3 ms·

Are you just planning to camp or do you plan to setup a small cabin? Can you dig a well there? Will you allow guests to visit? A tiny produce garden? Helipad?

• intenex 13y ago
  Hah Tynan got throttled by HN for posting too many comments too quickly. I'm also a co-owner of the island: 1. Yeah, we definitely have plans for structures -- yurts, we're actually thinking. 2. Hmm, haven't explored that option. Not sure. 3. Yep - tentatively 5 guests per each owner at a time. 4. Yeah food would definitely be fantastic. 5. We don't have helicopters yet unfortunately, but when we're mad rich sure :)
  • M2Ys4U 13y ago
    > 5. We don't have helicopters yet unfortunately, but when we're mad rich sure :) I would've thought that a helipad would be a good idea if you ever need to be evacuated by air ambulance
• jacquesm 13y ago
  Sweetwater well on a saltwater island this size is a rare thing.
  • lutusp 13y ago
    > Sweetwater well on a saltwater island this size is a rare thing. Not at all. It's not uncommon to have a fresh water table beneath the surface of an area dotted with islands. If you doubt this, ask yourself where the tree's roots go, and how those salt-intolerant trees survive. I live 100 feet from salt water in Washington State and I have a perfectly reliable fresh-water well.
    • jacquesm 13y ago
      Living on the mainland near the sea is not the same as living on a very small island more than a few hundred meters off-shore. See, the mainland has sweetwater running under it all the way to the sea shore and even a little bit beyond, depth and density will vary but it is always there. But a small island surrounded by ocean need not be like that, more than likely it is of a rocky composition (otherwise it would simply disappear or move around) and the water runs right off before it can pool in quantity enough that you could stick a well-head into it to reliably pump it to the surface for consumption. In such a situation catching it as it falls is your best bet (also better because a small island likely does not have a good filtering capacity and the water you pump up, assuming you can get at it in a useful quantities, will need a lot of processing before you can use it). It all depends on the actual situation but the chances are rather against it.
      • lutusp 13y ago
        > It all depends on the actual situation but the chances are rather against it. Not really. It's a matter of drilling carefully: http://geography.about.com/library/misc/ucghyben.htm http://geography.about.com/library/misc/ucghyben.htm "On low, small islands that are largely composed of coral or other porous materials, salt water intrusion into the underlying interior is quite common. The drilling or digging of wells on these islands and especially on along the shoreline must be done with care [emphasis added]." Notice that the author didn't say "pointless." Most reasonably-sized islands have a subsurface fresh water source. The presence of salt-intolerant trees tells you there's fresh water available beneath the surface. > ... assuming you can get at it in a useful quantities, will need a lot of processing before you can use it. If that were true, it would kill the trees. I know a number of locations in Alaska near salt water where, because of geological changes resulting from the 1964 earthquake, even though the surface is dry there's no subsurface fresh water at all, and all the trees promptly died. Those locations are rare. It's not nearly as simple as drilling a well far from salt water, but it can be done.
        • pavel_lishin 13y ago
          > Not really. It's a matter of drilling carefully. Oh my god. Tynan & Co. are LARPing Dwarf Fortress.