NY represents in HI

Today I hung out with Kar-Hai and his girlfriend Gina for a few hours. Kar Hai is my old friend from high school and the only person to date who has moved further West than anyone I know from NY. His girlfriend spent a couple of years in NY, but it's really her name that makes her "New York" ;) The stuff we did was a bit touristy but SO successful, and now I can strike these things off from my list of places I haven't seen in Oahu.

We re-visited Giovanni's shrimp shack which was delicious as always. The inspiration for my butter and garlic shrimp when Joyce was here came from this little food van. But I have to say theirs is a helluva lot better! Kar Hai peels a mean shrimp, I think he ate his 12 in something like 8 minutes, some poor shrimp left with shells practically intact! Gina nibbled on some rice and we left to go to Shark's Cove, a famous snorkeling area.

Unfortunately the weather was tenuous, a mix of sun and clouds which made visibility difficult. Shark's cove is surprisingly rocky, and the rocks are craggy and dangerous. It was so hard to even get out into the cove without scraping yourself. My only times snorkeling were off boats, so I had something to hold onto (ladders, ropes, etc). Even though it wasn't deep, having nothing to anchor myself to, I totally freaked out and had to go back ashore since I can't swim. Kar Hai and Gina came out soon after and we got drenched in a little sunstorm with the hard, pelty rain, but it lasted for all of 3 minutes. They didn't stay out long and soon led me to the tidepools where we saw some cool little sea creatures and just rested some before going to see. ..

SEA TURTLES!!! The last time that Joyce and I were here, there were no turtles in sight! This time there were 2!! I didn't realize how HUGE they were! Poor things, they had quite a few people gathered nearby, but some respect was given and nobody crossed the bright pink yarn that was put a few feet surrounding them. My god they were big! And looked annoyed, understandably. But I have to say it made my day to see them!

Then Kar Hai tried to take us to Gina's mom's Coffee & Chocolate shop on the main drag but the store was closed. She was probably taking a nap! It's a well known fact that Hawaii does stuff on its own, sweet time, which I think is great. But this was actually the first time I had wanted to go somewhere or do something and found it closed during normal business hours. This visit has been really convenient with stores being open more consistently ;)

So 3 wonderful events in one day, thanks to my seriously West, East Coast Crew -  Kar Hai and Gina =) They were off the next day to go camping in some cabins, although I can't imagine what that would be like considering living in Hawaii is kinda like camping already!