Category: Uncategorized

We had a Halloween Party at our place the weekend before Halloween. The bounce house was a huge hit… as were lollipops. Lots of fun costumes!

Susan, Skylar, and I randomly stopped at this hiking trail / stream not far from our house on one beautiful April day.

Hey Skylar.  Whatcha doing?  Just watching the game, drinking a Bud.  Whatupppppp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sumi and Keith recently moved from their beach front property to Ford Island.  For you history buffs that’s where the airfield was located that was bombed in the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The road leading to their house circles the airfield, to the left dilapidated hangers declared as historic monuments sit in the Hawaiian sun, windows shatters and rusting away.

I woke up early a couple mornings to take pictures of the old air tower.  According to Keith it’s the most haunted building on the island.

Ford Island has these brand new and shiny Levitt Townesque homes within 200 yards of the decaying infrastructure of historical pearl harbor .   Definitely a weird dichotomy and a reminder of the fast pace of life and death, Darwinism on a rapidly changing island state.

This past week I saw in the news that 50 foot waves hit North Shore Oahu (where the world’s biggest surfing competitions are held).  Sumi texted me to let us know she and Keith were heading up there to try and get a first hand look at the insanity.  I’m so jealous!

Our first full day in Oahu, Sumi, Susan, Mason and I drove to the North Shore and got lunch at one of the famous shimp shacks.  On the way we parked on the side of the road for a minute to snap some pics of surfers at sunset beach.

These are shots I took showing seasoned pro’s surfing 17-20 foot waves.  Can you imaging 50 feet!  That’s like surfing from the top of my office 🙂

After checking out the surfing we went farther north to where the world famous Hawaiian “shrimp shacks” are located.  Sumi, 8 months pregnant at the time, declined to partake in the deliciousness.

I had the garlic and butter shrimp and Susan had the spicey garlic.  If you don’t like garlic, I don’t think you had any options.  We were mighty hungry, and it was sooo good.  Totally doused in butter and literally a pound of garlic – it was probably best Sumi didn’t get a plate as her baby would have been born with heart disease from all the cholesterol.

If we get back to Oahu next year, we will be sure to sample the prawns.  For you easterners (hey, I had never heard of them either) a prawn is what I would call a mammoth prehistoric shrimp, ranging in size anywhere from a banana to 15 pounds of shrimpy delight.

Keith rented a boat from the Navy Marina our first weekend in Oahu.  We took it out about 5 miles to a massive sandbar in the middle of the ocean.  There must have been 30 or 40 other boats ‘parked’ around the edge of the sandbar.  You would walk for 1-2 miles in ankle to knee deep water to a remote island in the distance.  We didn’t have time for the walk,  but it was very serene.

We did some snorkeling while we were there.  The drop off was almost straight down – 400 feet to the bottom.  There wasn’t much coral although I did see a few big fish.  None big enough to eat me.

During our second week in Hawaii, we took a quick 30 min flight to Kauai, which is a small, lush, nature lover’s paradise. It has waterfalls (the opening to Fantasy Island was filmed here), hikes galore, beaches, and lots and lots of roosters. Apparently, there was a period when farmers let their animals go, and the roosters flourished. They have no natural predators (no snakes in Hawaii, coyotes, etc) so they are seriously everywhere….at the beach, in the mountains, at the parks, on the hotel grounds. I will forever associate Kauai with roosters.

Native warriors used to jump off Opeaka’a Falls to prove their manliness.  Thank goodness for beer and football today.

The name Opaeka’a means rolling shrimp; the name dates back to days when the native shrimp were plentiful and could be seen in the base of the falls.  It is one of the few waterfalls that can be viewed from a road.

The first day in Kaui Susan took a nappy nap and caught up on some serious jet lag, while I downed enough caffeine to kill a small rodent – perhaps one of the many chickens that invaded this island.  Into the rental car and down the road I went with my trusty tour guide, the 20 page brochure that we picked up at the airport just after we landed.

One of the spots I visited that day was called “Shooting Spout”.  Over thousands of years waves from the ocean rushed into lava tubes.  Eventually water broke through the surface and shot upwards toward the heavens.  This phenomena looks and sounds a lot like a whale blow hole.