Island life

We left the hotel, went to the drug store, drove to Hanalei, ate, got some snorkel gear and then went to the rental house and got settled in. The place is pretty nice and right across the street from the beach. After we were settled we headed over to the ocean and did some snorkeling. Danika went for a little while and then read, I was out for over an hour. It was overcast and a little windy, so the water wasn't very clear, but I still saw a lot of different fish. I can't wait to get out again when the weather is a little nicer with the under water digital so I can take some fish photos. We still have the stupid Jeep but hopefully will get the other car tomorrow. I can't wait to see Brooke and Chris tomorrow.

Today we had to kill time until we could check into the house. We thought that would give us a great opportunity to swap our rattle-trap Jeep for something more sensible, but apparently there are NO OTHER VEHICLES on the entire island. I spent a bit of time on the phone today with the manager, and I think he understood that I would not give up and be happy with my Jeep. We got a discount and our REAL car should be delivered to us first thing in the morning. Cross your fingers!

Whoo! This is a long one...

At long last I got to take the digital elph (S400) into the water. It was less than great, but I got a couple of okay shots. It turns out it wasn't such a nice day for snorkeling, there was a lot of "stuff" in the water which made visibility low and there was a pretty good wind which made keeping the camera steady nearly impossible. The sun was out, which was good, but it also made the lcd on the camera tough to see. I tried to take some photos of fish, which was pretty difficult and instead decided to try to get some images of "still" stuff to see how they turned out. Follow the link to see the photos...

Boogie boarding is fun, but it turns out I don't like the part where you get from the beach to the place where you catch the waves. I kept getting knocked down by breaking waves and dragged under. Brooke and Chris taught me when was the right time to rush out, but by then, I was exhausted, with a nose full of seawater, and a suit full of sand.

[Adria, how do I get sand out of our hair?]

Hi y'all. So this post is a little late since we went boogie boarding yesterday, but better late than never. So, we went to Chris' favorite beach, Kealia just north of Kappa'a. It has nice, big waves. Since I'm a beginner, Chris started us out in the smaller waves near the breakwater. I tried to start catching waves right away, but C had to slow me down (ed. note: "Patience, grasshopper.") and tried to teach me a thing or two about timing. All I knew was that when I saw a good one, I needed to start swimming like crazy to try to catch the wave.

I have always wanted to go surfing, and when I saw boogie boarding it got added to the list of things I wanted to do. Well, yesterday Chris gave us all lessons on boogie boarding and it was a lot of fun... until I got out of the water and realized that somewhere along the way (probably going through the wash...with an extra spin cycle) I really screwed up my back. It is now 10pm the next day and my back is better but I still can't stand quite straight, oh well it could be much worse, at least I can think of how much fun it was catching waves on the boogie board. :)

It is about 8:30am and we are headed to Tunnels beach for more snorkeling. We went last night on Anini and it seemed pretty good for my back. The water was not very clear and there weren't a lot of fish, we're hoping early morning at Tunnels will solve that. I got some photos yesterday, but I figured I would wait to unwaterproof my camera since we are going again now. I will try to get some photos posted later today, off we go...

Well, I have to say Tunnels was much cooler as far as snokeling goes. Unfortunately after I took one photo the camera's battery went dead. We will be going again, until then follow the link for some photos from yesterday as well as the one from today.

Chris and Brooke decided to go boogie boarding again, and since my back was feeling better, I decided it was best for me not to go and be tempted to get out and screw it up even more. Instead, I decided to walk over to Anini and do some more snorkeling. I went out into the water closer to where the park is (west of where the little walkway across from the house) to see if the snorkeling would be better there. I thought more people in the water there would make the fish a little less scared of MN white fish. I think they were a little less scared, and I think I may have figured out how to get photos of them... find the ones that want their picture taken. We'll see once I get a chance to pull that camera from the underwater housing, I am still waiting for it to dry.

I was working with a particularly friendly fish. I swam away to turn around and come back at a better angle when I noticed something large move in the distance. I went to investigate and as I got closer to my very pleasant surprise it was a sea turtle! It let me get pretty close (30 ft or so). The tide mixed with my curiosity and excitement made it difficult to keep my distance, but I did the best I could. I took some photos and a movie (I sure hope some of them turned out) and then just watched it for a while. It was so majestic, its movements slow and peaceful. It seemed to be keeping an eye on me, but didn't seem to mind my presence. After awhile it started to head off in a direction away from me, so I let it go and went back to finish the photo session I was working on before I saw it. I don't think it could have been a better day. I guess I should thank my better judgment (and Danika) for convincing me boogie boarding should wait. I will post photos of the fish and the turtle as soon as the camera dries.

As promised, follow the link for photos of some fish and the sea turtle.

Today we rented kayaks to go up the Wailua River and hike to Secret Falls. It was a really fun trip and I am pleasantly worn out, but here's the secret about Secret Falls: it's more of a trickle and not that exciting once you get there.

In a Kauaiblog first, we bring you video from our excursion on Wailua yesterday.

By the end of the day, Brooke, Matt and Chris had captured five coconuts and a dozen mangoes.

Yesterday was our Sunset Sailing Adventure with Capt'n Andy, so after the men folk made us breakfast
, we all headed down south to see how the other half lives. It was hot and dry, so apparently not as good as we have it. Anyway, while down there we went to the Po'ipu Beach area to check out the "Alien" landscape. This is just where the lava met the ocean a million years ago and is still very lava-like.

"4 Hour Na Pali Sunset Dinner Sail." Can you feel it? The beauty? The grandeur? The peacefulness of gliding over the water? Forget all of that.

It looks like I fell behind on the blogging, I guess I will blame my back. Sitting at the computer typing isn't doing anything good for it, but it feels pretty close to back to normal today, so I guess I can blog a bit. Follow the link for some photos.

My back was feeling pretty good, so I went with Chris and Brooke boogie boarding today. The waves were much tamer today and I was careful to not overextend myself. I caught a few waves and can still walk, so I guess I call that successful. Here is a photo of Chris and Brooke going in.

We went on a snorkel cruise down Na Pali from the north shore today, and I did just fine with Bonine on my side. The nice lady who talked me down when I was thinking about staying home told me to take one the night before and one an hour before. That combo made me a little groggy this morning (and probably tomorrow morning), but I did great on the boat. It also took just enough of the edge off that I was able to enjoy snorkeling--in deep water, no less--and finally saw a turtle up close. All in all, a good day.

Pictures to follow.

Last Monday I got a chance to go back to Tunnels Beach to snorkel. I went fairly early in the morning so there weren't too many other people there yet. I saw a few new creatures, most of which were fish, but the coolest thing I saw was an octopus. I was on my way back in and saw something moving and scurry into a crevice. It didn't look like a fish, so I tried to investigate. I got fairly close to it but still couldn't tell for sure what it was since only part of its head was sticking out. I thought it might be an octopus and I should wait a bit to see if it would crawl out of its hiding place. I waited and waited and waited and finally decided to give up. Just as I was swimming away, bubbles started rising to the surface and I noticed there were some scuba divers below me. The place where the octopus was hiding started to bubble a bit too, so I decided to wait thinking the bubbles might get it to move. I don't know if it was the bubbles that did it, but the octopus finally crawled out of its hiding place and scurried across the reef. They sure have an interesting way of moving. I tried to get a video of it, but when I looked back after changing the settings on the camera it was gone.

I also saw a small eel. I have seen a few eels one of which was pretty large. They kind of creep me out, so it was nice to see a small one. It didn't creep me out so I was able to get a couple of photos of it.

Unfortunately, the underwater housing for the camera fogged up shortly after I started snorkeling, so wasn't able to get as many shots as I wanted to (at least I got the octopus), but now I have a good excuse to go back again. Follow the link to see some of the photos I did manage to get.

We rented "single" kayaks today for a test run up the Hanalei river. It turns out we both find it easier to paddle and maneuver in a single than with both of us in a double, so if we get kayaks, we'll get singles. The paddle was a little windy, but nice, and we had a good solid two-and-a-half hours on the river before we came home for lunch. It was entirely uneventful.

We have the boats for the rest of the afternoon, so Matt is taking one out on the ocean by our house to ride some waves. My hips hurt from the morning, so I'm going to sit on the porch and read. [Raquel, I'm reading "Love Nun" and it is unbearably fun to read it in tropical weather!]

As you may have seen in the previous post Danika and I rented kayaks today and kayaked up the the Hanalei River. It was a nice paddle on pretty calm waters with lots of scenery. We got back to the house around noon, so we ate, I rested a bit and decided to try the kayak in the ocean.

Danika helped me carry the boat over to the beach by the rental house and I paddled out to the edge of the reef to kayak in the surf a bit. All was going well. I caught a few smaller waves and let some hit me sideways to see how easily I would be tipped if a bigger wave hit me. I felt I was ready for some bigger waves.

I paddled over to where the bigger waves were coming in. I caught a couple and then one was coming and I was parallel to it. I tried to get perpendicular to it, but it didn't happen in time. I figured I wanted to try getting back in the kayak out in the water, so I let it tip me. That was all well and fine, except I was in about 4 feet of water and the bottom was very sharp coral.

I managed to grab the paddle but the wind caught the boat and it started to head rather quickly towards the shore. I started swimming and swimming and swimming. I consider myself a fairly good swimmer so I wasn't too worried. It did suck that I had the paddle and was swimming in about 1-5 ft of water over very sharp coral. The boat was getting further and further away from me so eventually I decided to swim for shore and once on shore I would walk down to where the boat ended up. After swimming toward shore for a while, I noticed some very nice person was headed out toward my kayak and stopped it for me. I changed direction again and started swimming toward the kayak.

I finally reached it and thanked the guy who had stopped it for me. He smiled and said next time you might want to attach a leash, I just smiled and said thanks again. I swam it the rest of the way into shore (in all I probably swam ½-¾ of a mile) and then started walking it along the beach. I got to one of the paths that leads back to the road, so I shored the kayak and headed to the rental house. When I got there I told Danika what had happened and got some money. We walked back to the beach to get the kayak and find the guy who had helped me. We we found him, he wouldn't take any money, all he said was "Not needed". I would like to think I would have done the same thing and the next time I see someone who needs help I will sure try to help them.

Well, not really a shark attack, but I did see a shark today when we were snorkeling at Tunnels. I almost told Danika I didn't want to go snorkeling. I am sure glad we went. I had the camera and got a few photos. None of the photos turned out that great, but here is the best one.

There were a bunch of fish swimming around the shark. I yelled at them to RUN!!! But they didn't listen (I think either because they don't understand english, or they don't know how to run, just swim). I think the shark was asleep. I cut my arm open because I thought my blood might jazz him up a bit. When he woke up, he just gave me a funny look and said I was stupid for cutting my arm. Then I swam away. True story... really. Well the part about seeing a shark was true, and I did try to yell, but it is hard to yell underwater with a snorkel in your mouth.