Snorkeling

Many moons ago, my grandparents gave my cousin Kate a book called Charlie Brown's Super Book of Questions and Answers. It got passed down to me and my sister, and I saw it recently on the bookshelf of Kate's daughter. In it, among descriptions of many plants and animals, and the Peanuts characters and their little speech bubbles, is a whole little section on sea cucumbers. So when Jay picked up what looked like a huge slug (about a foot long, several inches in diameter, and black - the bottom photo on that page looks most like the one we saw) while we were snorkeling, that page flashed in my mind, although I don't remember the picture in the book (if there was one). Jay also pointed out many other things, mostly fish (unicorn fish, trigger fish, and a sea turtle - almost). A diver in the Navy and an avid surfer and snorkeler, he is a wealth of knowledge. Despite banging my knee on some coral (which really hurts, in case you were wondering), it was a delightful afternoon at the beach, and a nice way to wrap up the week. Thanks Jay!

Paradise Found!

There it is! It got nice out the last two days. Unfortunately, my cousin Laura wasn't feeling well, but her husband Jay kindly took me around Tuesday afternoon. We walked on Waikiki Beach and then hiked up Diamondhead. Then today, since the kids had a half-day of school, we went to the beach! It was pretty cloudy so we didn't take a lot of photos, but Jay did take me snorkeling, which was awesome. Being a diver in the Navy as well as an avid surfer and snorkeler, he knows a lot and it was really fun. Laura and I went to the swap meet, which is a big outdoor market that encircles the University of Hawaii football stadium with gobs of cheapo touristy junk, but I did manage to get a new bathing suit and a sarong. All of these activities are featured in the album "Hawaii Part II" under the Flickr link to the right.

Jay and Laura are going to lend me their big packpack so I should go make sure all my junk fits in there. Then it's off to bed and up early for 10 and a half hours on the plane!

Oh by the way, I am aware that the world clock link on the right ("Sydney Time!") is not working. I'll fix it as soon as I have time. In the meantime, you can go to www.timeanddate.com/worldclock and look it up.

Paradise Lost

Greetings from Hawaii! This is a photo of the sunset from the plane, shortly after takeoff from LA. The sun was setting for about an hour as we followed it west.


My friend Paul referred to Hawaii as Paradise the other day, but the weather here has been uncharacteristically grey and rainy, which has proved finding activities difficult. On Saturday, my cousin Laura, her husband Jay, and their boys Keegan, Brendan and Collin took me on a driving tour of Oahu, which included the Heiau, Laniakea (Turtle) beach, and Byodo-In Temple. On Sunday, we were rained in most of the day but did manage to drive to Ford Island and see the base and Pearl Harbor from the west. Today (Tuesday), Laura and I took the kids to school and then went to the USS Arizona Memorial. We had lunch with Jay (who got out of work early due to sewage overflow in Pearl Harbor from the rain) and Collin at the Rainbow Bay Marina, and then hung out at their house.


The weather is supposed to get better the rest of this week so maybe I'll have photos from the beach and other outdoor activities later! In the meantime, check the Flickr link on the right for the album "Hawaii Part I"!