Capturing the Moment

Lea Ready to Roll   On my circle island tours I drive past the huge Kualoa Ranch all the time, yet I have never ventured deeper into the ranch itself. There are several tours that allow you access to the ranch lands varying from movie location bus tours, to ATV tours, to horseback rides, and jungle vehicle tours. I knew that Lea is always on the lookout for famous movie locations so we jumped into the remodeled school bus for an hour long tour through Kualoa and Ka'awa Valley, or as I like to call it 'Jurassic Valley.' Sugar Mill Ruins WWII Bunker   On the way to the movie locations we passed the ruins of the old sugar mill, hearing the story of how the 9 year old son of the plantation manager slipped and fell into one of the boiling vats of syrup back in the 1860's. We passed WWII pillboxes and a massive bunker that housed some rapid fire guns that could have aided in the defense of the Kaneohe Marine Corps Base. ATV exploring On the Set of Jur...

  Diamond Head Crater looms just behind the bustling tourist district of Waikiki here on Oahu. The tallest part of the crater rim is only 762' above sea level but the hike up can make it seem much higher. The trail winds up from the bottom of the crater floor about 8/10ths of a mile to the summit. Lea and I headed out early in the morning to tackle this hike before the hot sun made it even more difficult.    We were pretty lucky, it was a cold morning and lots of clouds kept it overcast almost the whole way. The clouds also made the landscape pictures even more dramatic. We had a few photo stops on the way up but for the most part Lea and I trekked up with no problem. I made sure to take Lea up the extreme path to the top; 99 stairs straight up, a spiral staircase through the bowels of an old military bunker, a squeeze out of the bunker, and a loop up to the very top. The view was amazing!   From the top we could see Koko Crater on the southeast coast all t...

  My sister is in town for a visit so I am pulling out all the stops on an adventure filled exploration of Oahu to show her my new island home. She has already been to the big island and visited me on Maui twice so she knew to arrive ready for adventure. Our first day started out at the lookout on the rim of Punchbowl Crater . From the top of the military memorial cemetery here you can look down and have a great view of Honolulu from the airport to Diamond Head. From this serene spot we headed down into the hustle and bustle of Honolulu.   We drove through Waikiki, behind Diamond Head and past the mansions of the Kahala district before arriving at the famous Kahala Hotel. A few weeks earlier my mom discovered dolphins and sea turtles here swimming in the lagoon which the hotel surrounds. Lea and I happened to be there during one of their dolphin experience shows so we sat and watched the bottlenose dolphins show off just how intelligent they can be. The surroundings of t...

Turtle Sunburst On a beautiful sunny morning with slight offshore winds Heidi and I decided to go on a critter hunt at one of our favorite reefs off the west side of Oahu. We used Electric beach as our entry point and hung a left once out in the clear water. We came across some big schools of surgeon fish and tangs which contrasted nicely with the stark white sand. Heidi searching for interesting animals Heidi and her turtle    It had been awhile since Heidi and I had been free diving so we both needed to re-hone our breath holding skills. My short breath holds were evident when we came across our first turtle. But the more I dove the longer I was able to stay down. One turtle surfaced right next to me but for the most part the turtles were chomping away along the bottom eating up the algae. Hawaiian Day Octopus   It is always great hanging with turtles but I get even more amped swimming with octopus, especially if they are too big to find easy hi...

 The last four days were spent surfing some of the best waves in the world, all right here at home on the North shore of Oahu. Ben flew over from Maui and joined on the surf mini vacation. We explored a lot from the northeast all the way to the secluded west coast beaches to find the best conditions for surf. Ben and Jonathan surfed Makaha for the first time ever, then we found a new wave at Maili Point. It was pretty amazing to find such a nice, fast left amongst all the rights on Oahu's west shore.    But the real sparks were from the famous North shore waves. We stopped to look at pipeline and it was pretty flawless. The crowd was pretty intense as was the current on the inside. Jamie O'Brien and others were making the wave look much easier than it actually is. After watching a couple of surfers going over the falls into that shallow inside section we decided to move further down the beach to massive triple overhead waves at Sunset. At the end of the four da...

Hanging on in the current   Built in the 1940's, the YO-257 saw action in several different war campaigns across the Pacific. After surviving WWII, Vietnam, and Korea, it was lent to the Coast Guard as a transport ship. The YO came to its final resting place 100ft down off the shore of Waikiki in 1989 after being intentionally sunk to create an artificial reef by the Atlantis submarine company.   Heidi and I headed out early morning on the Kilikina dive boat with Hawaiian Diving Adventures to explore the YO wreck ourselves. It is a pretty deep dive bottoming out around 100ft so we would only have 20minutes or so. We were greeted with beautiful ocean conditions with clear water and no wind with beautiful sunshine above.    Looking down into the water one other thing was clear, there was a current, and strong one at that. Divemaster Erica and orange cup corals   The boat was equipped for the current with lines running down the side to hole onto. I...