16.02 Hawaii: day full of sports

After a loong looong time, well after 3 very long days and sleepless nights, I finally got to sleep in. And guess what? I was up a bit after 7 :D So ironic. Also this was the first morning when I had time to go running on the beach! Oh it was great. All the way down the beach and back was exactly a 30 minute jog. Next time I will have a chance to go running on Wednesday I think, then I will try to go all the way down and back one way and then the other way as well, that should come to at least 45-55 minute run.

The whole time I was running I stared at the water trying to spot some whales. At the time there is whales mating season. For them it goes this way that the females pick the males so males are jumping and wagging their tales and doing all sorts of tricks to impress the females. I did not see any in the morning, but in the evening when the sun was setting we were playing with the waves on the beach by our hotel and then we saw quite many whales cruising by and sprinkling water up in the air. Some of them jumped all the way out of the water and flapped their tail as well. Hopefully on Wednesday we will see them up close from the boat when we will be on the cocktail cruise.

Allright, back the day. So after running we got ready to head over to Lahaina where we had scheduled a surfing lesson to start at 12:30. We were divided into groups and each instructor got from 4 to 6 people. We were provided with special shoes and shirts. Headed over to the beach, each got to carry their own board from the car down to the beach. Apparently the bigger the board the easier it is to surf, makes sense to me only up to a point. I get it that it is more stable, but isn't it also more difficult to maneuver it? Anyhoo, each got a board and carried it over to the sand. Whole course lasted 2 hours. First 30 minutes we spent on the sand going over the moves, rules and theory. All sounded quite simple, not too many rules and all sounded pretty logical. To the water we go. First we paddled to an assigned spot by the buoys where our instructor got us one by one and headed out the sea to catch the waves. As you might guess the theory is lost quick when trying to do it in practice. Well but we all got up from the board and glided almost like pro's (some more and some less :D ). I absolutely loved it, although my balance is horrible on my two feet :)

Since there were 4 of us and only one instructor we had to stand (or I should say glide) around in the water quite a bit. We were in the water about 1 hour and 15 minutes I'm guessing and we got to ride the waves 4 times. Rest of the time we just paddled around and watched others. Since I absolutely loved the whole thing, being in the water in general and of course riding the waves, I arranged another lesson for Wednesday. This time it is going to be only me and the instructor. Today the instructor chose the waves for us and sometimes gave our board some speed by pushing, he would also shout of when we would have to push back on the board and get up on our feet. I'm hoping that next time when I have the lesson I'm gonna learn to choose and catch the waves all by myself, so that in the future I don't need any more assistance and can just rent a board and head out the ocean :) Wish me luck!

In the afternoon we just had nice late lunch, did some shopping and then headed back to the hotel. Spent some time on the beach, in a hot water Jacuzzi by the hotel pool and that was it. Nothing more for today :)

Tomorrow is Wytni's 30th birthday! In the morning we are scheduled for some snorkeling and watching turtles as well as visiting couple of places by the boat. Activities start at 6:15 in the morning and are over by 13:00. In the evening we are going to Hawaiian luau. Paarrrtyyyy!!!