18.02 Hawaii: Surfing, cocktail cruize and whale watching

Today had 2 highlihts: surfing and whales. In the morning we got to sleep in till 9, then got ready to head to Lahanai for early lunch.

My surfing lesson started at 12:30. This time I had a private instructor, no need to do the whole 30 minute instruction on the sand first and no need to stand around by the buoys waiting for your turn :) Also, this instructor got a bit different apprach on how to get up on the board - oh was I glad, as the last instructors guidelines were just so complicated that getting up on the board seemed impossible and took forever. Todays lesson was not about getting up on the board anymore, now it was all about getting up fast and manouvering. Oh it was great. I got so much background information on how the waves hit, how to time the glide, pointers on what I'm doing wrong, how do the rules go on catching a wave and so on and so on. During the breaks when we were waiting around for the waves we were just chit-chatting about life. It was great time, very informative, yet relaxed and fun. Also, the instructor, he was a real eye candy :) I wish I could sqeeze one more lesson in :D, but unfortunately our time is all booked and we are leaving the day after tomorrow already.

Mostly the experience is gathered by being in the water of course. Also each location is different, surges and drafts are different, waves form differently and so on. When surfing at a new location then the best bet is to follow the more experienced surfers and perhaps get somebody to explain the waters and help a bit with lineup. I guess the first time should be with an instructor if possible and then try to go out on your own couple of times.

In the afternoon we had scheduled a cocktail sunset cruize. Cruize was organized by Pacific Whale Foundation again. We got to see many many whales very close up, doing surges, flips, sprinkling water and going for deep dive. As the captain said we are swimming around in a whale soup :) There was a mommy teaching her calf how to jump out of the water, they did it couple of times - mommy first and then the baby followed, they were real close to the boat while jumping :) Then there was another one, little baby, who was clearly trying to do some sort of flip or go for deep diving, but did not manage and only had his tale stuck out of the water. Some people on the boat were joking that it is doing a head stand :)

Hawaiian language is great, they have all kinds of long and funny names. For one example is the state fish of Hawaii called "humuhumunukunukuapua'a" :) Street names and peoples names are funny like that as well.