This post used to contain pictures, but due to new storage limitations from WordPress, I had to fix the problem and decided to create a new blog that works as an archive for all the posts from my two years in California. This full post can be found here.

Today didn’t turn out the way it was supposed to but it was a very nice day anyway. Because of the bad weather (It’s not that bad, it was raining one night and morning and has been a little extra windy, but it is still 25C if not more. The waves on the north side of the island was supposed to be like 40feet today!!) the snorkeling with turtles was cancelled today again. So instead of that we went to Big Beach which was a very beautiful beach with yellow sand and huge waves! It was possible to be in the water, but it was tricky. They were breaking like right on the beach so it was very hard getting in and out of the water. Out wasn’t too bad. We just had to run out very fast and then we could jump with the waves, but going in. Oh my god! I thought I was gonna make it when I went in right after a big wave, but the next one caught up to me. The backcurrent of the first wave was like a brick wall and I couldn’t move particularly much.  So the next wave was at least as tall as I am and totally made me fall over and tumble around in the sandy water. I had sand, seriously everywhere after that!! But I survived and it was a workout even for just ten minutes.

That beach was by the way the same beach where the German au pair got bitten by a shark last summer and died. I wasn’t bitten and we didn’t see any sharks either. But we did see something else totally awesome! Whales! And today I learned that most of them here are Humpback whales. These were pretty close to shore and they were showing off. I think there were three of them and one of them did one of those super amazing whale jumps when they lift their upper body and then just falls down. And then they splashed with their side fins like all the time, blowing water and then one of them raised its tail and splashed it again and again and again. Like they do on SeaWorld. It was just so cool! I didn’t get a good picture of them but Caroline did get one awesome. I guess it doesn’t really matter though since we’re going to the whale watching tour tomorrow. And I can’t for everything in the world get a good translation of “whale watching” in Swedish. It’s disturbing…

The Big Beach was cut off from Little Beach by a small mountain and the view from that one was incredible. I wouldn’t say it was that good when you were looking on Little Beach, but Big beach was so beautiful. Well, Little Beach was too. But since that is a nude beach it wasn’t very nice to look at old men’s junks… Stephen Tyler from Aerosmith usually hangs out at that beach on Sundays, not nude. Maybe I will see him there on Sunday? He has a big house on that side of the island. I’m so not jealous…

Our next stop was the Kamaole Beach Park I. We played beach volleyball there for 1.5 hours. I didn’t enjoy it so much, but I missed it (I know, almost two weeks since I played!) so I felt that I had to. I really don’t like it to play more than 2 people on one side. Three is fine, but six? Oh no. But I got complemented on my serve which was awesome today. Better than everyone else’s, even the guys!

After that we had our last stop, Haui’s Life’s a Beach. It’s a restaurant and bar. I was starving and ordered a burger with ranch dressing and fried onion rings. And to that two Mai Tais. They were $2.50 each.

On the way home the girl in the front seat was so drunk. She was embarrassing herself with dancing and screaming along with the horrible songs she played on the iPhone’s AUX. Good thing it wasn’t a very long ride.

Back at the hostel I and Caroline tried the hot tub for the first time. It was warm and after 45minutes we were burning up and had to take cold showers. I will definitely go in that one after the 12 mile volcano hike on Saturday.

Our Canadian roomie left today and we got a new one. A German girl one year older than me. The funny thing about it, she came from San Diego where she’s been studying for the past six months. And the even funnier thing is that she came in from Waikiki, Oahu today and had spent 10 days on HI Waikiki where we also stayed! She arrived there on the 14^th and we on the 15^th. Haha! What a small world! She is very nice and is going to the whale watching tomorrow. I’m so excited about it, and then the Haleakala volcano hike on Saturday, beach day on Sunday and an amazing hike on Monday. And then of course Big Island. I just read on yelp.com that the black sand beach we are going to there have turtles basking on the sand. I really really want to see turtles up close again! Either snorkeling with them or seeing them on the beach.

Big Beach. Little Beach. Big waves! Humpback whales! Kamaole Beach Park I was a very nice beach with fine sand. But I spent the 1.5 hours playing beach volleyball instead. Even if I hate playing more than 2 people on each side. I had some fun though, and it was fun when everyone was so surprised a girl could have such a great serve as I had today (I usually dont, but today it was awesome for some reason)