Last day in Hawaii!

Muchos Mahalos

Today is the last day I will be in the U.S. of A. for awhile.  My time in Hawaii has flown by, I finally leave for South Korea tomorrow 11:00 a.m. sharp.  

One of the strange things about Hawaii is that you really do feel like you're in a different country.  This is one of the only states where they have their own alphabet, language and even holidays.  There's so much to do and see here that it would take you a couple years to feel like you've even made a dent into the culture and heritage this place has to offer.

I've been pretty lucky the last few weeks because I've been staying with 4 of my good friends who have all lived here and know their way around pretty well (3 of which are nurses...which you will see comes in handy later).

Highlights of Hawaii

I went spear fishing for the first time in my life.  I love to snorkel and dive but have never been down with a spear gun or 3 prong.  There's not much else to say...just take a look for yourself:

Okay that's Mark's...here's mine:

To be fair, Mark is roughly 3 times the size as I am...his fish is roughly 3 times the size of my fish...it's all relative.  Also, I'm not going to lie, I was more focused on making sure there were no sharks around (I would check about every 30 seconds).  So really, I was spear fishing and making sure the waters were safe for my buddies.  You're welcome.

Axel brought out his bow and arrow and we all had a little archery practice.  We all did pretty well considering the last time we had shot a bow was in 6th grade.  Everything was going great until we heard Axel yelling at everyone to RUN! 

Not cool Axel...Not cool

Hurricane Party

Now there's nothing fun about natural disasters or people getting injured or their homes destroyed.  We were really lucky that Hurricane Iselle didn't hit us as hard as she was supposed to.  Unfortunately just to the south of us in Puna they received the brunt of everything.  They will most likely be out of power for another couple weeks and probably more than that to clean everything up.  I will say it was very comforting to see how everyone around this island pitched in to help out those in need.  The schools became homes, restaurants became the only places that could provide ice, people offered up their houses for showers and shelter.  It was really cool to see the whole island come together and help one another out.

As like most people on the island we prepared for the worst...as you can see:

Halape, Volcano National Park

Halape is a sweet hike down a volcano down to a secluded beach.  The trail is 8.2 miles (one way).  There's a few stories here I'm not going to get into but just so you're aware, you should always bring more water then you think you need...it's probably a bad idea to bring more whiskey than water...and there may have been a time where a helicopter was almost called in for a rescue.  Piece together whatever you want with that.

Here's some pics:

Bman & Axel

Almost down to the beach!

Thank goodness for coconuts...sorta

Amazing hike...for the most part...

Korea tomorrow

Thanks to Axel, Sarah, Mark and Jess... and Karl!  You guys are incredible, I appreciate everything you have done the last couple weeks.  

Aloha from the Big Island!

I've made it to the beautiful island of Hawaii!  I finally arrived here on the evening of July 29th and have been running/swimming/driving around non stop since.  This little vacation on the way to South Korea has been amazing.

One of the first things we did once I arrived was drive up Mauna Kea.  Mauna Kea is a dormant volcano standing 13,803 ft above sea level, its peak is the highest point in the state of Hawaii.  Three of us really enjoyed the long bumpy ride up...one of us did not enjoy it so much.  On top of this volcano are the world's largest observatories for optical, infrared, and sub-millimeter astronomy.

I would say the coolest thing we have done here so far is night diving with the Manta Rays in Kona.  The four of us went out on a small boat with My Kona Adventures (www.mykonaadventures.com).  This was amazing for a few reasons, I've never gone diving at night so that was pretty wild itself.  Then, I didn't really know what to expect as far as how big these things were or how close they would get to us.  It didn't take long  for these massive creatures to start swimming along the bottom maybe 20ft directly below us.  We held on to the side of a raft that had a underwater light and would attract all this plankton, then the massive manta ray would look up, open it's mouth and shoot up right at us!  At the last second before swimming into us it would flip back so that it was basically belly to belly with us and then swim back down.  They would keep circling for the plankton many times, each time skimming our bellys or elbows as it swam by.

I have about 2 weeks before I have to leave Hawaii and start my life in S. Korea so I hope to keep you all posted on the the trouble we cause in the upcoming weeks.  We received word that a category four hurricane named Iselle is on the way...so that could be interesting.