Weather You Like It Or Not!

That's right - WEATHER!

You can't escape it.

It might be the sun and the wonderful breeze - or maybe a bolt of lightning, a crack of thunder and a tropical downpour.  Here, all of those things have greater relevance to what you do day-to-day, or when you do it.

So, the geekish person I am, I bought a weather station.  I know, if you want to know the weather, look outside - and I do that - in fact for the most part we live outside.  But I want to know - just how hot is it - just how much rain did we get yesterday - i was freezing last night, how low did the temperature go?

It is a great device - sits on a pole in the garden and measures temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction and rainfall.  It feeds it all to the internet where the history is stored.  AND, because I am a generous person, I can share it with everyone on Weather Underground.

So if you want to see what the weather is in Ojochal right now, take a peek at My Weather Station. Scroll down and you can see the history for the last week.

Or click on the Forecast for Osa link - it usually says the next 10 days are sunny and 33C!

Storm of the Century?

Lisle is in Ojochal at the moment, and we were chatting last night around 5.  He said it was really getting dark and starting to rain - low heavy clouds.

He texted shortly after that the power was out and the winds were crazy.

Something really dramatic happen -

reports of a tornado in the village - trees down all over

People still without power after 24 hours.

Lisle just shared photos of our property.

Giant trees from the valley behind us have crashed onto the lower area of the lot!

We have had trees fall before and the noise is outrageous, but Lisle said the storm was so intense he heard nothing.  He didn't know anything was wrong until he was standing at the kitchen window and thought the treeline looked odd - he went to look and found the mess - - fortunately no damage to the house!

Time for a chainsaw!

Of Birds and Bugs and Other Things

so to start off with, the other morning there is this dead bird on the front patio - not the first we have had - they are stupid and fly into the window - but this one looked more like it had just hatched or been unswallowed by something - kind of gross

The next morning, Lisle say - a toad pooped in the door track - I went to clean it - not toad poop - it had legs and was wriggling.

And yesterday it was the visit from the Jesus Christ lizard - they walk on water!!  a rather large one

All of yesterday was spectacular - sunny from first thing in the morning - hot 35C - in the pool with a beer - a beautiful day for a beautiful sunset - of course not - but quite the light show - a storm moved on over the ocean the lightning fingers shot across the sky - wish I was a better photographer - but the sky was neat nonetheless.  a glimpse of the lightning in some of the shots

Then the rain came - good heavy tropical rain - - lasted much of the night -  - finally stopped about 6 this morning.

It Stopped

Raining - that is!

It has been almost continuous since yesterday morning - - doesn't look like it has stopped everywhere, or that it will last!!

Strange Things - Part 2

Photo taken from the neighbours place looking over the Pacific

SCARY!!

Strange Things

Some things are just too freaky - makes you wonder if the end really is near!

Costa Rica gets rain - lots of it - - where our house is we get about 20 feet of rain a year (compared to Toronto which gets less than 3 feet of precipitation).  And storms can be harsh, torrential.

But this week there were two tornadoes outside San Jose - one on Tuesday and one on Thursday - unheard of!

Then, our friends sent these photos - two snakes seeking a nest of birds just above the house - CREEPY.

Shocking

 No, these aren't my photos, but the storm last night was filled with images just like this - multiple  bolts over the ocean - bolts that came from a central point and spread horizontally across the sky - blinding white flashes followed by ear splitting cracks as something nearby was hit - 45 minutes of wonder!!