Asian Drivers Will Get You Every Time...

Day 6 : I finally got on the surfing grind. I woke up early to get a morning session in. I was kind of nervous with this being my first solo outing, but still pumped. I cruised down to an area called Ala Moana, a local spot with consistent mid-sized waves rolling in. I was trying to remember all of the things that Kimo had taught me in my lessson, but with surfing there is so much to think about. Surfing is 90% paddling and swimming which I had found out earlier this summer at LF, was no my strong point. You have to know where the channels are to swim out through the incoming tide, you have to know where the wave is going to break, when to start paddling and charging the wave, who has priority on a wave, how to stay out of peoples way and most importantly, where the jagged reef is. Needless to stay, I didn't know where the jagged reef was, and found myself hovering 12 inches above it, then proceeded to get washed onto it, leaving me scraped and cut up. Cool. I finally ran into my buddy Alex who worked a local surf shop. He gave me some direction and showed me some powerful paddling techniques and soon after I called it good for that session.

Still craving more surf, a few hours later I set out to a beach called Diamond Head. Much faster and larger sets of waves with lots of wind. It was a more spread out area with less people which I thought would help me out. Wrong. I paddled out through the channel and got set up in a good spot. Tried to catch one, fell and got washed. From there on was I was in a pickle. I got stuck in the area where the waves break hard and couldn't get out to where I needed to be. I tried fighting through the sets for about 45 minutes. I knew where I needed to be there, but I was just too tired to get there. Thought about quitting. Then I quit. Started paddling into shore. Determination overcame me and decided not to quit. Turned back into the tide and fought some more. Fail. Quit again.... Determined again. Fought a lot and finally made it out. I found a great set coming in and paddled into it. Got wrecked but I still feel like I made some progression. I was satisfied. I moved here from Kansas to surf, and I finally was. Called it a day from there.

On the way home, tired as all hell, while riding my bicycle with my backpack and my surfboard in my left arm, a generous Asian woman volunteered to hit me with her car. It wasn't that big of a deal. I saw it coming but couldn't avoid it. She wanted to get out of her car and talk about it, but I figured there wasn't much to talk about. I gathered myself and simply told her, "it would probably be a good idea if you thought about paying a little more attention" and rode off.

Later that night, we met up with a familiar hometown face. Mr Tony Kyle. He's in the navy, stationed out here. He navigates submarines in the Pearl Harbor bay and offered to take us on a tour through the sub. It was massive and very impressive. No photos allowed in there though. All and all a great experience. Crashed for the night at Tony's.

In the garden outside my house

Ala Moana