MontanaRon

An English teacher's blog about his travels and his digital art.

Month: August 2014

Uncommon Rainbows

August 28, 2014 /

I was lucky and thrilled to see a somewhat rare weather phenomenon a few days ago here at The Farm. Iridescent clouds form, according to this website,

When parts of clouds are thin and have similar size droplets, diffraction can make them shine with colours like a corona. In fact, the colours are essentially corona fragments. The effect is called cloud iridescence or irisation, terms derived from Iris the Greek personification of the rainbow.

You can read more on the website. A few other sites I checked mentioned that although these types of rainbows are not extremely rare, they are rather uncommon.

It was lucky that the clouds broke from being overcast earlier in the day. I took a few photos of the rainbows, which were quite close to the sun. The disc of the sun was blocked by other clouds, but the glare was still intense, so I had to drastically underexpose in order to capture the colors in the clouds. The rainbow on the right in the first photo below was highlighting a pileus cloud that was on top of a cumulus cloud. The same website has a simple explanation of a pileus cloud. It lasted about 15 minutes, whereas the iridescent cloud on the left coloring the cirrocumulus clouds persisted for about an hour. These pictures, unfortunately, don’t give a true rendition of how beautiful the event was.

Iridescent clouds

The one on the right appeared only briefly, but the one on the left lasted for an hour.

Here’s how the cirrocumulus cloud appeared from the second floor window of the house at The Farm, followed by a close up view using the telephoto zoom lens on my camera.

Cirrocumulus Rainbow

From the window of the house at The Farm. Our neighbor’s house is the dark shape at the bottom of the photo. I wanted to give some scale to the photo, so I didn’t crop it out.

Iridescent cloud close up

A close up taken with the telephoto zoom lens on my camera, approximately 150 mm.

There were some other interesting cloud formations that day. The first one below is the cumulus and pileus clouds as they appeared after the rainbow dissipated. The other photo shows some rain clouds off to our south, moving toward Thailand. I converted these to black and white to add more drama, in my opinion, and as a change of pace from the usual color photos I post. There wasn’t much color in these to begin with, so I think B&W is appropriate.

Pileus and cumulus clouds

The pileus cloud sits atop the cumulus. It looked like a strong thunderstorm might develop, but it fizzled out after awhile.

Storm clouds

Looks like a heck of a storm heading for Thailand.

Finally, here’s a sunset that was captured the day before the above photos were made.

Sunset

Lots of nice sunsets lately with all the moisture in the air.

A (Premature) Sigh of Relief

August 19, 2014 /

I had to attend a workshop at the school this past Friday, and as I was riding the motorbike back to The Farm, I noticed that one of my island “markers” for the water level in the Mekong had shown that the river level had dropped substantially. We’d had several days of little or no rainfall, so I inwardly sighed that it appeared there would be no flooding in our area.

Riding into Vientiane today for classes, I noticed that the same marker now indicates that the water level has risen substantially, perhaps up to a foot more, so my relief has flown. It appears that flooding is possible, perhaps probable, because the forecast is calling for a high chance of rain throughout the upcoming week. We had fairly heavy rains for a short while last night, and it briefly rained heavily in Vientiane this afternoon. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the river stays within its banks until the rainy season ends in a few weeks. There are still a couple of feet to go before the muddy, caramel-colored mess visits our doorstep, so I’m hoping to stay high and dry until then. More later.

A Few Sunsets

August 7, 2014 /

My view of the western horizon really isn’t too good here. There’s the wat on one side and a house on the other, both of which intrude into the second-floor photos from Nai’s house I take of sunsets. Walking up to the small road that runs through the village doesn’t offer any better views. I’d have to ride my motorbike a couple of kilometers to some rice paddies where I would have an unobstructed view. It’s hard to predict, though, if the sunset is going to be something special that would reward my ride over the washboardy, pot-holed village road. For now, I’ll content myself with the view that I have.

So, here are a few nice sunsets we’ve had over the past month or so. Please forgive those two buildings that make the scene less than ideal.

Sunset in Laos

Sunset with the house intruding.

Sunset in Laos

Sunset with the wat intruding.

Sunset in Laos

Sunset–where are the house and the wat? I took this one with the telephoto zoom lens, which avoided the two interlopers.

Dragon Boat Racing Begins

August 5, 2014 /

Our timing was quite bad last Saturday in going to see the first dragon boat races of the season, which ends, I believe, sometime in late October or early November. We arrived at the National Cultural Park, which is a few kilometers from the Friendship Bridge, around 3:30 in the afternoon. We were just in time to catch the finish of the final race. Not that we were able to see much, since the banks of the Mekong were packed with spectators. This is the only photo I was able to take of the competitors. The near boat is from Nai’s village, and though they usually finish at the top, this day they took second place.

Dragon Boat Racing

And the winner is . . . the boat at the top, just barely.

Crowd of people along the Mekong River.

It was difficult to get any kind of view of the race due to the large number of people lining the Mekong riverbank. That’s Thailand on the far bank.

The races usually take place on Saturday, but since that’s a working day for me, we can’t get to the events early enough to secure good viewing spots. However, during the major, important national championship race later in the season, the college is cancelling classes on that particular Saturday; not many of the students would attend. That race takes place in Vientiane, so there will be quite a large turnout, with a myriad of activities, parties and what-not. I can hardly wait.

There’s always a carnival- or festival-like feeling at these events. Plenty of food, beer, live bands and other diversions can be found at the site. In fact, just as we left the area around 7 o’clock, we stumbled upon a bumper car ride, and, of course, we had to give it a try. I haven’t smashed around in bumper cars since I was a teenager. Tons of fun. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any photos; kind of hard to do while your bashing and getting bashed. Here are some other photos from the day.

The House of Horror

This must be a “fun” house type of attraction, the “House of Horrors.” It’s one of the first sights at one entrance to the Cultural Park.

The crowd at the boat race

Part of the throng at the Cultural Park for the first boat race of the season.

People eating and drinking and listening to a live band.

Other folks were taking in the live band and eating and drinking with their friends and family.

Dragon Boat Racer

One of the racers was happy to pose for this photo. I believe his team finished in 3rd or 4th place.

Grilled squid

Lots of food at the event. Grilled squid, anyone?

Roasted grasshoppers

If squid isn’t your thing, how about some roasted grasshoppers?

Laos food for sale

This type of food is more to my liking than the squid or the grasshoppers.

Grilled chicken

The grilled chicken was outstanding. I ate of couple of “sticks” of it.

The Cultural Park is a bit run down, with a very small zoo that includes monkeys and ostriches, some dinosaur statues and a display of traditional Lao houses. I was previously there in 2007. Now, a large swimming pool with an encompassing restaurant (it literally surrounds the pool) has opened right next door. I think most people are more attracted to the swimming area than to the park, but the park is still worth a visit, in my opinion. I think there’s a small entrance fee of a dollar or two.

I was disappointed that I captured only that one photo of the race itself, but there will be plenty more races later. I’ll try to attend as many as I can; they’re quite fun, and if you’re in Laos between the months of August and November, try to take one in.

Mekong Rising

August 2, 2014 /

Yes, with all the rain we’ve had, the river is steadily rising, nearly covering a few islands that I use as benchmarks to measure how high the water is getting. Hopefully, it won’t come up to our doorstep. That did happen some years back when Nai’s house had about three feet of water soaking the first floor. Here’s what it looks like when the Mekong decides to visit. These were taken on August 14, 2008 and posted on the blog here:

Children playing in flood waters

Children having fun in the flood of 2008 at Nai’s house.

Nai surveying flood

Nai surveying the flood waters at his house in Laos.

As you can see, the children were having a good time, but Nai was none to happy about the situation. The family helped him move everything up to the second floor, but cleaning up afterwards was quite a chore, he told me.

Yesterday was beautiful, with mostly clear blue skies and NO rain! I hope that continues. The first boat race of the racing season is today near the Friendship Bridge that links Laos and Thailand. We might go see it since it’s so close to The Farm, but rain is forecast for later this afternoon. More later.

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