Paseo Stadium is where Guam’s major league baseball teams play during the weekends. Paseo Stadium is located in the village of Hagatna in Paseo Park. Paseo Park is a great place to go during the weekends because there are a lot of things to do around the park. Also located in the park is Chamorro Village, the surf spot in Hagatna Boat Basin, the beach, and playground sets for kids. During the weekends at night you can find locals hanging around the park getting a bite to eat at Chamorro Village, watching the baseball games, fishing, or just getting together with friends.

Just when I was able to get some sleep the island of Guam got hit by a magnitude 6.7 earthquake at 7:51am this morning! According to the news reports the center of the earthquake was located 125 miles west-southwest of Hagatna and at a depth of 54.4 miles.

The earthquake was fairly strong as I’m pretty hard to wake up once I’m in a deep sleep. The earthquake lasted between 5-10 seconds from what I can remember and it shook everything in my room pretty hard. I was debating whether to run out into the street when it didn’t stop after a few seconds, but being the sleepy head that I am decided to lay in bed and just hope it stopped without getting much stronger.

The buildings on Guam are all made of reinforced concrete and are built to withstand a good beating due to the fact Guam is located in an area on the globe that receives many typhoons. Because of this, and the fact there aren’t many high-rise buildings on the island, there was no reported damage to any buildings. I’m pretty sure if an earthquake of this magnitude hit a major city in some other part of the world there would have been some damage created from the earthquake.

Here’s some links to news reports of the earthquake I found online:

http://www.kcra.com/weather/16219476/detail.html
http://www.bernama.com.my/bernama/v3/news.php?id=331956
http://www.guampdn.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080510/NEWS01/80510005/1002/NEWS01

I went to the northern most point on the island of Guam to a beach called Ritidian Beach this past week. The location of this beach was really out of the way from civilization, but the drive to the beach made for some spectacular views of Guam’s untouched northern coast during the last leg of the drive when I descended down from the cliffs to the coastline. I don’t think anyone lived in the surrounding area, and the only reason people would go there was to spend some time at the beach. While walking along the beach I noticed movement in the sand, and upon closer examination there were hundreds of hermit crabs like the one pictured below all along the beach. I’ve been told by the locals that there are huge crabs called coconut crabs on the island that can grow the size of car tires. I doubt I’ll ever get to see a coconut crab but I’ll keep my eyes open for one just in case!

While visiting a memorial park on the northern part of the island of Guam I got an exciting surprise when overhead I saw a strange flying craft in the sky. In the northern part of Guam there is a large Air Force Base, and the craft I saw was a B-2 Spirit Bomber owned by the US Air Force. The only reason I was able to spot the B-2 bomber was because it flew directly over the park at such a low altitude and it was such a clear day with almost no clouds in the sky. Once these bombers are way up in the sky and at a distance you can barely see them because the bomber is so thin. I guess the Air Force was doing training runs because the bomber actually passed overhead 3 times while I was at the park. Here are pictures of the B-2 bomber:

Umatac village and bay is located on the southwestern coast of Guam. Umatac Bay is considered the location where famous Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan first landed on Guam, and it was used as a stop for ships along the Spanish trade routes. The remnants of two Spanish forts on both sides of the bay still sit on top of the hills. The two forts were used as lookout points and were equipped with cannons which were used to protect the Spanish ships docked in Umatac Bay from other enemy ships trying to loot the cargo. Today the forts are a popular tourist attraction.

While exploring Umatac Bay this past week I had a chance to visit one of the forts and take some photos overlooking Umatac Bay. There are quite a few bays around the coast of southern Guam, but I have to say Umatac Bay is one of my favorites because of its scenic beauty and the number of historic sites around the area. Below are a few pictures I took while at Umatac Bay along with some descriptions that follow:

Left Image: A photo of Umatac Bay from one of the Spanish fort lookouts. You can also see the San Dionisio Church along the coast of the bay.
Right Image: A photo of the northern coast of Umatac Bay. The second Spanish fort is located on top of the rock/hill jutting out towards the ocean.

Left Image: Photo of San Dionisio Church which is the Catholic church for Umatac village.
Right Image: A photo of a cross in front of the San Dionisio Church with Umatac Bay in the background. In addition, if you look closely you can see the Spanish fort, known as Fort Nuestra Senora de la Soledad, on top of the hill in the background.

Left Image: A photo of the Spanish cannons at Fort Nuestra Senora de la Soledad which looks over Umatac Bay.
Right Image: Photo of Fort Neustra Senora de la Soledad overlooking Umatac Bay with the opposite coastline of the bay also visible.

Image Courtesy of Pacific Daily News

After spending some time at the beach today, I decided to take a break from sightseeing under the burning tropical sun to catch up on some much needed posts. I think my sun-burnt body will thank me for spending some time under a roof and out of harms way from all those UV rays. The amount of photos sitting on my hard drive waiting to be published on the blog is overwhelming and I’m going to try to get as much of them posted as I can today, but first here’s a current events story from Guam I came across while reading the paper today; something I think you’ll all enjoy (especially the male readers).

Well, after seven years of being on hiatus the Miss Guam Universe Pageant is returning to Guam this year. Fifteen of Guam’s most beautiful local ladies will start competing today for the title of Miss Guam. The winner of the Miss Guam Pageant will go on to compete in the Miss Universe Pageant and win a $5,000 cash prize, as well as some other perks. Go Miss Guam!

The heated Democratic Presidential race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama has been big news on the island of Guam the past few days. The close race has made the island of Guam the center of attention in Washington today as Guam Democrats vote in its presidential caucuses – an event which usually went unnoticed. History was actually made in Guam this year when Barack Obama’s campaign opened a Guam office in the village of Hagatna in early April. No other presidential candidate has ever made this type of commitment in the history of Guam. In addition to this, the radio and television stations on Guam have been consistently playing advertisements from both candidates over the last couple days. A few days ago Barack Obama even called in to one of the local radio stations as a guest which surprised a lot of people on the island.

I think it’s great that I’m on the island while such historic events are taking place on Guam. From what I have experienced, it seems like the Obama campaign spent a lot more money to win support in Guam. Pretty much every advertising channel on the island was touched by the Obama campaign. Obama had advertisements consistently running all over television and radio, pamphlets inserted into Guam’s major newspaper, and Internet ads plastered all over the biggest news website for the island, www.guampdn.com. The only advertisements I experienced from the Clinton campaign were television ads, and the frequency of the ads were very minimal. I think this was due to the fact that it has been mentioned the Clinton campaign is strapped on cash. I’m really interested to see who will win the votes from Guam’s superdelegates.

I’m not trying to turn this travel blog into a political one, but I think it was important to mention because this is such big news on Guam right now. The fact that both candidates are paying so much attention to Guam to win over votes from Guam’s super delegates shows just how close the Democratic race is for President.