December 23rd, Monday. I blinked my eyes open at 4am and rolled out of bed. After packing the last of my things I hopped in the car and drove to Vancouver to meet up with my friend Ryan — we had an early flight to catch. After leaving his car in the overflow lot and going through a not too busy security line, we grabbed a quick breakfast near the gate. There was a boarding delay of a few hours due to the flight computer not calibrating all of the parameters correctly, but after a couple hours we were in the air with a nice view of downtown Portland. We were sat in the very back row next to the bathrooms, and one of the (very nice) flight attendants offered us free drinks! Everyone in our row chose Crater Lake Hazelnut Espresso Vodka (not sponsored) over ice, and she even gave us Irish Cream to go along with it! Our flight was direct from PDX —> KOA and took about 6 and a half hours.

Once we landed, Ryan's dad picked us up and we headed straight to the resort to get settled in. After refreshing a little and having a bite to eat, we headed over to the pool and swam around for bit. We then got ready for a dinner reservation at a sushi bar nearby called Sansei's. Everything there was great, just a bit pricey. I ordered a tropical mai tai, and the fish was amazing, specifically the hamachi (yellowtail) and bluefin tuna. This was my first time in Hawaii, and nothing here looked real to me — the tall palm trees, the goats and birds roaming around, the color of the water! We stayed on the big island (Hawaiʻi) for our trip, but I will definitely have to come back to explore the others some day. Next time I'll cross surfing off of my bucket list for sure. I've never been anywhere tropical either — all of my previous travels were on very similar latitude lines so the climate was relatively similar everywhere I went. Mid 80's weather in December is definitely something new.

I don't have much to tell you about the next day. We spent it at the pool, in the sun, and just relaxing. We also got some groceries and made burgers for dinner! Very nice. The following day, Christmas, ended up being the biggest day of the trip. We woke up early, and packed into the car to make a loop of the big island, which we had set aside the whole day to do. We made a pretty quick stop for some Malasadas (popular doughnuts in Hawaii originating from Portugal) about 10 minutes out of the resort. Once we were on the road again, we had about 70 miles (113km) until we reached our next stop, ʻAkaka Falls. The trail was a little over half a mile (~1km) in total and took us by a second further waterfall, Kahuna Falls. You couldn't actually see the second falls very well, so I didn't get any good shots of it. The rainforest around us was almost more awe inspiring than the actual waterfalls, although I think we're spoiled in the Pacific NW in that regard. ʻAkaka Falls itself has an impressive drop of 442 feet (135m) down to the bottom, although we couldn't see the bottom from the trail. Overall it was a nice walk to stretch our legs but next time I'd try to find falls we could get closer to.

Another 70 miles away was our next stop, Punaluʻu Beach. This is a beach with black sand formed from the lavarock where sea turtles like to rest. This beach is also located in the reaches of Volcanoes National Park. We set up at a picnic table and ate some sandwiches we had packed, before exploring the beach. There were lots of people enjoying the beach, and a few people had stands offering fresh coconuts. We stayed until the sun set over the volcano. I'm beginning to think that this blog is cursed, because when transferring some of the images from the camera to my laptop, about 60 picutures got corrupted beyond repair. I'll show you what is left below!

Our original plan for the loop also included going up to the volcano as it was erupting at the time, however when we checked the live camera feed the caldera was only smoking so we headed back home instead. The next morning we decided to visit a nearby beach I spotted on google maps. Mahai'ula beach is located inbetween the airport and the resort we were staying at, and looked great for swimming! There is a two mile "road" that branches off of the main highway, although calling it a road would be generous — its really more of a trail. If we weren't in a 4x4 Jeep I don't think we would've made it at all. We walked along the shore until we found a spot we liked and jumped right in the water. The waves were pretty big (at least for me)! It did stay shallow for a long time with sharp lava rock lurking below the surface where you couldn't see them. We probably could've avoided that by swimming further out, but we stayed pretty close to the beach the whole time. Next time I WILL learn how to surf.

Our last day before our flight home was mostly spent relaxing, although we did go to the Costco in Kona, and I had the best poke of my life at a small shop in an industrial area nearby. If any of you happen to be in Kona, its called Pau Hana Poke. I had been hoping to take some pictures of the stars while I was here because it is so dark everywhere! There are certain laws in Hawaii meanth to regulate light pollution for a number of reasons (I agree with all of them, more of that everywhere else please). Aside from the first night, a mixture of smoke from the volcano and clouds blocked the stars, and I was getting worried that I'd missed my chance. I made my way to the beach to catch the sunset anyways. But as it got dark, the stars aligned (pun intended)! I stood in roughly the same circle for about an hour taking pictures of different points in the sky. It was nice to finally scratch that astrophotographgy itch again! After this we went to sleep and made the journey home. Getting a taste of Hawaii was incredible and I can't wait to be back!