The first leg of the journey is over. Got a nice boring video of the my plane taking me away from
Canadian soil for the next year, plus some pictures of Vancouver and Victoria Island. It was neat flying close to the towns on the island as seeing all the walking paths criss-crossing through the forests. There were also a bunch of clear cut areas throughout the island, sorta cool to see them from that prospective since I was more use to being in the middle of them shoving trees into the ground.
Tried to get the obligatory "last view of Canada" shot but the sun started shining right into the plane window and had to close it for sanity sake. Beautiful sunset though later in the day, unfortunately the plane wing covered up the sun, leaving a gorgeous colour gradient along the entire horizon.
And then my first view of Hawaii, which the camera didn't pick up. I'm excited for the flight away from the island to see it during the day. I was also surprised at the amount of lights on the island. Maybe it's just the size of the island in comparison to Ontario since you can see the entire island from the air.
But I landed safely and was found by my cousin.
I've been lucky enough that the jet lag is working in my favour. After landing we went back to their place and I passed out for the night. Though only 23:00, it felt more like 05:00. Also meant that I was up by 08:00, ready to go for the day. I also didn't really plan it around their schedule, but landing on a Friday was great since they had the weekend off.
They have a nice little house on the army residential reserve. Really nice view to wake up too. Haven't seen a guard yet but waiting for me to get stopped and questioned. The map is for the island we are on and staying just south of the 99 icon above Wahiawa.
Our first activity was a short hike up to one of the "pill boxes", an old military bunker. It was a "lovely" climb up a hill that my watch claimed is a 145 m accent, only to stand up on top before heading back down. Luckily there were a few flat spots where you got a great view and an oh so sweet breeze. Though I wasn't too nervous standing on top of the bunker looking over the cliff, watching the like 5 kids run around and jump from the middle of the roof to the lip around the edge, which over looked the cliff, gave me a heart attack. It was a nice hour long hike.
After sweating it up on the hike, it was beach time. The beach was really nice with fine sand, warm water, and not too crowded. Last time I swam in the Pacific Ocean was off the Haida Qwaii island by Prince Rupert, BC. And that was cold. We were joined by my cousin's cousin, and spent a few hours in the water or sunbathing. Only watched one person get stung by a jellyfish. I was only a little red after the beach. Stupid farmers tan.
To finish off the day, we stopped at a local brewery to try their beer. I had to try the pinehopple since why not. It was refreshing. Everyone on the island also has these hydroflasks which are meant to keep drinks insulated for 24 hours. And stores like the brewery have special deals for filling them up, so people were coming in for 40 to 60 oz refills. I like it. After that we went home, ate dinner, then passed out early again.
The next day we went to the beach again, because Hawaii. Driving down the road, you constantly pass other beaches, each which are world famous for this or that reason according to my cousin. The beach we choose had a giant rock for jumping off. I estimated about 10 m high. (That's me in the second rock picture).
The beach was also decent for snorkeling which I wanted to try. I swam around the rocks, such as the one you can see in the first picture above. Lots of different fish and one large turtle. Poor guy had dozens of people constantly swimming around him. I also tried borrowing my cousin's Gopro. Did not get the picture/video I wanted of the fish and turtle, but I'm not disappointed in what I did get.
Throughout the afternoon, we would see a dolphin far out in the water jump around a bit. By the time we were getting ready to go, two pods swam relatively close the the beach. My cousin wanted to try swimming out to join them, so of course I went with her. Though she didn't go the whole way, I took the Gopro. I didn't go as close as some of the other people, especially all the wake boarders, but I was within 20 ft of them for a bit. Making my cousin super jealous since she's been here 2.5 years and hasn't gotten that close yet.
My cousin's husband also fits right in with my American cousins for their bad Canadian and American jokes.
The day was finished off by going for shaved ice. It was delicious. Though I got a bunch of the fixings, I wouldn't recommend the beans, and their Mochi Balls were just flavourless dough. Afterwards, we went home, ate, and passed out again. I was suppose to stay out of the sun a bit or wear a shirt... but snorkeling and dolphins. So now I'm very red and a little painful. Had to sleep on my stomach. With cousins at work, going to take it easy over next couple days to heal, but we'll see how well that goes.
