Hawaii!

That's right. You can be jealous. Landon and I just spent a week in Hawaii liven' it up.  Make up for lost time, you know. There are a lot of pictures, but you might appreciate that I got it down from about 300 to 30.  

We ended up getting to Hawaii about 6 hours later than planned because of the stupid airlines.  We had about every possible problem imaginable, other than maybe crashing, in our 4 flights with United Airlines.  Never fly with them if you can help it. Anyways, we got to Honolulu on Monday and checked in to our hotel, then went along the main drag along the beach and did some shopping.  They have quite the night life in Waikiki, with lots of fun street performers that can only be there if they ask for donations instead of sales, ha. 

We got a sweet deal on this hotel.  It was awesome, and had a great view. 

Wishing I could play the Ukulele, but I'm not that cultural.

We did some bartering with people at the markets.  Those Hawaiian women are good at sales.  We had several insist that we needed to have children, and one tried to sell us the fertility tiki to help :)

Landon played with some birds at the International Market Place.
Apparently they are really used to people!

A look at the Hilton and skyline around Waikiki beach.

On Tuesday we drove to Pearl Harbor and the Polynesian Cultural Center.  Both were amazing.  We learned that the stress of traveling is not Landon's favorite, but we got there alright.

The USS Missouri-last battleship used by the U.S., last time was in Vietnam I think.   

We got to tour through the whole battleship, which was cool to see how the sailors lived.  We decided it would be much better assigned to a battleship than a submarine.  It was huge!  Afterwards, we took the tour to the USS Arizona.  For those who don't know, it was one of the ships sunk in the attack on Pearl Harbor, with over a thousand sailors still inside. The Government decided to leave it sunk and build the memorial over the tomb in memory of those who gave their lives.  They show a video before you go so you see footage and information about Pearl Harbor, the events leading up to the attack, and some pictures and photos on that "day that will live in infamy".  It was a cool experience. 

Then we drove over to the PCC.

Landon was pretty enamored with the tikis the whole trip.  We learned that they have grimaces and scary faces because they are supposed to chase away evil.  Each tiki has a different meaning (happiness, money, luck, etc.), and the length of their hair is significant but I don't remember how. Landon thinks that in the tribes, the longer the hair, the higher the status in the tribe, and the more power they had.

With a pretty legit warrior from Fiji, with a slightly darker tan.

They do a canoe pageant, where people from each island come out and dance on the canoes as they pass.  I put these pics in so you could see some of the cultural dress.

The Hawaiian royalty.  We learned that one of the famous kings was 7'6", and only average.
The Hawaiians were HUGE people. The Mauris were said to be around 8' tall! But then they intermixed with other cultures--japanese, white, etc. and are now smaller.

The Aerotearo Islands, AKA New Zealand doing the Haka

I'm pretty sure Tahiti is my favorite.  They do the fast booty shakin' dance and it amazes me every time, ha.  This is a video of a slower portion of the dance.

Samoa.  The men dancing shook the canoes and made the paddler fall in.  He's on the verge in the picture.

Fiji

Hawaii

Tonga.  They also had a show using the drums that was really cool. 

We did one of the contests where you throw spears at a target.  They say the best warriors and chiefs had the greatest aim.  Landon was pretty much a stud and hit the bullseye twice.  Even the native guy showing us how to do it didn't get that close even once.  "I pretty much could have been chief," he told me.

And, they did free cultural tattoos, so we got them for fun--as a cultural thing of course.

On a canoe ride.  Our paddler/tour guide for the ride always called us "cousins", and was pretty hilarious.

The Dum Dum statue like on Night At The Museum.

We got to go to a luau, which was great!  I even tried the poi, or raw marinated fish.  Not my favorite, but not bad.  They also had all the couples celebrating anniversaries or on honeymoons come up and dance in front.  Landon would have won the award for best moves if there was one.  He threw in some twirls and a dip or two to keep it exciting. 

The Samoans had some cool shows, like the guys who climbed palm trees, and the video below is a junior champion at fire twirling.

They also had weaving with palm leaves, a drums show, learning to hula, and singing with rainsticks that we had fun with.  And at night there was a show that was amazing too.  It was a pretty sweet place, we highly recommend it.  We got to stop by the temple and see the grounds on the way home.  I learned that the church bought all the land from the temple to the beach so there would be an unobstructed view down that road.  They even put the power lines under ground.  It's really pretty. 

It was a busy day, but tons of fun.  

Oh, and we also got some airbrush tattoos while at the PCC.  Our scuba guide told Landon his was the coolest one he had seen, and then he saw mine and retracted his statement, ha.  Not sure if it should be flattering or creepy, but the 60 year old guide said it was pretty sexy, ha.

I'll have to post our underwater pictures later after we get them developed, but scuba diving was awesome. We were the only group to see turtles, and they let us hold lots of different creatures.  He showed us some cool fish, and pointed out kinds of coral and things.  Landon was certified, so he had no problems.  I'm not gonna lie, having never dived before I was pretty terrified when my ears wouldn't equalize the pressure, and I breathed harder as I freaked out which made it worse because you can't breathe through your nose.  I probably shouldn't have gone while getting over a cold, since I've already had ear problems my whole life.  But once I got them to work, it was really cool.  My ears stopped hurting after a day or two.

With our cool diving guide.  I was glad we got him, he showed us a lot of cool stuff
and I think he was the nicest with my issues, ha.

Later that day we went boogie boarding, but there weren't any waves for the last three days of our trip, so it was kinda lame, but still fun.  Who would have thought, we go all the way to Hawaii to surf and boogie board and NO WAVES!

On Wednesday we went to Hanauma Bay to snorkel--which was amazing!  So many cool fish and turtles.  Interesting fact--this was once a volcano crater, and over time the water came in on that left side of the picture.  Now it is a federally protected area, and has lots of good reef area for snorkeling.  Beautiful beach too.

On Thursday we went to the Big Island, and Friday we got to go on a helicopter ride to see the volcano.  It was pretty awesome--the only active volcano in the world right now. I got pretty sick on the flight though, with my ears still weird, and the crazy helicopter motion, so it was probably more enjoyable for Landon.  They could only fly over the volcano vent for a couple seconds, but the whole ride was interesting.

In the area that was taken out by lava flow. They call this the road leading to nowhere.

The lava shelfs along the water, which can be dangerous and fall into the ocean, taking
any people around with it!

Macadamia nut farms.  We went through some of these on our zipline tour.

We went to Mauna Kea Beach which had beautiful sand and clear water.  We had two turtles come to play with us.  Landon even fed it a little from his hand.

He's pretty photogenic.  Just FYI, large tails mean they are male.

Doing some sand sculptures.  Mine was a mermaid, and Landon had a surfer in a wave.  Unfortunately, his wave caved in a couple times, so it was a long process :)

My boss told me we had to try the malasadas at this place, and
he was right. They were amazing!

We got to do a zipline adventure tour on the Big Island.  It was one of my favorite parts of the trip.  It went through rain forest, had views of the ocean, and the macadamia nut orchards.  They call those harnesses "wedgie suits"...

These macadamia nuts are still green.  They take 300 pounds of pressure to crack!

Eating some fresh guava picked off the tree. If you can't tell from my
face, it was a little sour.  As you can see on our helmets, we each had a tour nickname
for the guides.  I was "shorty" (which Landon like to think of as the gangster translation instead
height) and Landon was "zip stud".

At a black sand beach.  Landon posing on some lava rocks.

I came out to a camera. For some reason Landon felt the need to
document this part of the trip.

All along the road to Kona, there were white rocks spelling names and messages on the black lava rock.
We decided to stop and add our initials to them :)

We went to a farmer's market and bought a white pineapple--which is less acidic and sweeter than the yellow.
Delicious!  The lady was packing up and gave us some avocados (above--HUGE) and papaya as well.

Our hotel was on Banyan Tree Drive.  Each was named for someone famous.

Throughout the trip we also tried lots of different foods, like seafood, Thai food, Hawaiian, and this awesome Italian place.  We learned that our tolerance to spicy has gone down a lot, because we got the usual "Medium" on the Thai food, and both of us were sweatin' trying to eat it.  Along the trip there were interesting events, like the scary-looking lady who asked us to watch her bag at the airport right after the safety announcement warning to never do that. Or there was the chicken spam hidden in Landon's beef noodles (don't worry, we found it before he got too much).  Overall it was an awesome trip!  We love Hawaii!!!

I will post the underwater pics in a day or two.

Us at Brick Oven. We decided to take Angie out since she
basically did all our packing to move. We tried the whole
time to get her to hit on the waiter, ha.

Sorry I don't have many pictures. We've been so busy that I haven't taken the time to snap any.  Pretty lame for a blog, I know.  Landon is home! And such a lucky guy, along with going to Benson's wedding, he got to help move furniture and clean our old apartment as his homecoming activities for the weekend.  We are living in the new apartment now, trying to get things all unpacked.  Getting the couch inside the apartment proved the biggest challenge so far, since the doorway wasn't really big enough.  As the men tried to shove and maneuver, I winced just imagining the couch ripping every time.  But they got it inside without too many scrapes or scratches.  Thanks to our home teachers and friends for helping with the furniture!  We had to go back and clean the old apartment the other day, which wasn't so bad except for the oven and fridge.  I'm not sure what spilled in either one, but it was a questionable substance that left me gagging.  Bless Landon's heart, because he cleaned both of them while I did the bathroom and other areas of the apartment. I'm not sure if it was because he felt bad that Angie and I moved the rest of the boxes, or just because he loves me, but I'll take it either way.  But I had to laugh when he commented, while scraping the above mentioned substance off the fridge floor, "This is disgusting.  It's probably gonna give me cancer."

Just Another Week

 

The last week has been somewhat eventful. Angie and I saw the Pirates 4 movie in the dollar theater. I love that place, because I don't have to feel bad if a movie really isn't as good as I hoped--it's only a dollar, right? But I was a little peeved when the price actually went up to two dollars. Their killing my justification!  

Anyway, later, we heard that Seven Peaks was having a night party.  Generally it's a thing with a lot of high schoolers, but we figured, we get in for $4 instead of $25, and a lot of the slides are still open.  So, it's pretty fun night swimming, if nothing else.  We had a good time, and some of the slides are a lot more exciting in the dark :) I avoided the dance party though, to Angie's disappointment. We have also been lucky this week to see two good friends.  Troy Stucki was in town, and stopped by. We played some intense table tennis and mastered the mini basketball shot (well, he did. Angie and I still can't make anything!). Then my old roommate Ashley Moulder paid us a visit and we had fun catching up over some pool and air hockey.  I'm pretty sure none of us would ever be called a "pool shark" with how long those games took!  But it was good to see her again. 

This week Angie and I have been moving to a new apartment. We decided to skip the packing up part, and just take car loads of one room over per day.  It's kind of nice, because I didn't have to fold all of the clothes and then get them all out again to hang them up.  I just took all of the hangers from the closet, plopped them in the car and put them straight in the new closet. Brilliant!  We didn't really have to get any new boxes either, I am just using and reusing the four we found from someone getting rid of theirs.  The only downside is that since our moving process is taking a couple of days, Angie and I are doing it all ourselves--which means a lot of trips back and forth to the car. Other than the first day, where Angie nearly threw out her back, it hasn't been bad.  We still have the kitchen left, and then on Friday we move all of the furniture in a moving truck.  And then Landon and I will have a new apartment! Crazy.   Thanks to Angie, for staying here long enough to help me.  Moving is never fun, and she has been doing a lot to help while I'm at work.

Landon tells me they are done with the cherry harvest, and he is coming home today, after two months. He has been drying and preparing lots of fruits to bring with him, which is great.  Kinda sad that he is coming home to an empty apartment with moving boxes everywhere, but what can ya do.

Pioneer Day

One of the beauties of being in Utah for Pioneer Day is that I got the day off! So, I flew home to see Landon and our families. I spent most of Friday and Saturday with my parents while Landon's family was working on the farm. It was great to be home!  Mom and Dad tried to leave the weekend available so they could spend time with me, which was fun.  We went to the ward pioneer day celebration, and it was really great to see all of the women in our ward that I grew up with--Sister Monson, Sister Strebel, Sister Pierce, etc. They just make me smile. I got Mom and Dad to pose in a pioneer picture with me too.

We were being like pioneer days when they were always serious in pictures.

 On Saturday we went swimming at the Haine's and admired their beautiful yard while we were there. Mom cracked me up with the swimming because she was so sure she would drown.  But Dad and I talked her into a good kickboard race with us.  Oh, and can I tell you how much I miss having raspberries growing in the backyard! Dad and I had raspberries and milk for breakfast one day, and it reminded me of when I was little.  We would put lots of sugar on it, and you would scrape it off the bottom of the bowl with the raspberry milk that was left after finishing the berries. I never get to do that these days because they are so expensive!
I also met David this weekend--the brother who has been on a mission to Brasil. He gave his homecoming talk on Sunday and did a fantastic job. There was a huge get together at the Rowley home afterwards for lunch, which was fun.   We got in some family pictures while everyone was home.  Ryan even made it because he graduated from BYU-I this weekend!
I got to stay through Monday, so I took some pictures of people working and did some other office work until we had to leave to catch my plane.  It was really nice to be home!

Buckets

That's what I affectionately call my sister :) Probably nobody knows why except Michael, maybe not even Angie, but it makes me smile.  Sometimes we call her Rooney (for Angarooney), or Angie Bear, but mostly I just call her Ang.  She's pretty much my hero this summer. When Landon left, I didn't know how I'd make it two months alone, but Angie decided to come for her summer between semesters at Central. She's probably pretty bored, and her ward is the most anti-social young adults group I have ever seen, but she is stickin' it out so I don't have to be here by myself. And what better person to have around. We are two years apart, and grew up doing everything together.  Aside from sharing a room, we we spent most of every day together.  We fought here and there, but we were always great friends. Some people say we bicker, but both of us just think the sarcasm is hilarious, and we don't see why they think we were mad at each other at all, ha.  We went through high school and friend groups, sports and mutual activities together.  She has always been someone I could talk to about boy-talk, ambitions, struggles, or whatever. She just listens, and loves you for it. Gets excited when you are excited, and sad for you when it's hard.  She's probably one of the most encouraging people I know.  She was my maid of honor at my wedding, and did everything she could think of to make it fun and perfect for me.  The funny thing is, the older I get the more I realize that we are very different in a lot of ways.  But that works out when you can use those differences to make each other happy.  The best part is that when I'm around her I always end up laughing, which is a good thing for me right now.  I thank God all the time that he blessed me with my sister.

Lobsters

It's official. I think I have my first real sunburn. I have had little ones before that maybe lasted a night and then turned into a tan.  Angie and Michael were never impressed. But this weekend Angie and I went to Seven Peaks water park for about 4 hours in the middle of the day. Despite putting on sunscreen multiple times, we both look like lobsters.  I think that's what you get for buying the cheap brand of sunscreen. I feel bad for Angie, because she burns a lot worse than I do, and she was already peeling from last week--so her pain is a bit more severe.  But my neck, back and shoulders are a bright red, and we have been reapplying aloe vera pretty regularly.  Man, I hate being sticky! But it was a pretty fun time, so it made it more worth it.  I even got Angie to go on some of the crazy high scary slides, like the Free Fall.  My personal favorite was the one that looked like a half pipe for skateboarders, just higher.  So you go down, and then back up, and then you go back down backwards.  We may or may not have screamed.  We got to try out all the slides, relax on the lazy river, swim in the wave pool, and have a pretty great time. I even won the race where they have 8 people go down this one slide headfirst on mats.  It was great.  Gotta love half off coupons!

Here is a view of two of the scarier slides.
Angie chickened out on the blue one--it goes straight
down from that hole to the bottom.  You even fly
 off the slide a little.  What a rush! :)