the plane was finishing up boarding I had to run back through the sprawling airport to find someone at the security check point to punch two holes in my boarding pass. Luckily I made it and got on the flight.

We were off for Miami. A couple of hours later we touched down, and I was happy to. Until I got my headphones off and realized that we had touched down in West Palm Beach. It seems that there was some pretty bad weather in Miami and they had closed the airport to all traffic until the weather passed. Eventually we fueled up and were allowed off the plane to get some food, after sitting there for almost three hours. Which wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for the Bitch behind me that would not stop complaining. Either way we managed to get out and make the 16 minute flight to Miami.

I thought that I would be nice and just let others get off the plane, because I was sure that all our connections were lost at this point. So I figured there was no point in being pushy like everyone else. I sat back and let the majority of the plane empty which took about 10-15 minutes as it was a large plane. Once I got going and looked at my boarding pass I realized that there was a very slim chance that I could catch my original flight. I was supposed to depart at 5:55 and it was not 6:05, but the updated board showed it delayed until 6:15. So I ran, and I ran, and I ran. Did I mention how big the Miami airport is. And I ran. I made it to the gate at 6:20. The plane had departed.

At this point my only option was to rebook for this morning and take the free meals and hotel room that American Airlines was offering me.

I made my way back to the Miami airport this morning only to find out that I had been chosen for secondary screening. Great. Of course I left myself a few hours of extra time. So it was really no big deal to go through the little chamber that checks to see if you have any explosive residue on and have all my stuff swiped for explosives.

After all that the flight to Grand Cayman was really no big deal.

Heading back

I head back to Grand Cayman tomorrow. My flight leaves Buffalo just after 7 am. My connections are throught New  York city, and Miami. I will be in Georgetown somewhere around 6:30 pm.

Things are improving

Yes I am home. I got here about 2:00 pm yesterday. What a trip. Did I mention Delta sucks! Anyway I am glad to finally be home and have had some rest. We took the kids out for dinner last night which was great. And Delta did find my bag and will have it delivered to me this morning. Did I mention Delta sucks! Everything is good now, provided everything is in my bag and not broken. By the way did I mention Delta sucks?

Still here

I'm still here in Atlanta. It is 5:00 am and my flight leaves in 5 hours. I tried to get as much sleep as is possible on a hard bench. I am not sure if I did or not with all the Homeland Security crap over the PA system all night. With that and the propane powered floor cleaners going steady there was just too much noise to get any real rest. Did I mention that Delta sucks. Oh, and of course there is some debate on whether my checked bag will go to Buffalo with me or end up in Toronto like it was originally supposed to. Yeah. Delta Sucks!

Delta Sucks!

I knew that I was going to have a long layover but this is ridiculous. Delta cancelled our flight for tonight because of bad weather. So now I have to stay in the airport overnight and I now have a new flight to Buffalo at 10:05 in the morning. At least there won't be as much driving for Kathleen this way. But I still say Delta sucks. I was looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight, not in an airport lobby chair!

Atlanta

Well, I made it to Atlanta so far. And I am here for the next three hours, on top of the couple that I have already been here! So I am using this downtime to surf the internet and catch up on some computer time.

I got this photo last night looking over Seven Mile beach from our jobsite. The other one is of a rainbow taken from the same place earlier in the day.

Coming Home!

My bag is packed and I am almost ready to leave. I am coming home for a two week visit. I will be flying Delta fligh 906, Grand Cayman to Atlanta, then to Toronto. My flight leaves at 1:05 Cayman time and I will be in Toronto around midnight. See you all soon!

Newest jobsite visitor

We had a new jobsite visitor today. Late in the day while moving some material we came across this scorpion. Of course the guys had to pick it up so that we could get a picture.

Jobsite progress

As the pace of our job picks up it gets more and more difficult to update here, as there are other things that are more important such as eating showering and talking to family. Anyway the job is going really well. Yesterday we poured our first piece of the second floor which is a major milestone. The superintendant was very pleased with this so he let the crew knock off an hour early with pay and he bought 10 cases of beer. So we all hung out for and hour or so, until all the beer was gone. The picture shown is of the majority of our crew. You will notice it is quite a colourfull crew as we are working with people from Honduras, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Guyana, Cuba, The Phillipines, and of course Canada.

Return of the Iguana

I forgot to mention in my last post that our jobsite iguana has returned. He was caught on Friday close to the crane. He was quite tired out from being chased around, so he sat there for me to get some pictures.

Today we went snorkeling in Georgetown behind the Burger King. The reef here is named cheeseburger reef for obvious reasons. Anyway I didn't get any good underwater shots but I did get some looking from the water back into Georgetown. At this point we are probably about a third of a mile out to sea. It is amazing how far you can go without realizing it.

Update

We got our van back. It was found on the Monday in West Bay. The only things missing were the keys and my roomates sandals. The only damage was a small scrape on the passenger side. The landscape of our job has just changed dramatically. One of the guys is leaving and this leaves a pretty big hole in the chain of command. I cannot really go into detail on the internet, but it does at least temporarily leave us with the van fulltime.

Otherwise things are going pretty smooth. The building is changing at a very rapid pace. According to the locals we build faster than anyone else around. And on top of that they claim that our work is leaps and bounds above all the other contractors.

I also now have a contact that may get me some work in the Turks and Caicos islands. Not that I want to leave here, but if it was a better deal I just may. Of course right now it is quite a longshot, and likely not to happen, but there is a remote possibility. And the job I am on now was a remote possibility at one time. Again I cannot go into detail because it is still not even confirmed for my contact, but if it works out for him it puts me in the position to start feeling around.

Stolen Van

Somebody stole our company van out of our driveway last night. When my roommate Jim got up to go fishing this morning around 5:30 he discovered that the company's Hyundai H1 van was gone. Also he noticed his lunch bag outside dumped out. Upon further investigation I noticed my lunch bag missing. After the police arrived they checked around the house and found my lunch bag in the side yard. What is most disturbing about this is that someone was in the house while we were sleeping.

I go to bed fairly early and always check to see if the door is locked. We have Medeco locks on our doors and if someone actually tried to break in we would have heard them. So it is a bit of a mystery because the key for the van is gone off the table as well.

I am currently awaiting the arrival of the detectives to give a detailed statement and relevant details. I am sure that it would not take too long to find it as the island is very small and the people that would be out stealing vehicles don't have the accommodation's to hide one.

Not much to report

There does not seem to be much for me to report here right now. The job has picked up quite substantially so I am very tired in the evenings. I would like to get out one of these evenings and get some more pictures of what this place looks like in the evenings, but right now the humidity is high and my energy is low so it will not happen. I can say that after nine paycheques I have earned more money that I did all last year. If I can stick it out down here I should be able to resolve all my finances and come home to a nice tidy sum of cash.

Another great Grand Cayman Sunset

I got out today cruising around the island and snorkeling. We went down to South Sound and found the water a little too rough for swimming. But I did find a lot of conch shells for the kids while there. From there we went to a place called Smiths Cove. It is a popular swimming area, but I did not find the snorkeling all that great. From there I took Brian to the old standby, the wreck of the Gamma. There is also  nice reef nearby, so the snorkeling was much better there

After snorkeling and a nice nap, Jim and I went out for dinner. We went to a place called Rackham's in Georgetown. This is where I got the nice sunset shot. While there we were throwing french fries from our plate to the Tarpon in the water. Tarpon is a very large prehistoric looking fish. They get up to 8 feet in length and 200 pounds. They hang around the restaurants on the water because most of the places feed them as an attraction.

Adventure day

Today I have managed to get a company truck for the day. So I am going exploring around the island with Brian, one of the guys I work with. I have downloaded a program called google earth and when you zoom in on Grand Cayman it shows all kinds of diving and snorkeling points. So I am plugging the coordinates into my GPS and off I go. Hopefully I will come back with lots of great pictures again!

So much for Felix

Felix is gone. He didn't even take as big a bite out of us as Dean. Actually the only action I saw from Felix was some little 2-3 foot waves. So once again Grand Cayman escapes the wrath of the Hurricane.

Now that that is over with hopefully life can return to normal here. It will be nice to get back on track with making and saving some money. The job here seems to be going fairly well, and I should be getting ready to apply for my next work permit next month. Time is going by pretty quickly. The company that I am working for has managed to pick up some more work here and are pretty aggressive about getting more. This makes the work picture for me here on the island a pretty fair one. Again it kind of sucks being here without family. But when I get back we will have realized a bunch of goals that we have wanted to accomplish for some time. So we suck it up and carry on.

Turtle Island

Apparently the Cayman Islands used to be known as Turtle island because of the huge turtle population that they used to have. Now it seems to be a rarity to run into one of these majestic creatures. Fortunately for me I had my second encounter today with one. They seem to be as curious of us as we are of them. They tend to give you lots of time to get some shots of them. As long as you do not try to touch them or get too close they are very forgiving of your presence. Anyway I hope you all enjoy them through this video as I did taking it.

Felix running scared

OK, hurricane Felix seems to be moving quite a bit farther south according to the newest computer models. That is the good news. The bad news is that it will now be a category 4 hurricane when it is within the Grand Cayman striking distance. But once again, I have some great options for hurricane shelters. Any sort of harm is out of the question. It being a giant pain in my ass is of course fairly likely.

Here we go again

Apparently there is another weather system headed into our area. Right now it is Tropical Storm Felix. The current computer models show that it could be a category 3 hurricane by the time it reaches close enough to bother us. The predictions would be sometime on Tuesday. Of course anything could happen between now and then. And as Dean proved, the models are not always right. But I am sure that we will be taking the necessary precautions, and as with Dean, all will be well.

Kathleen is gone :(

Kathleen managed to get off the island today. Apparently her flight left about an hour late. But her connection in North Carolina was on time. So she should be landing in Buffalo right about now (9:45 pm). I will miss her presence like no one could understand, but we have set some goals and we both believe that we should meet those goals before I leave here.

I don't want to sit here and dwell on the fact that she is gone, but I wanted to post some pictures of her here.

Stingray City, and a Shark!

Today Kathleen and I went to Stingray City. Actually there really is no city. We were taken by a boat out to a sandbar where a large amount of stingrays frequent. Once in the water they feed the stingrays squid to attract them. It was quite interesting and Kathleen even ventured to pick one up.

After the stingrays they took us to a nearby reef for snorkeling. As soon as I was in the water I was face to face with a nurse shark! This guy came within 3 inches of me. We were quite close, but I guess it was not hungry.

All in all we had a pretty good day, and yes of course we finished it off with dinner out at one of the nicer restaurants on the seven mile beach strip.

I almost forgot to mention all of the iguanas that we saw driving to the dock. There must have been a hundred of them on both sides of this road. Check the video out!

Another update

Yesterday Kathleen and I ventured down to Rum Point. It was not quite as exciting as we had anticipated. It seems to me that it was more for the drinking crowd. And it was also more of a beach, and we wanted to go snorkeling around some reef. Aside from that the thunder and lightning along with the brief rainstorm put a bit of a damper on the experience.

Beyond that we just cruised around the the east end of the island, and took some pictures. I also must say that I have never eaten out so much in my life. I would be a little embarrassed to tell how much money I have spent on restaurants since Kathleen has been here. But I believe that Kathleen deserves to be treated out as this is her first real vacation since we had children.

Last night we had a great experience at a restaurant called Ristorante Pappagallo. I had an 18 oz. Rib eye steak that was absolutely fantastic. I would love to be able to bring family and friends here to experience some of the dining. It is a great place to eat out.

Dinner out

Well Kathleen and I have been eating out quite a bit. I guess this would be the obvious choice as we have no worries about the kids, thanks to our parents on both sides! Tonight we ate at a place called The Reef, on Seven Mile beach. This pictures is actually three pictures stitched together. I wanted everyone to see the sunset like we did. Evenings like this are absolutely spectacular, especially with Kathleen by my side. Sadly though it turns out that I do not like lobster. We both ordered the surf and turf tonight because we have never tried lobster. And fortunately for my wallet I do not really enjoy it.

Tourist

Today with my beautiful wife at my side I played tourist. We walked into Georgetown and bought some souvenirs. While we were there we took some pictures of the waves crashing up over the break walls, the most spectacular being at the Burger King drive-thru. We also had lunch at a great restaurant on the second floor. They had a balcony overlooking the street and the harbor.

After we got back from Georgetown we took a walk up Seven Mile beach and ended up at a bar on the beach called 'The Reef'. We stayed there and had a beer while we watched the sunset. Having Kathleen with me for all of this made it an absolute perfect day!

Back home

Kathleen and I came back home this afternoon because it appeared that all danger had passed. Everything seems to be somewhat back to normal. As we drove home I noticed that some of the local area businesses were opening back up. We went to the beach to see what it was like. The 16 foot waves had died down, but for a place that normally has no real waves to speak of it was pretty wild looking to me.

Almost gone

I suspect that I will be back home this evening. All of the projections and satellite imagery shows Dean well on his way. Best of luck to Mexico and Belize.

Still Alive!

Well hurricane Dean is blowing through and we are all still alive. I guess the fact that I am still typing away with electricity active and and internet connection must tell you how bad it is. The only service that we are currently missing is water. The water was shut off at 9 pm last night. It seems as though the Cayman Island Government is convinced that Dean has pretty much passed us by, they issued this press release this morning.

The five of us are just hanging around watching tv and making amateur predictions about the storm. Cell phone service is still up as well, so anyone can call us if they are uneasy.

We are all pretty comfortable here and have no real concerns about the storm, as it seems to have passed us by for the most part. They already have sunny skies in Jamaica and I expect the same here tomorrow.

Dean keeps moving south

The National Hurricane Center has released another update and Dean is creeping even farther south. It seems as though we may end up with it being pretty easy here after all.

Another Dean update

Apparently Dean keeps creeping more and more to the south. I am not sure that it will stay that way, but the way I see it is that the farther away it gets the better! You can see the difference from this picture to the last one that I posted.

Dean Update

I will try to make reasonably frequent updates on the storm and our well being. I am not sure when the electricity will go out, but when it does I will have to stop the updates.

All is well in Grand Cayman

Kathleen made it on Friday as scheduled. It was a little hairy getting into the airport as everyone is in a frenzy over Dean. Now it looks as though Dean will not be as powerful as thought and will stay a little farther from the islands as has been indicated the last couple of days. With any luck it will just be something to talk about. I am getting all my electronics packed up to take with me to higher ground just in case. So you may not hear from me for a day or two.

Other than dean everything is great. Hopefully Kathleen will still get a decent holiday out of all this mess and we will laugh about it in the future.

He's Back

Our Iguana really seems to like our jobsite. He was caught today by one of the rodmen from Honduras. This time I managed to get some close up shots. There is some debate as to the sex of this guy. There are two different men on site that both claim to be experts and they have differing opinions. So I have no idea if it is male or female. It is definitely any Iguana though.

Our crane if broken today so things are a little slow right now. I have a hard time standing around for a 10 hour shift, but it pays the bills. What is even more difficult if finding work for all the other guys. They all come to the Canadians looking for something to do and sometimes there is just nothing going on. I am sure that once they get the crane going that we will be busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest

Tropical Depression 4

Well there is a bit of a storm headed our way. It is now a tropical depression, and could reach tropical storm status by tomorrow. It is headed west towards the Caribbean and it is believed that it will reach hurricane status by Thursday. Some say that it will be a category 2 hurricane by Thursday, but that remains to be seen. Either way we were told to get some supplies together just in case it does actually make it here. I do not believe it will, because statistically The Caymans usually fair pretty well in hurricane season. And if it does, there will just be more work down here!

Not much happening

So there has not been to much exciting going on lately. The pace has picked up slightly at work so I am actually getting to put in a full days work! This is kind of nice, as I sleep better because I am actually tired. The picture above is a panorama that I stitched together with some software. It is looking out off of our jobsite over Seven mile beach out into the Caribbean. If you could see far enough I believe you would be looking at Mexico.

Once I get my tripod here for my camera I am going to climb to the top of the tower crane and make a panorama photo the should go completely around the island. Apparently you can see the water around the entire island from up there. Our crane is the highest point on the island at this time. This should make for an interesting one of a kind photo!

Kathleen will be here next Friday afternoon. This should make for an extremely long week for me, waiting for her. I really hope that she gets the relaxation that she deserves. Looking after all four of the kids alone is an immense task that I do not take lightly. She deserves alot more than a two week break, but we will do what we can. I am truly looking forward to her arrival.

Jobsite visitor

Today we had a visitor on our jobsite. The first time we saw this juvenile iguana, my co-worker Tyler caught it and we threw it in the office for a joke. After that we released her. Near the end of the day I was cleaning up and picked up a bucket that was upside down. She came running out from underneath. One of the Filipino's had stuck her under there and was going to take here home for dinner. I spoiled there plan and the iguana made a run for freedom!