Back from Hawai'i -- pics! :)

[Jessika]

Not sure who all may have noticed but I've been gone the past two weeks on a cruise in beautiful Hawai'i! We even visited Fanning Island, which that alone took two days at sea to get there, we even had to cross the date line (meaning we "went into the fuuuuuturrreeeeee"; our passports are stamped the 17th eventhough it was the 16th!), and this place is not even 200 miles north of the equator. It is a third world country, but absolutely beautiful!!!

Hawai'i was everything I'd thought and hoped it to be, and I absolutely loved Kona on the Big Island and Kaua'i was gorgeous!!!

A few animal stories while I was there, though. First off -- whales galore!!! We saw baby whales with mama whales, pods, and some even popped up literally under our boat. I even saw humongous manta rays in the wild... it was so cool, definitely an experience you just simply don't get at the zoo.

Also while we were in Kona, Hawai'i (the Big Island) HJ and I were walking to the brewery there and we heard tires squealing and I turned around and some a-hole flipped around a corner in his truck with his puppy in the truck bed and THE PUPPY FLEW OUT OF THE TRUCK, but was tied down by his leash, so he was being strangled by the leash and being drug by the truck and bouncing off the back tire. Everyone on the street was screaming at him to stop, so the idiot slams on his brakes, which caused the puppy to slam into his tire, and THANK GOD his leash finally broke so he tumbled across the entire street and landed in the bushes in front of me and starts running and stumbling cause obviously his front leg is broken. HJ starts running after him, I'm bawling because I thought I just saw a puppy get run over, and the guys are still in the truck trying to figure out what's going on. Some other dude finally got the puppy and a lady pulls over because she sees me crying and is like "is that your dog?" and I'm like "No I just feel really bad for him". I felt like an idiot afterwards, and even more p*ssed that the idiot had a puppy tied down at the end of his leash unsupervised in the back of a truck AND was driving like a moron!!!!!!! If you're gonna have your dog in your truck, either crate him and tie down the crate, or at least have the brains to tie his leash down so he does not have enough free space to fall over the side of hte truck and strangle himself!!!!!!

But I had a good dream that night about the puppy and he was wearing a cast and had some bandaids on so I think he's ok

Plus in Kaua'i on our "Jungle Falls Kayak", we stopped to grab a bite to eat and out of the bushes comes the most adorable little kitty!! I wanted to take him home with me! Apparently he's making appearances for about a month now, so everyone fed him some of their sandwiches, which is what he was waiting for apparently cause he went to town! And wild chickens flew up to join us for lunch also. Chickens are rampantly wild in Hawai'i, but I noticed a ton more on Kaua'i than on any other island.

Ooh, and while on Fanning Island, we were just relaxing on the beach when two little piggies run up and start snorting and digging in the sand. They were so cute!

I took so many pictures so I can't post any here, but I have uploaded a lot to facebook and made the galleries public so you should all have no problem viewing them (let me know if you do, though!).

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...a&id=501889047

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...6&id=501889047

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...0&id=501889047

[slleipnir]

Beautiful pictures! Looks like you had a great time Thanks for sharing them

[Laura's Babies]

OH MAN!! Those were beautiful!! I resisted the sunset pictures, the scenes of the cities and all of them but when it came to that whole rainbow, I HAD to save it to add to my rainbow collection. I have never seen a picture as beautiful as that one with the rainbow.. That will make a awesome background!! Hope that is ok with you!

[Husky_mom]

great pics!!... I would love to go there someday too..........*dreams away*......
did you met Kater?.... if not... you´ll have to go again

glad to have you back and hoping to see more of you and your gang

I´m sad about the pup........ poor thing........

[-Pickle-]

oh im so jealous! you lucky thing you. i hope you had extreme fun on your trip must have been weird going into the futurrreeeee

[BitsyNaceyDog]

Amazing pictures, Jessica. I love the picture of the little Java Rice Finches. They're such sweet little birds and I loved seeing a picture of them in the wild. It looks like you both had an incredible time, but how could you not in such a gorgeous place.

[Chilli]

Wow, what an adventure! I'm glad you had fun.
I love the pictures of the pigs in the sand. At first glance it appears like snow.

Gosh, these pictures and the pictures Alyssa posted from her cruise make me want to take one.

Thanks for sharing.

[Jessika]

OH MAN!! Those were beautiful!! I resisted the sunset pictures, the scenes of the cities and all of them but when it came to that whole rainbow, I HAD to save it to add to my rainbow collection. I have never seen a picture as beautiful as that one with the rainbow.. That will make a awesome background!! Hope that is ok with you!

Oh yeah its no problem at all! Which picture was it? I can send you the full sized version if you'd like

[Maya & Inka's mommy]

FABULOUS !!!! I've always been dreaming of going to Hawai; guess it will remain a dream...
These pics are wonderfull, you sure have a great camera!! Hey, is the water naturally so green??? Here in our Northsee, the water is gray.... .

[Jessika]

FABULOUS !!!! I've always been dreaming of going to Hawai; guess it will remain a dream...
These pics are wonderfull, you sure have a great camera!! Hey, is the water naturally so green??? Here in our Northsee, the water is gray.... .

Actually it was much bluer; the pics in Fanning make the water look green because we had my camera in Underwater Mode which puts a green filter on to make images underwater more "natural" colored" But above the surface everything else looks green, as you can see. I didn't realize it would do that until I get home haha.

Pics from later in the trip though are more exact

But yeah -- the water was so blue and pristine and CLEAR, everywhere!

[dukedogsmom]

What fun you must have had! Beautiful pics. I love the rainbow ones. Didn't realize they had so many there. I wish I could have been at that waterfall. They are some of my favorite things. I just love this. And I do hope that poor pup is alright. Wish it would get a home with some smarter people.

[Alysser]

I am amazed at the beauty! Wow gorgeous GORGEOUS pictures. What a wonderful vacation you had. I must ask, since that ship looks familiar. What cruise line was it? I just recently went on Norwegian Cruise Lines and LOVED it! You are SO lucky to have gone to Hawai'i It is something I have always wanted to do. Those pictures were gorgeous!

[Jessika]

I am amazed at the beauty! Wow gorgeous GORGEOUS pictures. What a wonderful vacation you had. I must ask, since that ship looks familiar. What cruise line was it? I just recently went on Norwegian Cruise Lines and LOVED it! You are SO lucky to have gone to Hawai'i It is something I have always wanted to do. Those pictures were gorgeous!

Yeah we were with NCL, our ship was Pride of Aloha. Must say I was not too impressed; the ship looked old and run-down, everything was faded, it needed a new paint job BADLY, the inside of the ship smelled AWFUL, and the outside was rusting badly.

I was also a little upset about their "freestyle cruising, you don't have to dress up if you don't want to unless you don't want to eat good food in which case bring nice clothes". Like, seriously, unless you wanted to eat at the buffet every night you needed nice clothes. And you couldn't wear flip-flops to dinner because it would "ruin the atmosphere". Um, ok. I was asked to leave from Crossings (sit down restaurant) because I was wearing flip-flops (but in a nice dress, I looked much nicer than the other old folks in line with their cotton shorts and screen printed shirts...) so I actually had to buy nice shoes in Maui just to eat a nice dinner. AND when I finally did get in, what did I see but every other person in line in front of me got in... wearing flip-flops...

But otherwise it was good, I just wish their customer service representatives were a little more knowledgeable on the cruise nad the shop and what is and isn't allowed because we called beforehand to ask about a dress code and they said there wasn't one anywhere. =/

[Alysser]

Personally, I think it all depends on the ship you go on. I've never heard of that ship with NCL but I just googled it. I've heard of Pride Of Hawaii, though. Anyway, My parents booked the newest ship NCL just made. In fact, we were on the maiden voyage in North America. It's called the Norwegian Gem. I agree with the dinner "dress-code" though. A women wasn't allowed in the most fancy restraunt on the ship because of her flip flops, and she basically had what I consider an evening gown. I saw some people wearing jeans, but you aren't allowed to wear flip flops? It's a bit stupid. The room we stayed in was really small too, but all cruise ships would be the same I guess.

Anyway, Sorry about your whole experience but I'm glad most of it was okay. I really like the whole idea of "Freestyle Cruising". I am not one for having a set schedule and dressing up so it worked out good for me.

[Jessika]

Oh no, I like the IDEA of "freestyle cruising", but they just need to be more specific about what exactly they mean by "freestyle", you know? Basically the only thing "freestyle" about the cruise was the buffet or breakfast at restaurants like Crossings.

Pride of Aloha was refurbished a few years back, the ship itself is about 10 years old and they bought it before then so it's seen a few years.


My understanding about the Pride of Hawaii is that the cruise it had was it's last cruise (they embarked the same day as us and basically had the same cruise the only difference is they were 7 days, we were 11 because we went to Fanning Island). After last week Pride of Hawaii is being refurbished and renamed the Jade or something like that (Pride of the Jade, NCL's Jade, something like that) and my understanding is that it is going to be a ship cruising like england and that area or something. I can't remember exactly