The Rogue Islander

Friday, April 13, 2012

SHARKS! and Makapu'u Point

Matt and I went on our first Dive Club dive last Saturday. It was supposed to be a shore dive off of the North Shore but the surf was still too rough (4-8 ft), so the site was changed to Electric Beach. Dive Club dives are pot-luck style so we spent the day eating some delicious food, going on a couple of great dives, and meeting some really nice people. One of those people, a guy named Abner, came with us on our two dives.

We started by making our way to the turtle caves. We saw a turtle and swam with it for a little bit...

...and we also found our first shark:

It was about 6', and we almost missed it because it was hidden in the shadow of the overhang. Matt spotted it, though, because of the light reflecting off of the white tips of its fins. Guess what kind of shark it is? White Tip Reef Shark. The name makes so much sense.

After this, Matt saw another shark (about 4') swimming away and decided to follow it. We swam behind it until we came to another very vibrant part of the reef. The shark swam into one of the overhanging structures and avoided the video we tried to get of it. However, we did get some great shots of the other wildlife:

School of blue-stripe snapper

So many!

Hey! Where ya goin'?

Ahh...Matt Attack.

Another shot of the reef. So much life!

I was about to scrap this shot, until I looked closely and saw that one of us accidentally got a photo of another shark. You can see the slightly lighter line under the overhang. That's probably the 4' guy we were chasing.

Pincushion seastar - so vibrant! I saw another one that was bright blue and rich purple, but didn't have a chance to get a good shot. Maybe next time.

Yellow coral with two Yellow Tang

A boxfish. I love these little guys.

Brilliant green coral

The brown guy is a lizardfish, if you google image search it, there are some crazy pictures. The blue guy is a Hawaiian Sergeant fish - they love jumping in my pictures.

Here is a video mashup of clips from our dives. Matt filmed all three:

The first part shows the school of snapper and some other divers, the second shows you a little more of the area of the reef we were exploring, the third shows the shark we found (at a different part of the reef).
We ended our second dive by hanging around the end of the pipe. We watched some turtles feeding along the rocks, below the main current. All of a sudden, one of the turtles swam too high and got swept up by the current and tossed like a leaf in the wind. We watched him try to make his way back down for a little bit, and then started to make our own way back. The turtle decided to join us and caught up with our group and then slowed down to swim next to Matt for a while.

We left Electric Beach feeling very accomplished and decided to go a step further in our adventuring and go on the Makapu'u Point Hike. It's a mostly paved trail that starts past Hawaii Kai/Koko Head along the East Coast of the island.

On the way up, we saw a ton of catci.

cactuses?

petrified cactus

As we were walking along the trail, we kept seeing small side trails that led nowhere or into thick vegetation:

Matt and I couldn't help but think that we were a part of some Lost episode. It turns out that we weren't too crazy in thinking that, seeing as they filmed a good chunk of the show here:

The giant tower is a prop they built for the show

Pretty cool. As we continued along the hike, there were some places among the breakers that caused "blowholes". Water from caverns in the cliff side would burst out and shoot up into the air with the added pressure of the surf. I didn't get a picture of this, but here is some ridiculously blue surf.

As we walked the path, I was on the lookout for humpback whales. This part of the ocean is designated as a national sanctuary for the whales. Unfortunately, we didn't see any this time. A little further up the trail, we caught a side view of our destination. There is an alternate path that takes you directly to the lighthouse (you can see it bordered by the fence). Matt and I walked the path that takes you above the lighthouse, though I'd like to try this one sometime.

Views from the top!

looking up the coast

The big one is Rabbit Island, named because it looks like a large rabbit head rising out of the ocean. The smaller one is Kaohikiapu Islet. I believe both are bird sanctuaries.

Apparently, this lighthouse has the biggest lens of any lighthouse in service in the US and is the 3rd highest light in the country. The more you know...

Views of Koko Head (first mound), Hanauma Bay (smaller and to the left), and Diamond head is a small speck to the right of Koko Crater

Clearer views of Diamond Head

And, finally, the obligatory warning sign:

albeit unconventional

A leak in the back of a boat is a stern warning.

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Playing Catch-Up and Byodo-In Temple

I can't believe it's already April. Matt and I have been living here for almost 5 months. FIVE! So crazy... You know what else is crazy? In the next two weeks I'll finally get to see these beautiful faces:

Mikko: New Homeowner
Bearded, Flannel-Wearing Surfer-Dude

Tom and Joan: Outstanding Parents
Mai-Tai Enthusiasts

Paola: Talented Photographer
Awesome Italian Exchange Student

WOOOOOOOO!!! That said, I need to catch up on my blogging before our visitors arrive.

One Saturday, Matt and I explored a little more of the North Shore. We stopped at a couple of beaches, then had a late lunch at Giovanni's Shrimp Truck. While Matt and I waited, we were entertained by the music coming from the truck and the cooks singing along to it. Every now and then the truck would start bouncing violently as the guys started dancing. Food always tastes better when the people serving it are having a good time. We got our plates and found some seats at a picnic table. This is the look I got when I said I wanted to take a picture before we dug in:

Sorry!

We shared a plate of Spicy Shrimp and Shrimp Scampi. So yummy.

A Sunday or two later, Matt and I spent a morning at the Byodo-In Buddhist Temple. The temple's website describes it better and more succinctly than I can:

"The Byodo-In Temple is located at the foot of the Ko'olau Mountains in Valley of the Temples Memorial Park. It was established on June 7, 1968, to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the first Japanese immigrants to Hawaii. The Byodo-In Temple in O'ahu is a smaller-scale replica of the over 950-year-old Byodo-in Temple, a United Nations World Heritage Site in Uji, Japan."

If my picture looks a little familiar, it might be because the Byodo-In Temple was one of the filming sites for the TV series Lost:

Jin! Sun! Convenient Shooting Location!

We spent about an hour exploring the temple:

The grounds were very quiet, with many koi ponds and walking paths.

The first thing we saw was the bell:

The Bon-sho (sacred bell) is 5 ft tall and weighs 3 tons.

We got to ring it.

First a donation...

Pull back on the shu-moku...

Release!

Don't underestimate the joy you would feel at ringing a 5 ft bell.

It was really run.

Inside the temple is the Amida Buddha. I'll refer you again to the site's description:

"The Buddha is thought to be the largest figure carved outside of Japan. Towering more than 9 feet, the immense figure is an original work of art carved by the famous Japanese sculptor, Masuzo Inui. When the carving was completed, it was covered with cloth and painted with three applications of gold lacquer. Gold leaf was later applied over the lacquer finish."

The 6-foot carving of a white man in glasses is thought to be no less majestic.

We also stopped at the meditation pavilion:

Pondering life's mysteries

Also pondering

Oh? You say this looks familiar, too? You are correct, my friend:

Another Lost scene

Crazy flowering plant outside the meditation pavilion

To the right of the temple is this small bridge. People feed the fish from here so there are so many koi that linger, waiting for food. There are also some wild black swans:

A couple more views of the temple:

And, finally, sight-seeing visit to somewhere in Hawaii wouldn't be complete without a warning sign:

No sightings this time.

Let me leave you with something to meditate on:

The Buddhist refused painkillers during his root canal because he wanted to transcend dental medication.

Monday, March 12, 2012

AKL Part II and Scuba Adventures

So in the last two weeks, a lot has happened. Matt and I got scuba certified...and we went to Ah Lang again.

First the Ah Lang story:

As you know, AKL rocked our worlds with her food, her games, her anger, and her booze (with a little love mixed in there somewhere). We had to go back. We had to make sure she remembered us and still loved us and we had to eat more of that food. Spoiler Alert: mission accomplished. We went for lunch on Saturday and the restaurant was full. We put in our order and, sadly, it didn't seem like AKL recognized us. We didn't give up hope, though. Lunch was amazing:

Stone Pot Bibimbap - rice, egg (over-easyish), meat, and veggies all mixed together and SO GOOD
Fish Jun (pancake) - exactly what it sounds like and also SO GOOD
There are 6 of those little bowls that have small tastes of kim chee, seaweed salad, yummy noodles and other goodies

The best wings I've ever had. Perfectly crispy, not fatty, amazing flavor. I don't even like wings, but I could eat these every day and not get tired of them. In fact, I want them now.

and we ended up being the last people in the restaurant for lunch. We started talking to a girl and her guy friend who were also there and had been helping out washing dishes and serving food. It turns out that she was AKL's daughter, Samantha. While we were talking, our last experience at the restaurant came up and, when Sam found out Matt cut his finger while washing knives, she cracked up, ran to the kitchen, and started speaking rapidly to AKL in Korean. Apparently, Sam helped out at the restaurant the day after our AKL Adventure 1 and AKL had given Sam a hard time all day, telling her to be careful with the knives while washing them, citing a "Stupid Haole" as the reason.

We were back in.

AKL came out with some Tofu for us to try and inspected Matt's finger. We enjoyed the rest of our lunch and brought our dishes to the back and wiped down our table. Sam loudly expressed her gratitude saying that all customers should be like us. Matt and I were totally modest and kept it cool and were about to leave....when...

AKL gave us some soup to-go that she only makes for her daughter at her request. What kind of soup? Amazingly delicious, homemade fishcake soup. We had it for dinner last night and it tasted like victory.

And now, the Scuba Story:

Matt and I had wanted to get Scuba Certified since we came out here. Unfortunately, it took forever for us to take the class because I had to get medically cleared for a variety of stupid reasons. As you can guess, that took a while. Finally, though, we signed up for Open Water Certification. With this certification, we can dive in "open" conditions (read: no caves) to 60ft.

The class went from 2/27-3/4. We had classes in a classroom on Mon/Wed and classes in the pool on Tue/Thurs both 6-9 PM, then certification dives on Sat/Sun from 7:30 am-noonish. Needless to say, it was a packed week - especially for Matt. The low point? Being stuck in the pool from 6PM until 12:30AM on Tuesday. I'll spare you the details, but know that on Tuesday, our group had 7 people in it. By Dive 2 on Saturday, there were three of us...including Matt and myself. I thought we were on some type of reality show.

The high point? Scuba Diving in the ocean for the first time. I've had flying dreams for as long as I can remember and the first thing that entered my mind when we started exploring the reef was that diving feels like flying. When you're neutrally buoyant in the water, you don't have to worry about floating or sinking, you just worry about controlling where you want to go and it is awesome!

We did our 2 dives Saturday, 2 dives Sunday and were certified...and then did another fun dive on Sunday for a total of 208 minutes of bottom time (all at Electric Beach).

Some high points of those dives:
-watching whales breaching and fluking before getting in the water
-a turtle hanging out with us while doing some of our qualifying skills
-riding the current from the giant pipe
-another diver getting porcupined by a banded urchin:

Yesterday, Matt and I tried to dive Hanauma Bay for a change of scenery. Unfortunately, the conditions were too rough, so we went back to Electric Beach for our first two solo dives. I was a little nervous, but had no reason to be because Matt was an amazing navigator and we had a blast! We used the new underwater camera that my dad surprised us with (THANK YOU!) and, while we are not pros yet, we got some great pictures. I have to admit (though I hate to) that Matt was much better at getting a great shot. I kept drifting away from the subject, haha. Well, I'll stop babbling and let you enjoy some of the pictures:

Matt's Robot Part I...that large coral-covered mass in the background is the pipe

Robot II - Oh yeah

He's got moves. This one looks like he's about to karate chop a shark.

Note: It's very hard to look cool in scuba gear. I am so not there yet.

There are two schools of fish here. The first is the obvious one, I got really close to these guys without the camera. The other is next to the pipe in the background, just hanging out.

Fishy fishy

Matt found an awesome coral overhang/cave that looked very scary and intimidating...until we realized that it's where turtles come to rest. We were surrounded by sea turtles. One was as big as I am, but moved too fast for us to get a good picture.

Rocky I

Rock Neck Monster

While Matt was signaling for us to leave, I had my back to this cave. His eyes went wide and he motioned behind me - I thought there was a shark - but it was this guy. Apparently he was coming from the surface and almost hit me in the head, so when I turned, I had a turtle butt in my face that I thought was a shark. I might have freaked a little bit.