Back in Ithaca, missing Hawaii

After a day of traveling I'm back in Ithaca. It's cold but friendly - the taxi operators didn't answer the phone but a fellow traveler secured a ride for me and all my stuff from the airport into town.

My little vacation in Hawaii was fantastic. I didn't do as much as I had planned - no hike out to Kaena Point, no visiting old stone temples or heritage sites, no Bishop Museum. What I did do was a lot of relaxing, meeting fellow travelers at the hostel and hanging out on Waikiki beach.

The absolute highlight of my stay on O'ahu was the surfing lesson I took on Wednesday. I joined two other ladies for a group lesson at a surf school next door to the hostel and boy, did we get lucky! A ridiculously handsome and broad shouldered tanned blond guy took us out to the Queen's Surf and had us riding waves in no time (well, the other two were riding waves in no time). For some reason it didn't come as easily to me as two years ago... but with my usual stubbornness I finally made it :)

The good thing about taking a lesson (apart from actually learning how to do this stuff - and (in this instance) the eye candy factor ;) is that the instructor gives you a push so that you can catch the wave. Try as I might on Friday, when I rented a board and went out by myself on Waikiki to fight for space with the other novice surfers, I could hardly paddle fast enough to catch the wave by myself. My arms were already impossibly sore after Wednesday's surfing, and so were my knees, the tops of my toes, the insides of my arms and (of all places) my pubic bone. Yep, it's a hard life :) But even if I didn't manage to ride a wave it was fun and as beautiful as can be, with Diamond Head in the distance and the white-sand beach stretching for miles.

Thursday was supposed to be all about snorkeling and cultural exploration on O'ahu's west (leeward) coast. As I was driving to the town of Wai'anae, where the snorkeling boat trip was to happen, I heard on the radio that the season's biggest swells were headed for Oahu's North Shore and that the waves might reach 20 to 30 feet. Being the surfer wannabe that I am I instantly decided to speed over there after the boat trip and watch, ditching all other plans.

The boat trip was fine. The heavy swell/surf had stirred the coastal waters up a lot so that the choice of snorkeling sites had become limited, meaning that all the boats doing this operation let their guests out in the same place. Thus, congestion and collisions were the order of the day during the snorkeling session itself. In the end we managed to put in about 20 minutes of hanging out in the water with all kinds of rainbow-colored fish. I was also lucky enough to spot a sea turtle hurrying away from the 50 or so tourists crowding her living quarters. At another point we saw schools of dolphins in the water and tried to get into the water with them, but they swam away as fast as they could when we started splashing in the water. Another attraction during the trip was a small pod of humpback whales. Very nice indeed although honestly, snorkeling is not really for me. Not enough action, you see.

Getting back to shore I couldn't get to the North Shore fast enough. When I finally made it up there, through the pineapple plantations of Central O'ahu, the traffic jam strung out for several kilometers - I obviously wasn't the only one who'd thought of going north for the day. It was pretty obvious where the action was at: people had parked their cars along the highway in Waimea Bay for the best views, almost reducing the road to one lane. I camped out in Waimea for a while, watching the incredible surf and incredible surfing (check this video to see what was going on), I drove up and down the coast to check out other famous surf spots and finally ended the day by watching the sunset in Waimea Bay.

And now it's back to the everyday life. Do my tax return. Find a place to live. Pay the credit card. Order more lab supplies. And life goes on.