As my readers know it’s the rainy season here in Panama and we’ve been getting more than our share this year. New records for rainfall being set nearly every month.
Last January I wrote a post about fog. Up here at 2,600 feet overlooking the Pacific Ocean we often encounter the phenomenon of “up slope fog” which forms when winds blow air up a slope (called orographic lift), adiabatically (occurring without loss or gain of heat) as it rises, and causing the moisture in it to condense. This can happen at any time of the day and we get plenty of it here. One minute it will be clear and sunny and the next thing you know you can’t see the far side of your yard. And then, a few minutes later it will be clear again.
This is what it was like a couple of days ago just after noon time.
It lasted like this for about 20 minutes then disappeared. THEN it started to rain…LOL. When it did start raining we had thunder and lightning like I haven’t seen here before and while friends not far away lost their electricity for several hours for once this house was spared that irritation.
We had several more episodes of fog during the day and on into the night. The street lights on the dirt road that passes by the house were eerie yellow dots in the distance in contrast to the fire flies blinking brilliance and I can only imagine what driving must have been like for those out on the narrow, twisting two-lane carreterra heading down to David.
One More Good Adventure 
If there’s anything I like more than fog, it’s reading someone who can drop “adiabatically” into the middle of a post and not even blink.
We had some of our own tropical rain yesterday, compliments of Karl moving into Mexico. A few more showers today and then we’re back to hot and sunny – and crossed fingers that nothing decides to stir itself up in the Gulf just now. That fast development that characterized Karl could just as easily happen…..uh…. farther north. 😉
It’s really amazing how fast storms can whip up in the Gulf. When I first moved to Louisiana in ’77 I was working on a supply boat out of Cameron. (I’d made the observation then that desolation would have been an improvement over Cameron.) There was a hurricane in the Gulf that had us and all the other off shore service boats move up the Calcaceau River to Lake Charles for protection. Nothing much came of that storm for us and after 48 hours everyone went back to Cameron only to have to return to Lake Charles when a tropical storm formed overnight two days later.