Hawaii - Day 1

Surf’s Up!  The waves are crashing against the shore and they are LOUD!   It’s easy to see the sunrise today as my body is on Louisville time. The temperature is a balmy 75 degrees with a few clouds in the sky.  

These are photos from the balcony of the house we are renting.  Below is one of the neighbors.  LOL

A rented house serves as home base for all the excursions and sightseeing the family plans to do this week.  The family includes my dad, Tom, my sister, Denise, brother-in-law, Ted, and nephew, Ben, my brother, Mark, sister-in-law, Heather, and three nephews, Mark Thomas (aka Bubba), Jacob, and Joshua, and finally me.  That is ten people in all.  My brother is the youngest and I am the oldest.

Denise, Ted, and Ben take off for a half day boat ride on the Body Glove.  Tom stays at the house for some peace and quiet.  Mark, Heather, Bubba, Jacob, Joshua, and I get ready for some kayaking.  Mark takes Heather, Bubba and Joshua to the kayaking place.  They come back and hour later.  The ocean is too rough for first time kayakers.  So we head off to a snorkeling beach.  Bubba doesn’t like the waves and so refuses to go into the water.  I stay on the beach with Bubba while everyone else is snorkeling.  I do go out a little later.

Snorkeling is different.  I need to retrain myself from breathing through the nose (as for swimming).   I do panic several times, but I can stand up in the water and correct the problem.   After 20 minutes or more, I figure out how to snorkel. Breathe through the mouth and out through the nose.  While I’m looking under water, I see fish swimming by.  I can definitely get use to swimming with the fishes.  

The snorkel bay is also a place that has sea turtles.  A few people tell us that the surf is too rough for the turtles and that we may not see one.  WRONG.  There one is at the water line eating the algae.  A local is guarding the turtle from unsuspecting humans getting into and out of the water.  I did get a couple of photos and a short video with my camera.   

Heather was able to take a very long video of the turtle with the Go camera attached to her wrist.  

After the beach, we came back to the house to sit in the hot tub for a while.   I know such a hard life.  Of course this is a vacation and anyone else would do the same thing in my place.   Mark and my dad take off for Costco to pick up some groceries, steak to grill and pizza for the kids.   

After dinner and sitting on the balcony watching the waves, everyone but my dad drives to downtown Kona to walk around the shopping area.  Heather gets items with a sea turtle on it.  The boys get something they wanted.  There is a store called Donkey Balls.  Donkey Balls are chocolate covered macadamia nuts or malt balls.  I get the donkey beans, chocolate covered coffee beans.   

The blog posts will be intermittent as the internet connection fails frequently and I am getting use to a new computer with a smaller keyboard.  Aloha my friends.