Hawaii (Part 1)

Since we took Landon to DC for his 16th birthday; I'm sure Payton was expecting a trip in December for her 16th. So, we thought we'd surprise her and take her in June. Unfortunately, she saw a text Max sent to a friend. So for three weeks she thought we were going to Hawaii! The day before we were to leave, she walked into my room and asked, "Mama, do you have something you want to tell me?" At that moment, I knew she found out. The rest is a long story that I am too lazy to type :)....so the short version is, I convinced her it was Max's work guys going, not us. Even though she was very disappointed for the day, it was worth waking her up the next morning with the three of us playing Hawaiian music, wearing leis and trying to hula. :) It took her a while to realize it wasn't a bad dream! :) The rest of the seven days was absolute wonderful! It was a perfect vacation that we had saved and planned for several months! A true blessing.

These next few posts are going to be picture heavy. It's hard not to do in beautiful Oahu.  :)

Our first day we went on base and bought some food, water and snorkel equipment.After that we explored the island.  Is that water not one of the most beautiful sights ever? Incredible. Of course, my family has to climb to the highest point (of anything!).  I think they get pleasure in stressing me out.

 I made sure and took one picture of us before we hit the water.

We stayed the rest of the day here in Hanauma Bay.

Here is Landon with a turtle that he is "trying" to take credit for.  It was someone else's masterpiece, but I told him I would play along. 

Here they are getting ready to parasail.
Max and I went to Maui 20 years ago with friends before we had kids, and I parasailed then. In the 37 years Max has flown helicopters, the views he gets to experience are pretty incredible, so he was also fine not going.

Here they go....

up, up....

...... and away! 

They enjoyed it. The captain dropped them in the water before he brought them back to the boat, but it happened too fast for my camera. 

Here we are on a snorkeling cruise. They take you out into the ocean to snorkel and then feed you lunch when you return. We scheduled ours early in the morning because the fish are more active.  But unfortunately, for wimpy me, the water was COLD. So I only snorkeled on the first stop and then stayed on the boat where it was toasty to take pictures.

 Here they are ready to go out again.

Cute.

 I bought Max a Gopro for Father's Day, so we got some great videos/pics. Here was some of the shots.

Wow, this is one big fish. 

And yet another one.  (Although, this one is not as much of a poser as the one above, Oh, she loved being in front of the camera underwater.) :)

This is the VERY cool part. There was a pod of dolphins that they got to swim with.

This is the view underwater. 

This is how close they swam with them. (Kind of scare how much those fins look like shark!) 

The captain couldn't believe how long the dolphins stuck around our group. I think it's because the humans did everything right. They didn't kick/splash. They didn't try to touch or swim to the dolphins. They just patiently waited until the dolphins came to them. It was an awesome experience! 

To be continued.....