Tasty Stuff...

I found this cool grater at the store you love to hate - Marshalls. This is the best tool ever for a lot of things. It has three different sizes you can snap into place. The first thing I made was a Green Mango Salad.


I've been cooking a lot more here in PR than in Washington because I've got too - there isn't much variety of fresh stuff. There is also the game we've got going of eating 3 things from the yard. So here is the latest installment - Green Mango Salad. This is a surprisingly refreshing salad that used 3 things from the yard!

Green Mango Salad
grate 2 green mangoes
1/4 cup grated coconut (toast it)

3 tbsp fish sauce
3 tbsp lime juice
1-2 tbsp brown sugar

1/2 cup chopped basil
1-2 fresh red chillies

3-4 spring onions
chopped nuts - handful

Parcha..

This looks odd but it is more variety and was tasty. It was pork with tomatoes (from the yard) and all kinds of spices like cinnamin, nutmeg and other stuff. Something different.

A Little Bit of Rain and...

we have cat antics.What is it about the laundry basket? Whether or not there are clothes in it or not they all love to play in it (the cats). Tuca has not seen the other cats in it but here she is inside on a towel. How do they figure things out?


The latest edition to the jungle room (porch) is this tree fern parrot. I think I'll get another one or two and strap orchids and ferns and stuff them them. Our house isn't fussy so I can water them and the mop or hose out the room. I got the iris for in the head since I think it looked like a parakeet. It didn't take long for the cats to figure out that this was a great scratching post. Blanco was sitting on top of the head swatting the dangling seed pod while Pollo was down below swatting it back! Tree fern carvings are the tropical equivalent of chain saw sculptures in the northwest (we didn't have any, but here I can't resist the whimsy).

8 days ago or so we actually had a half inch of rain and the cats came in. Only 6 can fit on the couch though, so the others...

slept in a box...

or a cat bed...or inside somewhere (the other 3).

Diving While Jeff was Working Hard on Solar

While Jeff was working hard on solar stuff I went out diving. There wasn't anything I could do to help him (I PAINTED all the stuff during the week - still haven't finished the rejas) so I went with friend David for some very nice dives over the last two weekends. This is the trail to Natural.


When you follow it down you get to the beach and it doesn't give any indication of how nice things are underwater. We dove on a Saturday and Sunday since it was great visibility and calm conditions. On Saturday it was turtle heaven when we saw 20 turtles or so (Jeff was with us on this one I think). The next day we saw a school of Sabados (tarpon) (we usually see these on the drop off at Corseca), Mero, blah blah it was just a schooling fish day!Fabulous!

Here are the cinder blocks Israel sits on when he "watches" the cars (for $3). His family is great, it is nice to be able to give someone the keys, and he gave me a Ceiba tree seedling that will grow up to be like this one I hope.

Last weekend Jeff was very hard at work and I went to Shacks with Raul (left) and David (right). Conditions were stupendous! We had a wonderful 96 minute dive with over an hour of that on the outside of the reef. No current, good visibility, sunshine.

It was soooooo good we came back on Sunday and conditions were pretty similar but a little more windy. We decided to try uncharted territory and headed to the east as far up the beach as we could walk. We went out and slipped into the "holes" and then found ways out to the outside reef. We headed straight out (north) for quite a while and since there was current went with it to the west when we came in.

Flat flat flat. The surface conditions were wonderful. We saw a huge eagle ray and a really big nurse shark - biggest shark I have seen here in our 1 1/2 years. We came out one of the normal holes after 96 minutes.

On the way home I saw a horse in a pickup. I just love how low the truck is to the ground and the horse just looking ahead at the highway in front of him!

Solar Panels Installed

One ton of coal produces about 2000 - 3000 KWH of electricity.
We use 2500 KWH of electricity every year.
This pile of solar panels is 3' x 5' x 2', probably the same space as a ton of coal.
These panels may provide all the electricity Katrina and I use for the rest of our lives.
They are guaranteed to have at least 80% output after 20 years. They will probably have 60% output after 40 years.
10 Evergreen 205W panels = 2050W * 5.5 solar hours = 11KWH * 75% efficiency = 8KHW/day


After many hours of hard work here they are installed!

The batteries should come tomorrow. The Inverter/Charge controller should come early next week.