Hawaii!! Day Two

We took tons of pics of the guys surfing on the Bonzai Pipeline. It was fun to watch them catch wave after wave. They were so far out that it was hard to get a good pix. Lots of long boards and lots of boogie boards and several body surfers of all ages.

Shark's Cove at Sunset

Shark's Cove in the daytime. This is where we did some snorkeling. Craig traveled the farthest and saw the most stuff. There was a reef of somekind to the left and out to sea more in the pix. The waves would crash over the reef and a lot of young guys were out there playing in the waves on the reef. Yes, I did try snorkeling~it took me a LONG time to get used to wearing that mask and then putting my head down in the water but I did see some fun stuff. Dad was extremely patient with me. As our knees and feet passed over the coral rocks, we got the strangest little swollen cuts on our bodies. Dad got a rather long one that took a few weeks to heal.

This is Turtle Beach. Aout 11 am everyday, these big sea turtles swim up onto shore and bury themselves in the sand to 'bask' (as stated on the sign). It is fun to see them in the surf as they bob and play around before they come up. Then they use their flippers to crawl along in the sand to get to the perfect spot. The minute they are settled, the turtle protection volunteers place the red rope around them and allow NOBODY with 6 feet of the turtles.

They are very passionate about their work and know each turtle by name and how old they are. Some turtles even have little locating devices placed on their shells.

We visited here several times. One of the times, I was standing close as a turtle came up and reached my hand out to help the volunteer lady as she was scurrying around trying to place the red rope before anybody could get to the turtles. She was SO appreciative that I was her very best friend for the rest of our time there. She invited me to join their group if I was going to be in Hawaii for a while and made sure that we had the very best photo op before we left.

The volunteers were very helpful with information but very passionate about their work!

Our second day is Hawaii was beach day. We visited Turtle beach, Sunset Beach, Hukelau(sp) Beach and many more. We snorkled and swam and generally just enjoyed some of the excellent beaches on the North Shore. I believe that this was also the day that we ate shrimp from one of the shrimp farmers along the Kam Highway. As you travel along you see lots of ponds of water along the Highway with grassy banks and little ramadas with picnic tables where you can order fresh shrimp. It was delicious!