Hawaii :)

Hilo, Hawaii

This is on The Big Island. We saw land early in the morning around five! Everyone got up in order to see the ship dock!  It was great to see land again and see city lights, buildings, and know that we would soon be able to walk on solid ground again! My friends and I decided to do complete independent travel the first day.  We went into town and walked around and had some breakfast and enjoyed being around civilization again. The town was small yet had the feeling of typically Hawaii. Hilo is not a touristy town at all which was extremely interesting to see the real Hawaiian cultural instead of the typical golf course, beach, fancy hotel atmosphere. Majority of the people were speaking Hawaiian so we often felt completely immersed into a different cultural. We had learned so much on Hawaii history so we often felt we were in a culture that was completely different than the mainland of the US.
My friends and I decided to take the free public bus and see where it took us.  The bus was interesting and a great experience. We were surrounded by locals that were all extremely friendly. We asked them questions and all very willing to help us with anything. We ended up at a black sand beach. It was beautiful with the light blue water crashing against the black lava rocks.  We even saw a turtle!! Many SAS students had the same idea and it turned into what felt like springs break. So we were entertained by that for bit and then decided to leave.  We wen to a lu’au at night! The lu’au was a really interesting experience in order to see the typical hula dances, listen to their music, and understand something that is still extremely important in their culture. They did several different dance that included chants, dancing and singing. At the end they tried to teach everyone the hula.
        The second day in Hilo I went snorkeling through a SAS trip. We took a bus ride to the other side of the island. The other side was another little town that was has small little shops and restaurant. We took a small boat out to where we are going to snorkel and we saw whales. Apparently it is breeding season so the whales were everywhere. We saw both the calf and the mother whales. We then went to our snorkeling spot where we were able to see TONS of fish! It was great! My favorite fish was this small poke-a-dotted little fishy. It was crazy to snorkel and then get back on the ship to think that all of that and so much more is under me. It is amazing how detailed every part of the ocean is. I have never thought of snorkeling in the way that I did today. I know it sounds cheesy but I feel like I became more in touch with nature because I came into with such a different attitude after being on the open sea for days. After snorkeling people went cliff jumping off these lava rocks.

Honolulu
We then arrived in Honolulu early the next morning, which was an completely different experience, opposite of Hilo.  The feel was busy, not as friendly, and dramatically felt like a typical tourist. We took the public bus to Waikiki beach. We rented surfboards and attempted to surf. It was a blast we all did not do to well because it is extremely difficult. I got up once for a few seconds. We walked around all the really nice stores such as Gucci and others. At night we met up with two of my friends from high school. It was really fun to hang out with them. They took us around all night!

The next day my friend took us to the North Shore where there was a surfing competition at Pipeline. It was a blast and the waves were huge!!  He was able to show us all his favorite beaches and we even saw two turtles! The day was great we had the best shaved ice with ice cream in the middle and had a great local restaurant. It was such a fun day that was really relaxing and saw a whole different side to this island. I got destroyed in the waves too!! ☺  GREAT TIME IN HAWAII now were on our way to Japan and will be there in about 11 days!! YAHOO