Hawai'i in August: Mauna Kea Beach and Snorkel Cruise

Thursday, August 8, we went to Mauna Kea beach early. Jim is super into snorkeling there. It's his new favorite thing. The Rob and Annas saw a big manta ray out by the point. Jim went out too late and missed it but saw other fun things. I was also pleased to find that they have a raft out there again. When I was growing up, there was a giant orange raft that we could swim out to and jump and dive off. Now they have an inflatable white raft. It's fun to swim out there, but because it's lower and not firm, it's not as fun to dive from. But hey, better than nothing. Ever went out to the raft with Jim and me. I had to pull her on a boogie board. Can't remember if Jim took Wren out with us or if we left her on the beach.

We visited the lava tube in Ahualoa that afternoon, which made us late getting organized for dinner. My phone could not deal with the light in this photo:

The big people went to dinner at The Fish and The Hog  that night for Pod's birthday. We left the little people in the charge of Clara and Tristan. Apparently Tiny was not pleased and did lots of crying, which is uncharacteristic. When we got home, we gave Pod his presents and sang to him. He conducted.

Friday we had breakfast at Hawaiian Style.

Then we went on a Fair Winds snorkel cruise from Kealakekua. Wrenzy was so exhausted that she passed out on the way to Captain Cook.

The first time I did a Fair Winds cruise, I thought the fish were absolutely incredible. This time I was underwhelmed; not sure if it's gotten worse or my standards have gotten higher. Also we had to deal with kids who didn't do that great with the snorkeling, so that didn't help. 

The dolphins gave us a good show.

The high dive and slide from the boat might have been the best part. (Note: when Jim looked at this post, he pointed to the below picture and the above picture and said, "I kind of look like the dolphin!")

My one-and-a-half was not amazing, and it hurt my head quite a bit because I didn't get my hands together.

The littles enjoyed driving the boat.

Less than two weeks after our cruise, a woman was attacked by a shark at Kealakekua Bay. So that's really not my favorite.

We split up for dinner because the Homers and we were in a hurry to get our exhausted kids to bed. We ended up eating a subpar meal and then going for Scandinavian shaved ice on Ali'i Drive. The shaved ice took a while because we had to park and walk, and then there was a long line. Jim accused an older, possibly drunk South African man of cutting in line. The man said he'd been there, and Coco confirmed it. That was unfortunate. Jim and I ordered way too much shaved ice (we got three gigantic ones), but the girls were happy about that. The Homers had to leave us because we took so long eating all of it.

In the end, our excursion wasn't much faster, and we missed this sunset that the rest of the fam enjoyed from their restaurant. Oh, well.

As we drove home, Coco called and asked about going to Merriman's for late-night chocolate purses because it would be our last opportunity to do so. Jim and I gave up on the idea, but Coco called in an order and picked up two purses on the way home - minutes before they closed. The guy helping her remembered her from when she worked there like 15 years ago and gave her a little former-employee discount, which was very nice. Coco always knows how to make the fun tims.