Friday, February 24, 2006
Addendum to the Hawaii Post: Underwater photos are in!
http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=441241140823386821/l=83470103/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
Check 'em out! Some fish, some people in swimsuits and wetsuits, and a whole lot of sea turtles.
-N
http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=441241140823386821/l=83470103/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
Check 'em out! Some fish, some people in swimsuits and wetsuits, and a whole lot of sea turtles.
-N
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Hi everyone. This is going to be a long one, so hold on to your hats.
First and foremost, you can get pictures from most of this stuff at:
http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=287221140678133115/l=83223349/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
It’ll make a nice little accompaniment to all the text that ensues.
First off: Valentines day. I finally hit on the best possible gift for J(5) after some pondering and considering. She said she wanted flowers, so I definitely wanted that, but just going out and buying flowers for valentines day seemed so unoriginal. So instead, I made her some flowers. Origami flowers. I made her a ‘tulip in a vase’ and a larger vase with just a whole bunch of flower-like folds. After that, I got a little bit crazy, folding a couple of larger modular folds and cumulating in a big one: Five intersecting tetrahedra. That was a tricky one to fold, but it came out really nice. Then I folded a heart and stuck it inside. A cute little gesture if you ask me.
J(5) told me afterwards, though, that she was really kind of expecting origami flowers from me. So creative yes, but it seems my girlfriend really has me pegged. She got me the world’s softest stuffed cat. Now I finally have a lap cat of my own. Though Tigger is slowly becoming more and more amenable to my petting. He certainly bites less.
Then…what else…what else did I do last week…something neat happened…Oh yeah, I went to Hawaii!!!!!
First off, in summary, the trip was awesome. We did tons and tons of crazy-awesome-amazing stuff all weekend. We left Wednesday morning and got back Monday at around noon. So 5 days in Hawaii. Not a bad vacation.
Day 1:
We got into Hawaii at around 3 and the very, very, very first thing we did…was loose our luggage. There was another flight coming over, though, soon afterwards, and they were fully expecting our luggage to be on it. (It was, ultimately.) We, on the other hand, zipped off in our rental car to see as much as we could of the island.
We were staying in Hilo, which is on the east, lush, green side of the island, so we just got in and started driving, stopping pretty darn quick to check out the Banyan trees, which are the ones that grow up, then drop roots from above and look like a thousand and one big ol’ vines all wrapped around each other. Great for tree climbing.
Next we drove another…what…hundred feet down the road and found ourselves in a Japanese garden. It was very nice, lots of neat plants and lanterns, and a few cool-looking bridges. The pictures of me ‘napping’ and J(5) under the tree are from a jaunt we took off the nearby beach to a little offshoot of land that we decided to declare as a sovereign nation. Population 2.
Next up: Historic (old) downtown Hilo. The city hasn’t had too much luck in the past, having been hit by two tsunamis and nearly wiped out by lava flows on numerous occasions. So they haven’t been updating the downtown area much, but there were some neat sights to see, and we caught the tail end of a farmers market, picking up some strange ‘hole-less donut’ pastry that I still can’t pronounce. After that, the guidebooks sent us off to ‘Uncle Billy’s’, where they have live performances of Hawaiian music and hula. That’s where you get the pictures of me with a very large flower in my ear and J(5) and me posing on the table and looking happy. Cause we were. Cause Hawaii is awesome.
Day 2:
We drove to Kona, on the eastern, ‘covered in old lava’ side of the island. The next ten or so pictures are all of stuff we saw along the way. Every couple of miles, the road would take a bridge over a river, and all along the river would be this absolutely *verdant* (the official vocab word of our vacation) scenery. Trees and plants and waterfalls…and all this is *on the highway*. It’s like how you can see glaciers from the road in Juneau. “And here you have…amazing pristine beauty!” Anyway, the pictures of the greenery were of the Hilo side, and the pictures of the rocky, black landscapes were of the Kona side. Both beautiful, but for obviously different reasons.
We hung out in Kona for a while, checking out shops and the general atmosphere. Pretty awesome, all around. That picture of the gecko you see? That’s from the ‘gecko store’, where there are, evidently, geckos running around everywhere. Awesome.
Next up is a single picture of a helicopter. You see, we were supposed to go on a helicopter tour, but unfortunately, the machine in question was broken. Lucky us, however, are very flexible and still had plenty of time in HI, so we just rescheduled for Saturday. (Day 4, for those you you keeping track.)
On the way back, we stopped at a fledgeling national park, a field, essentially, covered in old volcanic pumice. We tromped around for a bit, mostly just listening to the awesome sound that pumice makes when it moves around (almost like glass), before a park ranger came by and told us that the path was, in fact, over *there*. Like I said, the place was under construction, and I saw some markers and thought path. Don’t worry, we didn’t break any federal statutes, we could have just slipped and got ourselves quite well ground up by jaggy volcanic rock. Park rangers: looking out for *you*!
Leaving ‘bunch of rocks’ national park, we drove back to Kona and went to a Luau. You can’t go to Hawaii and not have a Luau. They had all the fixn’s. First up, island-based arts and crafts. We made a couple of Angel fish (on fishing poles, you can see them in one of those pictures) and then watched a demonstration on how to open up a coconut. After that, we saw the pig taken out of the oven and then watched the arrival of the Royal Court. (Guy with big hat). That older couple in the picture was a quite lovely married couple that sat right across from us and kept us quite well entertained all through the night.
We ate lots and lots and freakin’ TONS of food. The Kalua Pork was especially legendary. Fish was good too. And I don’t care what anyone says, I like Poi. And while we ate, we got to watch lots of traditional dances and the like. All quite well performed. J(5) and I danced for the couples dance, too. That was really nice: low light, genteel music, and spontaneous dancing. Aaah. The highlight, as it usually is in these things, was the fire dance. The guy was truly fantastic. Those pictures with swirly swirles of fire? That was him. Quite epic. Also, sorry the pictures of the dancers are so blurry, but I couldn’t figure out how to change the shutter speed on the camera. Which is just as well, cause it makes those fire dance pictures look awesome.
Following the Luau, we drove back to Hilo and crashed out. I would also like to point out that this very night was the first time that I told J(5) that I loved her. And I meant it. And so did she when she said it right back. So if we look a little extra smiley in all the rest of the pictures, you’ll know why.
[Grin!]
Day 3:
The next pictures are of Rainbow falls. Say it with me, kids. Rain-bow-falls. Very good. It’s called Rainbow falls because the water hits the pool below with such force that it throws mist up in to the air that forms rainbows when you stand in the right spot. A few pictures from the viewing area, then a couple of the trail over to the top of the falls, where you can scramble all along the rocks. You see that picture of J(5) sitting on what looks like the very edge of the cliff before the waterfall? That’s because she *was* on the very edge of the cliff. So you have her to thank for all those lovely pictures sticking out over the edge of the falls. J(5) is more adventurous than me, and I more cautious than her, but she says I’m cute when I worry, and I suspect that the ideal level of adventure lies somewhere between the two of us, so we naturally tug each other in the proper direction.
Next up, more water, this time a place called ‘boiling pots’. The guide book says there’s no trail access down there, and they *lie*. It may not be official, but it’s definitely a trail. Anyway, we scampered among the rocks, had our picture taken by a nice family (who we, incidentally, met again as we checked out some more of the Hilo Waterfalls later.)
That picture of me doing the weird pose? That’s for my roommate, he’s probably the only one who would get it.
And to your left, you will see The Volcano! We strolled and drove our way through volcano national forest. We took a quick stroll along the rim in those first few pictures you see, and the next ones, in the dark, are underground, in a lava tube, a long, nearly cylindrical tube that was created by an old lava flow. The pictures are in the part that was lighted, but we took a flashlight and explored (yes, mom, you’re allowed) the rest of the lava tube, the part without lights. Let me tell you something, you turn off your flashlight and it is *dark*. We didn’t take any pictures of the darkness, but just go into MSPaint and draw a black square. That’s what it looked like.
See those next few pictures? With the steam? That’s all coming up from the ground. What happens is, water seeps down from rain, hits boiling hot magma, turns into steam, and then rushes back up into the air. There’s steam vents all over the place along the rim, and we got to go right up to one and get blasted with hot air. Also a great view of the crater along a .1-mile (egad!) hike.
No pictures, but we made a brief stop at the volcano museum, also along the rim, and got to see Pele’s hair and Pele’s tears, along with real-time seismographs of various areas. Real neat.
Next is a picture of me sitting next to one of the ‘great cracks', formed by cooling lava, and then a picture from in the crater of another crater deep down. You could see where sulfur had stained the rocks, and the museum said the floor was ‘usually solid’. That’s hot stuff!
Following, you’ll find some pictures of one of the newest lava flows, one we had to drive down to the end of the road to see. They had just completed a highway all the way around the coast of the island, and this big ol’ lava flow came right down and covered the whole thing up. That’s where you get the pictures of the lava rocks on the road. The lava is still flowing, too. You have to be there at night to see the glow, but we did get to see the massive steam plume where the lava continuously flows into the ocean. They don’t let you get close, though, being as the new land can, and has, disappear into the ocean without any notice at all. On the way back to Hilo, we saw some birds fighting over some food, which made for good entertainment.
Day 4:
Helicopter day! We spent the morning at a farmers market, where J(5) picked up some nice t-shirts, I got some awesome salad dressing, and we had coconut drinks and several more pastries I can not pronounce or spell. All of them where hammered with sugar, though, so they were good stuff. We also picked up some lovely bread that ended up being snack food in the car for pretty much the whole rest of the trip. Good stuff.
Then there’s a whole grip of pictures from our helicopter trip. We took the ‘waterfall’ trip, which was awesome. Tons of waterfalls that just fall off enormous drops of up to 1400 feet, according to our guide. My favorite part, you can see in picture 878. They called it the ‘keyhole’, It’s this enormous cliff that rounds out the end of a valley, and three waterfalls fall all the way down into it. Ruling place of King Kameamea’s favorite wife (he was thirty, she was ten. Aww.)
Also awesome was ‘the Saddle’, where we got to fly over a dip in the mountains and into *another* pristine valley. J(5)’s favorite part was seeing Humpback whales from the helicopter. They were neat, but I’ve seen plenty up in Alaska, so they weren’t quite as novel to me. I’m spoiled.
Spent the rest of the day tooling around Kona. We rented some snorkel gear for me [J(5) brought her own, she does scuba!] and hit one of the reefs. It was pretty neat. Got to see a little tiny octopus and a little tiny Moray eel. Belive me, if it was much bigger, we would have traveled far away until it was small again. There was a woman just floating there and watching it, while it stuck it’s head out and opened it’s mouth, ready to take off any finger within range. Skeery, but awesome. It was only maybe a foot long in total. No sea turtles, though, which was a downer for J(5), who really wanted to see one. I saw one when I went to Oahu last year, but only briefly. She was still jealous.
Went back to Kona, had dinner at the hard rock café, and strolled along the beach, where we saw a sea turtle (yay!) playing and eating in the waves. He’d stick his cute little head up out of the water every couple of minutes. It was really neat to watch. Got to watch part of a volleyball tournament, too. There was some good gaming there, driving home exactly how bad we all are at beach volleyball. (Mostly we’re just lazy).
Back to Hilo!
Day 5: (Last full day)
The next pictures are there as proof to J(5)’s family that she did, in fact, go shopping for her very own two-piece bathing suit. Huzzah!
First half of the day was spent around Hilo again, checking out some close-by waterfalls. Very awesome, very close, and very huge drops. Not to mention tons of crazy flora around. We got to see wild Iris’s, and there’s a picture in there with J(5) and a flower as big as my fist!
The Falls were awesome, and J(5), of course, found a little off-the-path trail that led down to another waterfall. I followed her, after a spell, (still more adventurous than me), and we found it and took some neat pictures. I like the near-identical pictures of us in front of the falls, taken by each other.
After that, we went back to the Kona side and hit up another beach for some snorkeling. This one was even better, with tons and tons of coral and fish and two, count ‘em, two, sea turtles. J(5) will tell you that I pushed her toward them, and this is a dirty, dirty lie. I’m the cautious one, remember? There were currents, there were waves! Promise, not trying to disturb the endangered species. Plus, those things eat coral! I like my fingers right where they are. Really pretty creatures. We do have some pictures, too, but they’re on a camera that uses that old technology. Y’know, film. We have to get them developed, but they’re on the way.
I, unfortunately, decided to go with some crazy high-tech snorkel gear that was supposed to make snorkeling easier. Instead, it made it nearly impossible to breathe without sucking water in through it’s ‘clever’ valves, and it didn’t let much air down either. It was called, ironically enough, the ‘mo flo’. Ha. I go to switch with J(5), though, and hers worked much better. It was a tube. That’s it. No more high tech snorkels for me. We switched back after a while, though, and J(5) hit the coral some more while I rested on the beach. When she is done, she takes off her wetsuit (Wetsuit! We’re in Hawaii! My girl is such a wuss!) and starts to run out of the surf. Which was great, for a while, until she tripped and fell. But you know why I like her? Cause she tripped and fell, and then we both busted out laughing, because it was funny. They never show that part in the movies.
After that we had an early dinner, went back to Hilo, and packed, and then cuddled up and just relaxed for a while.
Day 6:
Flew out of Hawaii crazy early in the morning, got home without trouble.
That’s it!
Other news, in brief, because it’s late and this is long enough as it is:
-More neat stuff happening at work, but in the interests of national and corporate security, let’s just call it ‘neat stuff’ and leave it at that.
-J(5) is going to go to south America for a month. I’m not going because she’s going to meet and old friend and because she’s going to hike Maccu Piccu, which is a 4 day long hike, and I am a wuss. I get to take care of Tigger, though.
-Still working on my studio, getting ideas for stuff and slowly piecing together what it is, exactly, that I want.
-Finally got my W2s, so I can do my taxes now.
That’s the basics, and I’m ready for bed, so good night to you all!
-N
First and foremost, you can get pictures from most of this stuff at:
http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=287221140678133115/l=83223349/otsc=SYE/otsi=SALB
It’ll make a nice little accompaniment to all the text that ensues.
First off: Valentines day. I finally hit on the best possible gift for J(5) after some pondering and considering. She said she wanted flowers, so I definitely wanted that, but just going out and buying flowers for valentines day seemed so unoriginal. So instead, I made her some flowers. Origami flowers. I made her a ‘tulip in a vase’ and a larger vase with just a whole bunch of flower-like folds. After that, I got a little bit crazy, folding a couple of larger modular folds and cumulating in a big one: Five intersecting tetrahedra. That was a tricky one to fold, but it came out really nice. Then I folded a heart and stuck it inside. A cute little gesture if you ask me.
J(5) told me afterwards, though, that she was really kind of expecting origami flowers from me. So creative yes, but it seems my girlfriend really has me pegged. She got me the world’s softest stuffed cat. Now I finally have a lap cat of my own. Though Tigger is slowly becoming more and more amenable to my petting. He certainly bites less.
Then…what else…what else did I do last week…something neat happened…Oh yeah, I went to Hawaii!!!!!
First off, in summary, the trip was awesome. We did tons and tons of crazy-awesome-amazing stuff all weekend. We left Wednesday morning and got back Monday at around noon. So 5 days in Hawaii. Not a bad vacation.
Day 1:
We got into Hawaii at around 3 and the very, very, very first thing we did…was loose our luggage. There was another flight coming over, though, soon afterwards, and they were fully expecting our luggage to be on it. (It was, ultimately.) We, on the other hand, zipped off in our rental car to see as much as we could of the island.
We were staying in Hilo, which is on the east, lush, green side of the island, so we just got in and started driving, stopping pretty darn quick to check out the Banyan trees, which are the ones that grow up, then drop roots from above and look like a thousand and one big ol’ vines all wrapped around each other. Great for tree climbing.
Next we drove another…what…hundred feet down the road and found ourselves in a Japanese garden. It was very nice, lots of neat plants and lanterns, and a few cool-looking bridges. The pictures of me ‘napping’ and J(5) under the tree are from a jaunt we took off the nearby beach to a little offshoot of land that we decided to declare as a sovereign nation. Population 2.
Next up: Historic (old) downtown Hilo. The city hasn’t had too much luck in the past, having been hit by two tsunamis and nearly wiped out by lava flows on numerous occasions. So they haven’t been updating the downtown area much, but there were some neat sights to see, and we caught the tail end of a farmers market, picking up some strange ‘hole-less donut’ pastry that I still can’t pronounce. After that, the guidebooks sent us off to ‘Uncle Billy’s’, where they have live performances of Hawaiian music and hula. That’s where you get the pictures of me with a very large flower in my ear and J(5) and me posing on the table and looking happy. Cause we were. Cause Hawaii is awesome.
Day 2:
We drove to Kona, on the eastern, ‘covered in old lava’ side of the island. The next ten or so pictures are all of stuff we saw along the way. Every couple of miles, the road would take a bridge over a river, and all along the river would be this absolutely *verdant* (the official vocab word of our vacation) scenery. Trees and plants and waterfalls…and all this is *on the highway*. It’s like how you can see glaciers from the road in Juneau. “And here you have…amazing pristine beauty!” Anyway, the pictures of the greenery were of the Hilo side, and the pictures of the rocky, black landscapes were of the Kona side. Both beautiful, but for obviously different reasons.
We hung out in Kona for a while, checking out shops and the general atmosphere. Pretty awesome, all around. That picture of the gecko you see? That’s from the ‘gecko store’, where there are, evidently, geckos running around everywhere. Awesome.
Next up is a single picture of a helicopter. You see, we were supposed to go on a helicopter tour, but unfortunately, the machine in question was broken. Lucky us, however, are very flexible and still had plenty of time in HI, so we just rescheduled for Saturday. (Day 4, for those you you keeping track.)
On the way back, we stopped at a fledgeling national park, a field, essentially, covered in old volcanic pumice. We tromped around for a bit, mostly just listening to the awesome sound that pumice makes when it moves around (almost like glass), before a park ranger came by and told us that the path was, in fact, over *there*. Like I said, the place was under construction, and I saw some markers and thought path. Don’t worry, we didn’t break any federal statutes, we could have just slipped and got ourselves quite well ground up by jaggy volcanic rock. Park rangers: looking out for *you*!
Leaving ‘bunch of rocks’ national park, we drove back to Kona and went to a Luau. You can’t go to Hawaii and not have a Luau. They had all the fixn’s. First up, island-based arts and crafts. We made a couple of Angel fish (on fishing poles, you can see them in one of those pictures) and then watched a demonstration on how to open up a coconut. After that, we saw the pig taken out of the oven and then watched the arrival of the Royal Court. (Guy with big hat). That older couple in the picture was a quite lovely married couple that sat right across from us and kept us quite well entertained all through the night.
We ate lots and lots and freakin’ TONS of food. The Kalua Pork was especially legendary. Fish was good too. And I don’t care what anyone says, I like Poi. And while we ate, we got to watch lots of traditional dances and the like. All quite well performed. J(5) and I danced for the couples dance, too. That was really nice: low light, genteel music, and spontaneous dancing. Aaah. The highlight, as it usually is in these things, was the fire dance. The guy was truly fantastic. Those pictures with swirly swirles of fire? That was him. Quite epic. Also, sorry the pictures of the dancers are so blurry, but I couldn’t figure out how to change the shutter speed on the camera. Which is just as well, cause it makes those fire dance pictures look awesome.
Following the Luau, we drove back to Hilo and crashed out. I would also like to point out that this very night was the first time that I told J(5) that I loved her. And I meant it. And so did she when she said it right back. So if we look a little extra smiley in all the rest of the pictures, you’ll know why.
[Grin!]
Day 3:
The next pictures are of Rainbow falls. Say it with me, kids. Rain-bow-falls. Very good. It’s called Rainbow falls because the water hits the pool below with such force that it throws mist up in to the air that forms rainbows when you stand in the right spot. A few pictures from the viewing area, then a couple of the trail over to the top of the falls, where you can scramble all along the rocks. You see that picture of J(5) sitting on what looks like the very edge of the cliff before the waterfall? That’s because she *was* on the very edge of the cliff. So you have her to thank for all those lovely pictures sticking out over the edge of the falls. J(5) is more adventurous than me, and I more cautious than her, but she says I’m cute when I worry, and I suspect that the ideal level of adventure lies somewhere between the two of us, so we naturally tug each other in the proper direction.
Next up, more water, this time a place called ‘boiling pots’. The guide book says there’s no trail access down there, and they *lie*. It may not be official, but it’s definitely a trail. Anyway, we scampered among the rocks, had our picture taken by a nice family (who we, incidentally, met again as we checked out some more of the Hilo Waterfalls later.)
That picture of me doing the weird pose? That’s for my roommate, he’s probably the only one who would get it.
And to your left, you will see The Volcano! We strolled and drove our way through volcano national forest. We took a quick stroll along the rim in those first few pictures you see, and the next ones, in the dark, are underground, in a lava tube, a long, nearly cylindrical tube that was created by an old lava flow. The pictures are in the part that was lighted, but we took a flashlight and explored (yes, mom, you’re allowed) the rest of the lava tube, the part without lights. Let me tell you something, you turn off your flashlight and it is *dark*. We didn’t take any pictures of the darkness, but just go into MSPaint and draw a black square. That’s what it looked like.
See those next few pictures? With the steam? That’s all coming up from the ground. What happens is, water seeps down from rain, hits boiling hot magma, turns into steam, and then rushes back up into the air. There’s steam vents all over the place along the rim, and we got to go right up to one and get blasted with hot air. Also a great view of the crater along a .1-mile (egad!) hike.
No pictures, but we made a brief stop at the volcano museum, also along the rim, and got to see Pele’s hair and Pele’s tears, along with real-time seismographs of various areas. Real neat.
Next is a picture of me sitting next to one of the ‘great cracks', formed by cooling lava, and then a picture from in the crater of another crater deep down. You could see where sulfur had stained the rocks, and the museum said the floor was ‘usually solid’. That’s hot stuff!
Following, you’ll find some pictures of one of the newest lava flows, one we had to drive down to the end of the road to see. They had just completed a highway all the way around the coast of the island, and this big ol’ lava flow came right down and covered the whole thing up. That’s where you get the pictures of the lava rocks on the road. The lava is still flowing, too. You have to be there at night to see the glow, but we did get to see the massive steam plume where the lava continuously flows into the ocean. They don’t let you get close, though, being as the new land can, and has, disappear into the ocean without any notice at all. On the way back to Hilo, we saw some birds fighting over some food, which made for good entertainment.
Day 4:
Helicopter day! We spent the morning at a farmers market, where J(5) picked up some nice t-shirts, I got some awesome salad dressing, and we had coconut drinks and several more pastries I can not pronounce or spell. All of them where hammered with sugar, though, so they were good stuff. We also picked up some lovely bread that ended up being snack food in the car for pretty much the whole rest of the trip. Good stuff.
Then there’s a whole grip of pictures from our helicopter trip. We took the ‘waterfall’ trip, which was awesome. Tons of waterfalls that just fall off enormous drops of up to 1400 feet, according to our guide. My favorite part, you can see in picture 878. They called it the ‘keyhole’, It’s this enormous cliff that rounds out the end of a valley, and three waterfalls fall all the way down into it. Ruling place of King Kameamea’s favorite wife (he was thirty, she was ten. Aww.)
Also awesome was ‘the Saddle’, where we got to fly over a dip in the mountains and into *another* pristine valley. J(5)’s favorite part was seeing Humpback whales from the helicopter. They were neat, but I’ve seen plenty up in Alaska, so they weren’t quite as novel to me. I’m spoiled.
Spent the rest of the day tooling around Kona. We rented some snorkel gear for me [J(5) brought her own, she does scuba!] and hit one of the reefs. It was pretty neat. Got to see a little tiny octopus and a little tiny Moray eel. Belive me, if it was much bigger, we would have traveled far away until it was small again. There was a woman just floating there and watching it, while it stuck it’s head out and opened it’s mouth, ready to take off any finger within range. Skeery, but awesome. It was only maybe a foot long in total. No sea turtles, though, which was a downer for J(5), who really wanted to see one. I saw one when I went to Oahu last year, but only briefly. She was still jealous.
Went back to Kona, had dinner at the hard rock café, and strolled along the beach, where we saw a sea turtle (yay!) playing and eating in the waves. He’d stick his cute little head up out of the water every couple of minutes. It was really neat to watch. Got to watch part of a volleyball tournament, too. There was some good gaming there, driving home exactly how bad we all are at beach volleyball. (Mostly we’re just lazy).
Back to Hilo!
Day 5: (Last full day)
The next pictures are there as proof to J(5)’s family that she did, in fact, go shopping for her very own two-piece bathing suit. Huzzah!
First half of the day was spent around Hilo again, checking out some close-by waterfalls. Very awesome, very close, and very huge drops. Not to mention tons of crazy flora around. We got to see wild Iris’s, and there’s a picture in there with J(5) and a flower as big as my fist!
The Falls were awesome, and J(5), of course, found a little off-the-path trail that led down to another waterfall. I followed her, after a spell, (still more adventurous than me), and we found it and took some neat pictures. I like the near-identical pictures of us in front of the falls, taken by each other.
After that, we went back to the Kona side and hit up another beach for some snorkeling. This one was even better, with tons and tons of coral and fish and two, count ‘em, two, sea turtles. J(5) will tell you that I pushed her toward them, and this is a dirty, dirty lie. I’m the cautious one, remember? There were currents, there were waves! Promise, not trying to disturb the endangered species. Plus, those things eat coral! I like my fingers right where they are. Really pretty creatures. We do have some pictures, too, but they’re on a camera that uses that old technology. Y’know, film. We have to get them developed, but they’re on the way.
I, unfortunately, decided to go with some crazy high-tech snorkel gear that was supposed to make snorkeling easier. Instead, it made it nearly impossible to breathe without sucking water in through it’s ‘clever’ valves, and it didn’t let much air down either. It was called, ironically enough, the ‘mo flo’. Ha. I go to switch with J(5), though, and hers worked much better. It was a tube. That’s it. No more high tech snorkels for me. We switched back after a while, though, and J(5) hit the coral some more while I rested on the beach. When she is done, she takes off her wetsuit (Wetsuit! We’re in Hawaii! My girl is such a wuss!) and starts to run out of the surf. Which was great, for a while, until she tripped and fell. But you know why I like her? Cause she tripped and fell, and then we both busted out laughing, because it was funny. They never show that part in the movies.
After that we had an early dinner, went back to Hilo, and packed, and then cuddled up and just relaxed for a while.
Day 6:
Flew out of Hawaii crazy early in the morning, got home without trouble.
That’s it!
Other news, in brief, because it’s late and this is long enough as it is:
-More neat stuff happening at work, but in the interests of national and corporate security, let’s just call it ‘neat stuff’ and leave it at that.
-J(5) is going to go to south America for a month. I’m not going because she’s going to meet and old friend and because she’s going to hike Maccu Piccu, which is a 4 day long hike, and I am a wuss. I get to take care of Tigger, though.
-Still working on my studio, getting ideas for stuff and slowly piecing together what it is, exactly, that I want.
-Finally got my W2s, so I can do my taxes now.
That’s the basics, and I’m ready for bed, so good night to you all!
-N
