Wednesday, December 23, 2009

THE STORY BEHIND NIGHT STAR

THE STORY BEHIND NIGHT STAR

An altered aromatic sensation based on an exact copy of the aroma of what we called “Rosa Maris”- the rose of the sea; inspired by foundings from German perfumer Adolphe Saalfeld’s bag of perfumes that had been found in the debris field of Titanic. A central theme of the composition is rose - The Rose Jacqueminot.
Scents of Time as a Company started when we originally contacted RMS Titanic in Atlanta after reading in January 2001 that a complete bag of perfumes had been found in the debris field of Titanic and that when the submersible placed the bag on the mother ship it literally smelled of roses! The bag’s story is as follows:
Adolphe Saalfeld originally hailed from near Leipzig in Germany, but settled near Manchester in England. A chemist by trade, he diversified into perfumery, and decided to seek his fortune in America, boarding RMS Titanic with his bag of samples. Adolphe travelled first class return ticket, numbered 19988 and costing thirty pounds and ten shillings for cabin C-106 aboard the White Star liner.
Here is a note from his diary:
I just had an hour’s roaming about on this wonderful boat. I liked my cabin very much – it’s just like a bed-sitting room and rather large. They are still busy to finish the last things on board.
And later, on departure from Queenstown (now Cobh) in Ireland:
Dear Wifey,
After a fair night’s rest and an excellent breakfast I am enjoying a promenade in glorious weather. The wind is fresh and the sea moderate, but on this big boat one hardly notices any movement. I write these lines just before we are getting into Queenstown so that you get them tomorrow morning. I shall not be able to write you again before getting to New York.
Fondest love to all

Adolphe

P S shall write to office on arrival and Eric will no doubt phone you at once
(When eventually auctioned many years later, the letter was seen to be postmarked “ Manchester 4.30 pm April 12, 1912”) Adolphe survived the sinking of Titanic, and was rescued by the Carpathia some hours later on Lifeboat number three. But his leather bag containing two wallets with over sixty phials of assorted fragrances and essential oils, went two and a half miles down to the Atlantic bottom:
The Captain and Officers of the Carpathia did all that was possible to make us comfortable and to those that were sick or injured, they gave their tenderest care. The icebergs were huge and the weather extremely rough on the voyage to New York.” Adolphe’s bag plunged to the ocean floor taking over ninety years to be re-discovered. RMS Titanic Inc. were salvaging in the debris field when the claw of the small submersible, which took four hours to gain the ocean floor, grabbed a leather bag to bring to the surface.
Here is the newspaper article of that event:
"April 17, 2001titanic-atsea
Dik Barton is a salvage expert working with RMS Titanic Inc. – the company that holds the rights to the ship’s wreckage. He and a diving crew were on a mission last summer to recover personal effects for an exhibition when they came across a small leather pouch. “We didn’t know what we discovered until we hit the surface,” says Barton. “But we knew this was special immediately when we took the pouch from the collection basket [of artifacts] and brought it to the laboratory on the ship. Ascent filled the entire lab with Edwardian perfume.” In a secret warehouse location near Detroit the bag of samples were examined and restored by a team from Eastern Michigan University, and Scents of Time were called in to take over the recovery process by sampling the phials. Many were intact as they were safely kept in aluminum tubes, and since the liquid inside acquired the pressure of the ocean water outside, had not exploded.'
Scents of Time brought this ocean treasure back home to the UK to examine with sophisticated apparatus – gas layer chromatographs and a mass spectrometer. A combination of the nose of an experienced perfumer and the “aroma print” thus captured allowed an exact copy of the aroma of what we called “Rosa Maris”- the rose of the sea., which was tempered a little for modern tastes without altering the aromatic sensation.
And there was something else of interest in the perfume formula. A central theme of the composition is rose. And it may be a particular rose. In 1906, six years before Titanic sailed, Francois Coty brought out a fragrance called La Rose Jacqueminot.
The Rose Jacqueminot was first grown in France in 1853, and has a strong rosaceous aroma. General Jacqueminot had been a revered veteran of the Napoleonic wars and the Rose was named in his honor.
bottles_from_titanicIt is known that as a newcomer to the industry Adolphe Saalfeld visited Grasse, European centre of the essential oil business, many times. He modeled some of his fragrances on the best sellers of the day, and La Rose Jacqueminot was one of them.
What makes this story of interest is that in the name of this particular rose we have the two lovers of the recent Titanicmovie – Rose and Jack! Saalfeld was also experimenting with the new chemistry of synthesis from the later 1880’s in using Vanillin, the key aroma ingredient of Vanilla.
Finally, in the form of its essential oil, Mayflower (Hawthorn) too had once again set sail for America. A perfume is composed of up to a few hundred aromas living peacefully together in their container. Any form of energy or chemistry - such as heat or light - and in particular oxygen - can affect the perfume dramatically, which is why Scents of Time always advise that fragrances are kept in the cold and in the dark.
What better proof do we have of this sage advice than those sixty phials of fragrance and oil which rested on the sea bed, in the cold and dark, for nearly one hundred years before being recovered and brought to the surface – most as intact aromatically as the day they were first created.
A description of that fateful night when Titanic sunk was given by passenger Lawrence Beesley: “The night was one of the most beautiful I have ever seen: the sky without a single cloud to mar the perfect brilliance of the stars…and in the place of the ship in which all our interest had been concentrated for so long…in place of Titanic, we had the level sea now stretching in an unbroken expanse to the horizon…with no indication on the surface that the waves had just closed over the most wonderful vessel ever built by man’s hand; the stars looked down just the same way and it was bitterly cold.”
As a research exercise this had been a magnificent achievement. But it stopped there. After all, Titanic’s disaster was less than a hundred years ago, fifteen hundred perished and the experience was still raw in some people’s memories.
We genuinely believed Adolphe would not have approved of a replica fragrance being marketed. Adolphe carried his bag onto RMS Titanic with a tag labeled “Wanted First Class – For baggage room”.
His treasures would travel with him in cabin C106. It is reported that Adolphe moved from Manchester to Twickenham on his return to England, in part to try and get away from the terrible memories of Titanic’s demise. But they never quite left him alone. He had his chauffeur drive him around London at night when he couldn’t sleep.Night_star_pic
And there was another probable detractor. From conversations with Elizabeth Dean I felt that she too would not have approved. Millvina (Elizabeth) Dean , the last survivor of that fateful night, died aged 97 on May 31st 2009 near Southampton , England. She was the liner’s youngest passenger just two months old at the time. Her family were third class passengers moving to Kansas. She and her mother and brother survived. Her father did not.
And so the brief was radically changed. Chris Sheldrake, sorcerer’s apprentice to Serge Lutens and now working for Chanel was asked to create a fragrance of the future- NIGHT STAR. For steam ship read star ship. For latitude and longitude read galactic coordinates. And Night Star, a symbol of future hope, would be dedicated to Millvina, who, along with Adolphe, has now joined the night stars above.
There is apparently a planet – the third from its own star, just under twenty one light years away. The planet exists in what NASA term the “goldilocks “ zone. Not too hot, not too cold. it is likely to have water and to support life. What kind of flowers would it have? They would not be green, as the radiation from this star is different from our own sun. And so photosynthesis would not make chlorophyll. What would the perfume of ASTEROSE smell like? It would be composed of the elements of the periodic table, which exist throughout the Universe- Hydrogen, Oxygen, Nitrogen and Carbon. The brief on NIGHT STAR was to create a fantasy fragrance based on earthlike aromas which would be both alien in make up, and yet have a comfortable, earthly feel, reflecting Gliese 581d’s potential as our new home.
THE PERFUME NAME
What’s in a name? That which we call a rose. By any other name would smell as sweet. - William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (II,ii)
NIGHT STAR - From the star Gliese, and its planet Gliese 581d - a possible new location for humankind.

THE STORY BEHIND NENÚFAR

THE STORY BEHIND NENÚFAR
Take to thee Lotus flowers and plants and Lotus buds when they recur as every bloom and every herb of sweet odor at its season; cool water and incense, joints and offering requirement in full tale, that thy Ka may be satisfied with them for ever and ever.” Tomb of Aahmose; Pharaonic Egypt
THE NAME OF THE FRAGRANCE
Nenufares are aquatic plants, one family of which is the Nymphaeaceae, and one member within it is the Blue water lily, Nymphaea caerulea which is the basis for the fragrance.
COLOUR
Light blue reflects the fact that the Blue Lotus is an aqueous water lily.
THE BLUE LOTUS FLOWER
Water lilies are considered sacred plants by many of the world’s great religions. The basis of this is that whilst the plants have their roots in the dirt and mud, their blooms rise to the surface, in the same way that a spiritual being can overcome adversity and rise to the heavens.
nenufar_lotus“In the beginning were the waters of chaos ... Darkness covered the waters until...the Primeval Water Lily rose from the abyss. Slowly the blue water lily opened its petals to reveal a young god (Nefertem) sitting in its golden heart. A sweet perfume drifted across the waters and light streamed from the body of this Divine Child to banish universal darkness. This child was the Creator, the Sun God, the source of all life.
So the Primeval Water Lily closed its petals at the end of each day...Chaos reigned through the night until the god within the water lily returned... the Creator ... knew that he was alone. This solitude became unbearable and he longed for other beings to share the new world with him. The thoughts of the Creator became the gods and everything else, which exists.
When his thoughts had shaped them, his tongue gave them life by naming them. Thoughts and words were the power behind creation.” The Waters of Chaos

HOW NENÚFAR WAS REDISCOVERED AND RE-CREATED
The Ancient Egyptians were famed for their ability to produce some of the world’s finest fragrances. Some of the most precious natural raw materials were reserved for the Pharaohs, their court and their descendants, as they were seen as Gods’ representatives on Earth.
The Gods were believed to smell fragrant and the elite wished to emulate them. One of the most revered and precious flowers was the Blue Lotus. Rare even today in Egypt, clues as to the use of this fragrant bloom, and its obvious effect on humans, were found in pictographs on Egyptian temples and sacred sites, where animals, Gods and artisans were depicted smelling Blue Lotus.
The perfume of the Blue Lotus was believed to be a “giver of life” and linked to eternal life. Thus it was that vessels made to hold its sacred essence in potions were decorated with the Crux Ansata, or Cross of Life as well as Lotus blossoms. These were the first clues, which led us to explore the marvelous aroma of the Blue Lotus.
The Blue Lotus is one of the most common flowers depicted on temple and tomb walls. It is found adorning heads, hands and necks forming garlands, and leopardheadbands used in rituals. These images suggest that the flower had a hallucinogenic effect on its users.
But whilst the aroma of this bloom is in itself glorious, it was not this, which literally “turned on its users.” So where did the physiological effect come from?
Another clue came from Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem “The Lotos-Eaters” which was based on one of Ulysses’ adventures from his ten-year journey home after the siege of Troy. After landing on the island of Lotus eaters, believed to have been near Egypt, the effect of eating lotus blooms is described below:
How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream, With half shut eyes ever to seem Falling asleep in a half dream! To dream and dream, like yonder amber light, Which will not leave the myrrh –bush on the height; To hear each other’s whisper’d speech; Eating the Lotos day by day….”
Research in Mexico showed a similar use of the Nymphaeaceae for ritual and possibly recreational consumption, whilst other Egyptian drawings show some kind of concentrates being added to wine. One particular scene shows the Pharaoh offering the Blue Lotus to his God, making the following observations about the flower’s effect:
“When you look at its brilliance your eyes become dazzled and alive. When you breathe its scent your nostrils dilate with its potency.”
This gives a strong indication that the Blue Lotus has a psychedelic effect. Another set of clues to the use and effect of this flower came from some research filmed in a documentary called “Secrets of the Pharaohs – Unwrapping the Mummy” which was made with the help of Manchester University, UK.
nenufarWhen the 3000-year-old Mummy of Asru, a high-born temple chantress was forensically examined, it was clear that she had ingested the Blue Lotus flower. Further scientific examination demonstrated that the flower contained bioflavonoids in quantity, which exceeded that of Gingko Biloba, used today primarily to help improve blood flow to the brain and other extremities – a natural Viagra! It is also very good for increasing oxygen levels to the brain and thus enhancing memory and thought.
Since Asru was in her fifties, suffering a number of ailments attributed to old age, and in a role, which necessitated giving sexual favors, it would seem that the Blue Lotus, taken by Asru over the long term, would have enhanced the singer’s sexual vigour and her general health.
So whilst the aroma was entrancing, it was actually the flower petals and calyx, steeped in a wine diffusion, which had life-enhancing properties and the chemistry of the flower became even more fascinating on further investigation.
There are three very interesting phyto-sterols in the Blue Lotus. These are chemicals, which are biologically active, meaning that they can have an effect on living beings.
The chemicals were Myristicin, Quercetin and Kaempferol. These flavonoids are also found in tomatoes and tomato paste, and we should recall that the humble tomato was once referred to as “the love apple”
Myristicin is a known hallucinogen, also contained in nutmeg. The NENÚFAR three phyto- sterols, or flavonoids, often help give a plant its color or taste, but can also promote other effects.
These interesting substances were found in the Blue Lotus samples of Stapeley Water Gardens when I visited with the Givaudan perfumer Montserrat Moline. We smelled and recreated the aroma of the Blue Lotus in the summer of 2003 with the help of my head-spaced “aroma print" of the flower. The chemistry proved to be the same as that of thousand-year old samples held at Kew Gardens.
And when the aroma chemistry of the Blue Lotus was put together again, it contained myristicin, in the scent of the humble spice Nutmeg. Several millennia later and you can imagine how the likes of an eighteen-year-old Cleopatra enthralled the most powerful men at the time, not least Julius Caesar and Mark Anthony. Never underestimate the intoxicating power of the Blue Lotus...

THE STORY BEHIND PYXIS

THE STORY BEHIND PYXIS
THE NAME OF THE FRAGRANCE

In the House of the Vetti at Pompeii there are a number of frescos depicting various industries with young cupids (also called erotes or cherubims) at work. One of the frescos clearly demonstrates the art of making perfume, depicting a pose of a woman testing the fragrance on completion. That was the perfume we wished to recreate, and in its honor we named it Pyxis, recalling the little Pixies (or Piskys) which made the original, and gave the inspiration to perfumer Sperato. The “Py” suffix also means fire (as in pyromancer, or pyrotechnics...) and is appropriate for a fragrance born again from a fiery volcanic burial.
COLOUR
Terracotta red reflects the tiling of roman villas, and the lava flow of Vesuvius.
HOW PYXIS WAS REDISCOVERED AND RE-CREATED


pompeii_visuviEveryone knows the story of Pompeii and Herculaneum. How these two Roman towns were destroyed and buried by pyroclastic flows and surges from an eruption of Vesuvius in 79A.D. It cannot be better described than through the observation of Pliny the younger below:Postcard_Pyx
"A cloud, from which mountain was uncertain at this distance, was ascending, the form of which I cannot give you a more exact description of than by likening it to that of a pine tree, for it shot up to a great height in the form of a very tall trunk, which spread itself out at the top into a sort of branches; occasioned, I imagine, either by a sudden gust of air that impelled it, the force of which decreased as it advanced upwards, or the cloud itself being pressed back again by its own weight, expanded in the manner I have mentioned; it appeared sometimes bright and sometimes dark and spotted, according as it was either more or less impregnated with earth and cinders. This phenomenon seemed to a man of such learning and research as my uncle extraordinary, and worth further looking into."
"He ordered a light vessel to be got ready, and gave me leave, if I liked, to accompany him. I said I would rather go on with my work; and it so happened he had himself given me something to write about."
It was in September 2003 that we first read an article describing the discovery of a preserved perfumer’s house in Pompeii. We set off for the ruins where the Soprintenza Archeologica di Pompeii granted us permission to explore the house of unguentari Sperato (that was what they believed his name to have been) near the Norcera gate of Pompeii.
Sperato’s public motto was “In Herbis Salus, in Lequem Vita!” which meant “Health in herbs, life in Propolis!” (a wax-like resinous substance collected by honey bees from tree buds or other botanical sources, and said to be a health giving food).
At this time Pompeii was both a loving and lustful city, there were over forty Lupanare – brothels – in the vicinity. The poetry of Gaius Valerius Catullus from a couple of centuries earlier, describes an appreciation of perfume, often linked to Aphrodite goddess of love.
pyxis"You will dine well, dear Fabullus, at my place In a few days, if the Gods are kind to you, If you bring along with you a dinner large, and splendid, and yes, a charming girl as well, and wine and wit and every kind of laughter. If, as I say, you bring along these things, sweet friend, you will dine well. For your Catallus’ wallet Is full of dust and cobwebs. But in return you will receive the purest essence of love or something still more fragrant and more graceful, for I’ll provide a perfume which was given to my girl by the Venuses and Cupids."
And further….
“But I shall return your favour with the sweetest of refinements. In fact, I shall give you a perfume conferred on my sweetheart by love and desire, and when you smell it, O my Fabullus, you will pray to the Gods to make you all nose!”

Sperato spent his life formulating scented products to both invoke and provoke love. He took the earlier work of the Greek poetess Sappho as the leitmotif, or recurring theme, of his creations.
  • “Now shakes my soul a wind on the mountains Overwhelming the oaks”
  • That wind on the mountains was the force of love.
  • “Once again Love drives me on, that loosener of limbs, bittersweet creature against which nothing can be done.”Aphrodite_Anadyomene_from_Pompeii
The perfume of Sperato was clearly one of a number of formidable love potions. Pyxis builds on the findings of Antica Erboristeria along with my own conjectures based on the burnt seeds and spores of herbs, plants and flowers found in Sperato’s garden, as well as the remnants of materials found in his storerooms- all the aromatic gatherings of Empire. Givaudan perfumer Mike Evans composed, appropriately enough, a perfume called a Chypre.
Taken from the French name for Cyprus, a Chypre by definition is an accord of a number of aroma materials, consisting of citrus (normally bergamot) a floral combination, oakmoss and labdanum.
We had come full circle to the Island of the Goddess of Love Aphrodite in producing Pyxis for your delight. A true “shaker of limbs.” It is only fitting that Pliny should have the last word in this story with a description of the fertile volcanic soil of Campania, the rich source from whence sprung Pyxis.
“It is certainly the case that a soil which has a taste of perfumes will be the best soil….after a shower the earth sends out that divine breath of hers, of quite incomparable sweetness, which she has conceived from the sun. This is the odour which ought to be emitted when the earth is turned up, and the scent of the soil will be the best criterion of its quality”.

THE STORY BEHIND ANKH

THE STORY BEHIND ANKH

THE NAME OF THE FRAGRANCE
The Ankh symbol was the Egyptian hieroglyphic character that stood for “life”. The gods of Egypt were often portrayed carrying it by its loop, or bearing one in each hand, arms crossed over their chest. Its other names include the Egyptian Cross, the key of life, or “handled cross” from the Latin crux ansata.
Ankh is based on the known formula of Kyphi, the thrice-burnt incense of Egypt. It was fired at dawn to welcome the sun God Amen, at midday to mark its highest point and at eventide to remind the sun god to return.
In ancient times perfumes and incense, which energised people, were known as “givers of life”. So it is appropriate that this fine fragrance based on the best of Egyptian formulae and found on the walls of the appropriately named Laboratory Room located in the Temple’s Great Hall at Edfu (between Aswan and Luxor), should be named Ankh.
The Greek historian Plutarch mentions in one of his books that Egyptian priests burned incense three times a day; Frankincense at dawn, myrrh at mid-day, and Kyphi at dusk. Others claim that Kyphi was the only incense sacred to the sun.”
COLOUR
The Golden colour of the pack reflects the treasure mask of Tutankhamen.
tutmask2“The incense comes, the incense comes, the scent is over thee, the scent of the eye of Horus is over thee, the perfume of the goddess Nekbet. Which comes forth from the town of Nekheb It cleanses thee, it adorns thee, It makes its place upon thy two hands. Hail to thee oh incense! Take to thyself the eye of Horus. Its perfume is over thee”
All life is grass, and the sun is the giver of life to our planet. It seems appropriate therefore that this fragrance, based as it is on the plant life of Earth, bears Ankh as its name.
HOW ANKH WAS REDISCOVERED AND RE-CREATED
The death of the young king Tutankhamen has always remained a mystery, and conspiracy theories abound. These were further compounded by what happened to his widow, who wrote to the Hittite King Suppiluliuma for help after Tutankhamen’s early demise;
tutfinalI am Ankesenamen, wife of Tutankhamen. Pharaoh of Egypt, which you call the land of Misra. My husband is dead and I have no son. People tell me that you have many sons. If you send me one of your sons he will become my husband, for it is repugnant to me to take one of my servants as my husband. Please respond with haste, as time is of the essence. It is two moons to my husband’s entombment. I am very much afraid
And after some time…
I am Ankesenamen, wife of Tutankhamen. Why do you say “They are deceiving me?” If I had a son would I write to a foreigner to publish my distress and that of my country? You have insulted me by speaking thus. My husband is dead and being readied for burial. I have no son. I will never take one of my subjects and marry him. I have written to no one but you. Everyone says you have many sons; give me one of them that he may become my husband.”
The prince – son whom Suppiluliuma eventually sent was murdered at the frontier and Ankesenamen was seemingly forced to marry Ay, a high official of the Egyptian court.
On November 1, 1922, archaeologist Howard Carter’s team began digging for his final season in the Valley of the Kings and three days later unearthed the staircase to Tutankhamen’s tomb. After excavation down to the plaster blocks of the tomb, at four in the afternoon on November 26, 1922, Howard Carter broke through and saw “wondrous things.”
The treasure of Tutankhamen had been discovered after centuries, but some of the boy-king’s most precious treasures had already been taken. Here are Carter’s own words from his diary: “The oils and unctuous materials were stored in thirty-four alabaster (calcite) vessels and one of serpentine, which are remarkable for their diversified shapes and sizes. The ten alabaster jars of similar kind found lying on the floor in the antechamber, emptied and abandoned, in all probability came from this hoard in the annexe. With rare exception the lids and stoppers of all these vessels had been forcibly removed, thrown aside, and their contents poured out and stolen, leaving but a small amount of residue in each vessel. On the inner walls of some of the vessels that contained viscous substances, the finger marks of the predatory hand that scooped out the precious material are as clear today as when the theft was perpetrated…….
……..when the metal robbers made their first incursion, it is evident that they crept under the Theuris-couch in the Antechamber, forced their way through the sealed doorway of the annexe, ransacked its entire contents for portable metal objects, and were, no doubt, responsible for a great deal of the disorder found in that chamber.
Subsequently – it is impossible to say when – a second robbery took place. The objective in this case was the costly oils and unguents contained in the alabaster jars. This last robbery had been carefully thought out. The stone vessels being far too heavy and cumbersome to carry away bodily, the thieves came provided with more convenient receptacles, such as leather bags or water skins, to take away the spoil. There was not a stopper of a jar that had not been removed, nor a jar that had not been emptied. On the interior walls of some of the vessels that contained viscous ointments, the fingermarks of the thieves are visible today.”
But in their hurry to melt into the night with their hoard, thieves dropped some of the incense and unguents, where they were duly found and catalogued by Carter 32 (t) Four incense balls. These were about 2.2 in diameter. Probably made of a paste of gum resin. Burns freely with smoky flame and gives out pleasant aromatic odour. Yellowish in colour.
Analysis
A few tiny fragments from a broken ball were tested in the preliminary way that alone was possible with such a small amount of material. The material was of a yellowish-brown colour, brittle, slightly resinous-looking, burned with a smoky flame and gave out a pleasant aromatic odour. Solubility in alcohol = 83% approx. and in water after alcohol 21% approx. It was therefore a gum-resin and hence could not be either Labdanum or Storax; from the colour it was probably not myrrh and altogether was suggestive of frankincense.
The incense balls from over three thousand years ago are now in the Egyptian museum in Cairo, and their formulae form the basis of the male scent Ankh.

THE STORY BEHIND MAYA

THE STORY BEHIND MAYA
The word Chocolate has an Aztec derivation, and indeed when Emperor Montezuma wanted the sixteenth century equivalent of a slush ice he sent runners to the volcanic mountain-top of Popacatapetl, near the Aztec capital city Tenochtitlan, to collect snow. This was sprinkled liberally with cocoa and vanilla to create a cooling tasty treat fit for a King. ‘Xocolatl’ - a bitter frothy drink made with chocolate, was also beloved by the Aztec ruler. Most of the world’s cocoa, from which chocolate is derived, is grown in a narrow belt 10 degrees either side of the Equator, and includes now, as well as South America,West Africa Malaysia and Indonesia.
The Mayas too revered chocolate aroma, and chocolate’s Latin name “Theobroma”, means “God food.” Vanilla is a well-loved aroma the world over, and one of the theories for its ready appreciation by all is that it has a smell reminiscent of mother’s breast milk. The main plant species harvested for vanillin is Vanilla planifolia. Although it was originally only native to Mexico, it is now widely grown throughout the tropics, with the world’s largest producer being the island of Madagascar
Thus Maya is a fitting tribute to both the deities and the wearer. If you’re seeking a mate, wearing Maya will find plenty of men willing to sacrifice themselves on your altar of love. But if you’re simply wanting to make a statement, then Maya puts the ancient Gods firmly on your side.
THE NAME OF THE FRAGRANCE
Maya takes its name from the central and North American peoples who inhabited present day Mexico and Guatemala. So far our search for aromas lost in time has centered on the ancient Post_card_Mayaworld around the Mediterranean. Here we offer a New World scent. December 21, 2012 is a date of special significance to the Maya, who were obsessed with time. It is the time of winter solstice, when the Northern Hemisphere is furthest from the sun. But it is also a time, which happens only every few thousand years. And the last time it occurred civilization was in its infancy. It is at midnight on that date when the solar system will eclipse the view of the centre of our galaxy the Milky Way- from Earth. To the Maya time will either end or begin on that pivotal date. And thus we offer the fragrance of the Maya in sacrifice, such that it will not be the end of days for humankind. Let its fragrance, rising to the heavens, please all our Gods.
COLOUR
Green denotes the verdant Mayan jungles of the Mexico and Guatemala after rainfall.
THE BOTTLE DESIGN
Is a typical Mayan fresco picture from Northern and Central America.
MAYA’S TALE
Dark were the days of the Maya's conquest before the armed might of Spain in the sixteenth century. And a greater dark fell on their memory, as books and sacred texts were burned by the Church, that pagan practice be erased from the earth. But some texts remain in hidden places, and can again be brought to the light of day, such as this nobleman's letter to the Spanish court describing an ancient practice:
mayafinalThe lords and principal personages of the land had the custom, after sixty days of abstinence and fasting, of arriving at daybreak at the mouth of the Cenote, and throwing into it Indian women belonging to each of these lords and personages, at the same time telling these women to ask for their masters a year favorable to their particular needs or desires.
The women, being thrown in unbound, fell into the water with great force and noise. At high noon those that could cry out loudly and rope were let down to them. After the women came up, half dead, fires were built around them and copal incense was burned before them.
When they recovered their senses, they said that below there were many people of their nation, men and women, and that they received them. When their heads were inclined downwards beneath the water they seemed to see many deeps and hollows, and they, the people, responded to their queries concerning the good or the bad year that was in store for their masters”. Don Diego Sarmiento de Figuero - Letter to King Charles V of Spain: 1579
And this epistle from a churchman to his masters in Europe: “From the court in front of these theatres runs a wide and handsome roadway as far off as the Well, which is about two stone throws off. Into this well the Mayas were and still are accustomed to throw men alive as a sacrifice to the gods in times of drought; they held that they did not die, even though they were not seen again. They also threw in many other offerings of precious stones and things they valued greatly; so if there were gold in this country, this well would have received most of it, so devout were the Indians in this.
This well is seven long fathoms deep to the surface of the water, more than a hundred feet wide, round, of natural rock marvelously smooth down to the water... At the top near the mouth, is a small building where I found idols made in honor of all the principal buildings in the land, like the Pantheon in Rome... I found sculptured lions, vases and other things so that I do not understand how anyone can say that these people had no tools”. Writings of Bishop Diego de Landa from “Chichén-Itzá: The City of the Wise Men of the Water by Roman Chan”
Back in the late nineteenth century when the American Edward Thompson read these accounts, he wondered if there was any truth to the stories, and set out to prove their veracity or otherwise. Journeying on horseback he was guided to the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza. This flowery account of his visits is by his friend, T.E Willard, detailed in a turn of twentieth century book, “The City of the Sacred Well” about the city of the Itzas, where the sacred cenote is situated.
For days I had been travelling, first by train, then by volan- that satanic contrivance which leaves one bruised from head to foot- and finally in the saddle, dozing over the head of a somnolent horse.
Even the witchery of the moonlight could not long hold alert my fatigued body and mind. On and on we plodded, hour after hour. Midnight passed and how many hours I do not know, when I heard an exclamation in the vernacular from my guide. Startled out of my half- conscious dream, I became erect in the saddle.
My Indian was earnestly pointing up ahead. I raised my eyes and became electrically, tinglingly awake. There, high up, wraith- like in the waning moonlight, loomed what seemed to be a Grecian temple of colossal proportions atop a steep hill. So massive did it seem in the half-light of the approaching morning that I could think of it only as some impregnable fortress high above the sea, on some rock, wave- dashed promontory. As this mass took clearer shape before me and with each succeeding hoof- beat of my weary steed, it grew more and more huge. I felt an actual physical pain, as if my heart had slipped a few beats and then raced to make up the loss....” From an initial foray in the City overgrown with foliage, Thompson homed in on the well of sacrifice.
... “And then my eyes were caught and held by a broad raised roadway leading straight away from the temple towards a vast black pool overgrown with trees. Breathless, frozen to the spot, I could only look and look, for in a blinding flash I realized that I was gazing at the Sacred Way, and at the end the Sacred Well in whose murky depths even then might lie the pitiful bones of many once lovely maidens sacrificed to appease a grim god. What untold treasures this grisly well might hide! What tragedies had been enacted at its brink!
I descended and as I walked along the Sacred Way I thought of the thousands, millions of times perhaps, of times this worn thoroughfare had been trodden in bygone ages where all was now desolate. Here was I, a grain of dust moving where kings and nobles of countless centuries before had trod and where, for all I know, kings and nobles may again tread long years after I am still a grain of dust but moveless.
At the brink of the well I peered into the blackness and continued to gaze into its depths, picturing in my mind's eye the awesome ceremonies it had witnessed. The chant of death begins, swelling softly over the slow pulsing of the drums. The solemn procession leaves the holy temple of Kukul Can and the funeral cortege advances along the broad raised avenue of the Sacred Way, towards the Sacred Well, the dwelling place of Noh och Yum Chac, the terrible rain god who must be placated by human sacrifice. The corn in the fields is withering- crying for rain. If the anger of Yum Chac be not appeased, famine will follow and the dread Lord of Death, Ah Puch he of the grinning sightless skull, will walk abroad in the land. Slowly, slowly the cortege draws near.
At its head is the high priest, clad in ceremonial vestments and elaborate feathered headdress as befits the pontiff of the feathered serpent. And what is this embroidered bower borne so reverently by sturdy, sun -browned lesser priests? Is it a bier, a stately catafalque? Is the pitiful victim already dead? Ah, no! she moves… beautiful, flawless- the most lovely maiden to be found in the land. Through every city and village and the country side, for weeks and weeks, a thousand priests have sought her, the fairest flower of Maya maidenhead, Her face is pale. She knows the supreme honor that is hers, she who is to become so soon the bride of the Rain God.
But there is a terror in those lovely eyes, a benumbing, cold fear of the Unknown. And behind them filling the whole of the Sacred Way, come the king, the nobles, the great warriors, and many priests. Already on the far side of the sacred Well is gathered a silent, grave faced multitude, the whole populace of the city and pilgrims from afar.
The high priest enters the little temple at the brink of the well. The dirge ceases, the drums are stilled. He performs his devotions to the Rain God. He lights the maya_templesacred incense burners and the fragrant blue vapor floats, curling upwards. Again the slowly chanted dirge starts, to the muted beating of the drums. He lights a basket of sweet-smelling copal incense, holds it aloft, and casts it into the well.
The chant grows louder, the drums beat faster. It is believed that the young maidens were drugged at a well-side temple by concoctions using the narcotic effect of tropical flowers and sensual perfumes, of which both vanilla and chocolate formed a part, as well as the smoking incense of burning copal resin, sacred Mayan “Pom”. This aroma was their first sense of eternity and led them more willingly to sacrifice.
Two powerful nacons, or lesser priests, lift the maiden from her couch, their muscular brown arms forming a sling in which she lies as lightly as a leaf on the bosom of a stream. They advance with her to the edge of the well. The pitiless sun glares down on her upturned, fear stricken eyes and she throws one slender arm over her face.
Her gauzy garments reveal the tender flesh and adolescent contours of a girl in her early teens. Slowly the nacons swing the feather-like body backward and forward in an ever-wider sweep, while the drums and chant swell to a roar. At a sign from the priest the drums are suddenly stilled: the chant ends in a high-pitched wail. A last forward swing and the bride of Yum Chac hurtles far out over the well. Turning slowly in the air, the lithesome body falls faster and faster till it strikes the dark water seventy feet below. An echoing splash and all is still. Only the widening ripples are left. The child bride has found favor in the eyes of her Lord, the great God Noh-och Yum Chac.”
Let Chac Xib Chac, the Red Man of the East be satisfied with our courageous warrior.
Let Sax Xib Chac, White Man of the North, be pleased with our maidens. Let Ex Xib Chac, Black Man of the West, be happy with our gold.
Let Kan Xib Chac, Yellow Man of the South, be content with our songs and prayer.
Let the four gods in one smell our copal offerings and in return give bountiful rain for our harvest and replenishment of our cenotes.
We give life to receive life. We offer bounty to receive bounty. But we are mere mortals, and our gifts are returned by the Gods magnified.
Let Ik, god of clouds, bear Chac's gift of water to our city. So mote it be.”
In more measured tones Thompson relates from his own book, “People of the Serpent” (Puttnam 1933) as follows:
maya-palenque“For days and weeks after I purchased the plantation, I was a frequent worshipper at the little shrine on the brink of the Sacred Well. I pondered, mused and calculated. I made measurements and numberless soundings, until, not satisfied but patiently expectant, I put my notebook aside and awaited the accepted time. It came when I was called to a scientific conference. After the session was over, at an informal gathering, I told of the tradition concerning the Sacred Well of Chichen Itza, of my belief in its authenticity, and the methods by which I proposed to prove it.
My statements brought forth a storm of protests from my friends. “No person,” they said “ can go down into the unknown depths of that great water pit and expect to come out alive. If you want to commit suicide, why not seek a less shocking way of doing it?”
But I had weighed up my chances and made up my mind.” Returning to Boston, Thompson ordered dredging equipment and in his enthusiasm took diving lessons for a couple of months from Captain Ephriam Nickerson, an old salt from Long Wharf.
Continuing with extracts from his book:
“Under this expert and patient teaching I became a fairly good diver, but by no means a perfect one, as I was to learn some time later. My next move was to adapt to my purpose an orange peel bucket dredge with a winch, tackles and ropes of a stiff -legged derrick and a thirty- foot swinging boom...”
Thompson had also been introduced to a Greek diver, Nicolas, from the Bahamas. He enlisted the man's talents, along with another Greek helper, and two weeks later they had rigged up outfits of waterproof canvas with 30-pound copper helmets and plate glass goggles and air valves.
The Greeks were invited to join Thompson back in the Yucatan in two month's time. His next move, having brought the heavy equipment through jungle, was to locate the spot at which the chosen ones were thrown, if Don Diego's letter was true. For this was no water hole in the wishing well sense of the word, but a vast hole some one hundred and sixty feet in diameter. He worked at the junction of the cenote with the paved causeway from the temple, assuming a procession would form part of the sacrifice. There was also a small platform near the presumed ruins of the cleansing and intoxication building.
I established what I called the “fertile “ zone by throwing in wooden logs shaped like human beings and having the weight of the average native. By measuring the rope after these manikinsancient-maya-3 were hauled ashore. I learned the extreme distance to which sacrificial victims could have been thrown. In this way I fixed the spot where the human remains would probably be found”.
...“Several times we brought up the skeletons of deer or of wild dogs, and once the tangled skeletons of a jaguar and a cow, mute evidence of a long-past forest tragedy…Then, for along while finds even as interesting as these ceased. Absolutely nothing was brought up but mud and leaves, with an occasional stone. My high hopes dwindled and became less than nothing, The work was interminable, nauseating…”
“…The bucket slowly emerged from the heaving water that boiled around it, and, as I looked listlessly down into it, I saw two yellow-white globular masses lying on the surface of the chocolate-colored muck that filled the basin. As the mass swung over the brink and up the platform, I took from it two objects and closely examined them. They were hard, formed evidently by human hands from some substance unknown to me. They resembled somewhat the balls of “bog butter” from the lacustrine deposits of Switzerland and Austria.
There, ancient dwellings were built on piles in the midst of the lake to protect them against raiding parties. The crocks of butter were suspended by cords let down between the piles and immersed in ice-cold water for preservation. Despite all their precaution, raids did occur and the dwellings were destroyed by casual fires as well as by raids: so the crocks of butter fell unobserved from the charred piles down through the icy waters to rest unheeded in the increasing deposit until ages of time changed them into the almost fossilized material known to archaeologists as ”bog butter.”
Month after month the dredge brought up hundreds of copal balls. Whilst it had a tendency to drop half its load back into the cenote, a veritable treasure was brought to the surface. Axe heads, vases, incense burners, chisels, copper discs, rubber snakes and golden bells figured among the finds.
But these two nodules could not be bog butter, for unless the known data are strangely wrong, the ancient Mayas kept no domestic animals of any kind, much less cows or goats. They seemed to be made of some resinous substance. I tasted one. It was resin. I put a piece into a mass of lighted embers and immediately a wonderful fragrance permeated the atmosphere. Like a ray of bright sunlight breaking through a dense fog came to me the words of the old H'men, the wise men of Ebtun:
In ancient times our fathers burned the sacred resin- pom- and by the fragrant smoke their prayers were wafted to their God whose home was in the Sun.”
Thompson also went down the narrow shaft created by the dredge, some seventy feet to the rock bottom of the cenote. Feeling around in the dark he brought back by the basket more ghastly souvenirs.
The skeletal remains of young men and women. The Spanish legend was indeed true! At the end of his book, some three years before he died, Thompson wrote.
“In place of the rough bridle-paths by which I first travelled to ruined groups such as Chichen with horse and pack mule, there now run modern highways with speeding motor cars. The specialist backed by unlimited resources has stepped in to complete the work in which I was one of the pioneers. The task of reconstructing the story of the marvelous lost civilization of the Mayas is proceeding towards its accomplishment the faster because of these things and in that fact I find a mighty satisfaction. I am proud to hope that the labors of my lifetime may have contributed something to this end.”

Monday, December 14, 2009

Sanchez South Creek

It started out looking like bad weather this weekend for getting out into the woods, but Sunday turned warm and was essentially rainless. Brack and I took advantage of the weather window and headed to San Felasco Hammock State Park to continue exploring the SW part of the hiking-only section. We parked at the trailhead on Millhopper Road and headed mostly northward through the low and mesic hammocks mentioned last weekend, intending to explore a 10-acre karst depression to the immediate north. I was expecting the depression to have comparably interesting karst geology and flora as the lowlands did last weekend, but if not then the plan was to head off to the NE to a short valley that runs almost due north to discharge into Sanchez Prairie. And the latter is exactly what we did, taking the easy way back (hiking trails) back to cover a total of almost 9 miles.

As mentioned in my last post, this tract is part of the transition zone between the impermeable highlands and karstic lower elevations. Sinkholes here are constantly opening up and plugging shut. Take the “Dumbbell Sinks” example from last weekend where a stream and groundwater seepage originally drained into a pair of sinkholes. The west sink then became plugged with clayey sediments, causing the sink’s water level to rise and overflow into the east sink. A small sudden-collapse sink adjacent to the west sink more recently opened up and now takes surface flow from the west sink, and is eroding a channel that is small now but will surely grow wider over time.


A little further to the north is a medium-sized sinkhole with a very fresh mini-collapse-sink at its south end. Clods of dirt are still falling into the new little pit.


We encountered another, small sinkhole about 10ft deep with sides almost vertical, way too slick and steep to climb in and out of without aid, and too dark under a closed laurel oak canopy to be photographed. This sink looks like it collapsed opened within the last several years.

A very interesting part of the trip for me was seeing the above-mentioned short valley that enters Sanchez Prairie from the south. This valley is totally absent on the USGS topo and derivatives, including my Garmin GPS topo, but is depicted clearly on the Alachua County Fernandez Grant 2-ft topography. I call it Sanchez South Creek. We encountered it about midway along its mapped length and walked along it and a little ways out into Sanchez Prairie, following its incredibly sinuous stream.


The photo does not do service to two things about the creek. First, it gives only a hint of one section after another of parallel, 30ft long sections of stream oriented perpendicular to the direction of valley flow. I guess that the ratio of perpendicular flow to parallel (to valley flow) is almost 2:1. The second thing the photo does not show is the damage by feral pigs. They have torn up literally every square inch of this streambed such that not a single plant can be found in the bed. How many species of plants are now rare here, or no longer occur here at all because of pigs? And what about the small animals that lived here, like crayfish and salamanders? Mostly eaten, by pigs.

It is truly disheartening to see nearly every square foot of San Felasco’s streams, sinkhole bottoms, wetland edges, currently-dry wetland floors and mesic karst valley bottoms thoroughly plowed up by pigs. Pigs are bad enough in so many wild places in Florida, but the situation may be worse in Florida state parks because pig hunting is not allowed and FDEP does not have an effective feral pig control program of its own. You and I, and the state’s biodiversity, suffer as a result. “I sho’ got to git me a remedy” (Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings).

In another place on the day’s trail, we both were struck by this life-laden log:


It supports turkey tail fungus, green-fly orchid, resurrection fern, moss and myriad invertebrates that woodpeckers dine on. And you know why it is covered with plants and fungi? Because feral pigs can’t reach it!!!

Geology isn’t the only thing changing in San Felasco. Check out this huge live oak. It is a former Florida Champion Tree, more than 9ft in diameter, but its end might be near. You can see two limbs have died and fallen off it, including one that may have supported a quarter or a third of the tree’s leaves. Bob S showed it to me in the late 1970s or early 80s, and that big limb was alive then.


During these San Felasco explorations, I am obtaining waypoint locations for all the sinkholes encountered, and am up to almost 80 in number. I hope to eventually get enough of these sinks mapped that the patterns of lineaments and karst features begin to form a bigger picture of San Felasco’s hidden hydrology.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

You’ve Decided to Publish. Now What?

Twelve Months--Violeta Dabija

The biggest moment in my writing career came with the realization that I wanted to be published by a traditional publisher.

Once you realize that you really want to take that step…what do you do next?

It’s my day to blog on A Good Blog is Hard to Find. Hope you’ll pop over for some tips to help with your journey to publication.

And...if you don't blog-hop on weekends, you wouldn't know if you received an award yesterday. Might want to check Sunday's post, just in case.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

red shouldered hawk

While working in the veg garden this morning, I tossed a few beetle larvae and earthworms out into the lawn behind me. The next thing I knew, this red-shouldered hawk was sitting in a sweetgum about 8 ft from me watching the garden ground intently:


As usual, I did not make a second eye contact and ignored it until my camera was loaded for bear, so it relaxed and let me take a few pics. Thank you, Bird.


I really need to get back to the garden, but my sandhill crane was impatient this morning too, so I am of a mind to stand aside while they gorge for winter. There must be something else I can do around the place for a while...

Monday, November 16, 2009

Estonian Fairy Tale








The 10 Coolest Places to Swim

1. Bioluminescent Bay

Located in Puerto Rico, on Vieques Island, there is a shallow body of water with a narrow inlet known as Mosquito Bay. In each gallon of the bay there are 720,000 phosphorescent single-celled organisms that glow when they are agitated. It is a defense mechanism — the glowing is designed to daze whatever predator is bothering the tiny dinoflagellates. All together the bay, on a moonless night, will produce more than enough light to read. Swimming in Mosquito Bay will cause your limbs to be bathed in blue-green light. If you stop moving the light will dim, and eventually disappear completely, but each time you twitch it begins anew. Every time your kayak moves it too will be illuminated. It’s also easy to spot larger creatures; when manta rays or large jellies enter the mangrove swamps gentle rings of light form around them. If you scoop up a handful of the water you can watch individual glowing plankton roll down your arms and hands. And the salinity of the water, like the Dead Sea below, is high enough you can float sitting upright. Photographing Biobay isn’t easy, so there aren’t many high quality pictures of it, but enjoy the ones we found below.
2. Jellyfish Lake

12,000 to 15,000 years ago one of the limestone rock islands in the nation of Palau sealed itself off from the ocean and became a marine lake. A few jellyfish were sealed inside, and with virtually no predators, they began multiplying and evolving. Today more than 10 million jellyfish inhabit Ongeim’l Tketau, known as Jellyfish Lake to tourists. Their sting became evolutionarily useless, and has been lost over time, to the point that the jellies are completely harmless to swim with. Swimming in Jellyfish lake, surrounded by a translucent sea of rhythmically pulsing creatures, is known to be unbelievably serene. The jellies, varying in size from basketballs to blackberries, slowly undulate as they follow the path of the sun across the surface of the lake.
3. Devil’s Swimming Pool

The Devil’s Swimming Pool, or Devil’s Armchair, is a naturally formed infinity pool at the very top of Victoria Falls in Zambia. 420 feet above the river below, it is perfectly safe (in the dry season) to relax at the edge of one of the world’s largest waterfalls. From above the water it appears as if there’s nothing to stop one from being carried over the lip of the falls, but beneath the surface there is a natural rocky ledge that generates a back-eddy and stops the current. Looks scary, especially to jumping into, but the thousands of still-alive visitors can attest to its perfect safety record.
4. Dean’s Blue Hole

In a bay west of Clarence Town on Long Island, Bahamas, is the deepest underwater sinkhole in the world. It plunges 663 feet to the ocean floor, making it vastly deeper than other blue holes (The Great Blue Hole in Ambergris Caye, Belize is 410 feet deep, and the Blue Hole in Sinai, Egypt is about 420 feet deep). Dean’s is known worldwide as the perfect spot for free-diving; it was the location over the last few years of numerous new world and national free-diving records. The blue hole is roughly circular at the surface, with a diameter ranging from 25 to 35 metres (82–110 ft). After descending 20 metres (66 ft), the hole widens considerably into a cavern with a diameter of 100 metres (330 ft). If you prefer marine life to extreme breath-holding, however, I might recommend The Great Blue Hole in Belize. I snorkeled and dove it in 2007, and was enthralled with the crystal clear water and huge number of large fish and sharks. It was the first place I encountered a wild Blacktip reef shark, a wonderfully beautiful place. Jacques-Yves Cousteau declared it one of the top 10 scuba diving sites in the world. See a gallery of pictures of the Great Blue Hole below.
5. Zacatón Cenote

Zacatón is one of a group of five interconnected sinkholes, or cenotes, located in the northeastern state of Tamaulipas, Mexico. It is the deepest water-filled sinkhole in the world with a total depth of 335 meters. DEPTHX, a NASA funded project using an autonomous robot has measured the underwater portion to be 319 meters deep (an air-filled 16 meter drop from the surface to the water accounts for the total depth). In a 1993 dive Dr. Ann Kristovich set the women’s world depth record of 554 feet, and on April 6, 1994, explorer diver Jim Bowden and cave diving pioneer Sheck Exley plunged into El Zacatón with the intent of reaching bottom. Bowden dove to a men’s world record depth of 925 feet, but Exley (who invented/standardized use of the “Octo” or octopus safety regulator) died, probably from high pressure nervous syndrome (HPNS) at around 879~906 feet. The name Zacatón comes from the free-floating islands of zacate grass which move about on the surface with the wind. They are visible in the pictures as the surprisingly-large circularly symmetric islands. Because they aren’t connected to the lake bed they float with the wind. Besides swimming and diving in the cenote you can swim to the islands and suntan and picnic as they slowly drift on the surface of the sinkhole.
6. The Dead Sea

The shores of the Dead Sea are the lowest land point on the surface of the Earth. Resting 1385 feet below sea level, the Dead Sea is also a hypersaline lake, one of the world’s saltiest bodies of water. It resides in the Middle East, between Israel and Jordan, and even appears in the Bible. What interests STS, however, is the level of salinity. Besides tasting awful, it also provides exceptional levels of buoyancy. The tourist in the photo is sitting in a reclined position, and the water is dense enough to support his weight. If you tried that in your local swimming pool you’d immediately sink. Apparently it’s an unbelievable sensation.


8. Yangbajain hot springs

The Yangbajing hot springs, in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China, (known to people who appreciate freedom as Tibet) provides much of the electricity for Lhasa, the capital. A thermoelectric power plant on the edge of the Yangbajain hot spring fields, which cover 20-30 square kilometers. These particular springs are so interesting because they are at an elevation of approximately 14,000 feet (about the same as the peak of Mt. Rainier in Washington State). The water emerges from the crust of the earth at 84 degrees F, which is higher than the boiling point at that altitude. The springs themselves aren’t as beautiful as some of the other locations on this list, but they have a misty charm of their own.

9. The Seagaia Ocean Dome

The Seagaia Ocean Dome was the world’s largest indoor waterpark, located in Miyazaki, Miyazaki, Japan. The Ocean Dome measures 300 metres in length and 100 metres in width, and is included in the Guinness World Records. It opened in 1993, and visitor numbers peaked in 1995 at 1.25 million a year. The Ocean Dome was officially closed on October 1, 2007. The Ocean Dome sported a fake flame-spitting volcano, artificial sand and the world’s largest retractable roof, which provided a permanently blue sky even on a rainy day. The air temperature was always held at around 30 degrees celsius and the water at around 28. The sand was made from crushed marble, which doesn’t stick to skin as much as regular does — meaning when you lay down you don’t get sandy. Check out the pictures below — what an engineering project!







10. Sistema Sac Actun

The Yucatan Peninsula is home to the longest underwater cave system in the world. Sistema Sac Actun was found to be connected to Sistema Nohoch Nah Chich, creating a system 154,783 meters long, the longest underwater cave in the world. By comparison the previous record holder Ox Bel Ha measured a puny 146,761 m. I mean that’s only 91 miles long, sheesh. The two have been exchanging the record for years as new, previously unexplored, sections are discovered. The whole system has been named Sistema Sac Actun, and is home to some of the most decorated and beautiful cave diving sites in the world. The most well known entrance is Grande Cenote, pictures of it are above and below. There is surprisingly little information about this incredible cave system, but we’ve shared what we could find. Once you get in to the system the water temperature is relatively constant, and some parts are very fragile and require perfect buoyancy. As you get deeper in the system there are incredible stalactites and stalagmites, and other geologic features.