Honolulu Zoo & Symphony Performance

Hey Everybody,

Sorry it took me so long to write this. On November 16th we went to the Honolulu Zoo in Waikiki and Tami and I had to go to the Honolulu Symphony performance for our music class. This is the skyline that we could see on the H-1 on our way to the zoo.

This is the Nene Goose which is Hawaii's state bird and it is endangered.They had 4 giraffes and 2 hippos at the zoo. We watched the hippos swim for quite some time before moving on.

Then we got to see a turtle race because they had just put out food for the animals. The turtles were fun to watch eat.

This is Rocky the Orangutan who was being fed by the zookeeper. He also drank some Gatorade while we were there and we found out that Orange Gatorade is his favorite.

These Lemurs were next to the pond of little turtles that had just been fed so they were wondering where their food was.

This is a paint tree which has very smooth bark and looks as if someone painted all different colors all over it. They are really cool trees.

This sign says that this zoo is the best zoo within 2300 miles and shows the distances to the closest zoos.

Jon and Alex had fun petting the goats in the Keiki (kid) zoo.

After leaving the Keiki zoo Tami and I had to get heading to the Honolulu Symphony performance at the Blaisdell Concert Hall.

While we were waiting for our teacher to get there it rained and we saw a double rainbow. They are kind of hard to see but they are there.

Here's Tami and I waiting to go watch the show. We had a fun day at the zoo and watching the symphony. It was a neat opportunity to see the symphony perform.

Sending you warm wishes and aloha kisses. Jessica:)

Dole Pineapple Plantation

Hey Everybody,
The trip to the zoo got postponed so we decided to go to the Dole Pineapple Plantation. We ate brunch and then waited for the bus. Once we got going on the Pali Highway we saw an accident on the opposite side of the road. (It turns out that an older couple was driving and the man had a seizure. He hit the median and flipped the car but they're both doing fine.) So we then made it through the Pali Tunnels and got to see the next exciting thing on our journey. Since there was an accident they were having all the traffic rerouted. One of the tour buses tried to turn around in the median and got stuck. So when we were driving they were unloading all the tourists that were on the bus. The rest of our journey was pretty uneventful compared to the very first part. It took us about 1 1/2 hours to get to the Dole Plantation. We were quite happy to arrive as you can see in the picture below. I went with Tami, Alex, and Jon.



This is us before we started the maze. We were so excited. We had to trace 8 stencils on our card.


It took us an hour and a half to finish the maze but we did it. I rained off and on the entire time we were in their. We got lost a few times but it was so much fun.

There is a coy fish pond that you can feed the fish at and they go crazy when people would throw the food in.

The last thing we did was get some Dolewhip. It's pineapple ice cream and it was so good. Then we headed back home for dinner. I hope you enjoyed the pictures cuz I had fun taking them. Sending you warm wishes and aloha kisses:) Love Jessica

Snorkeling at Hanauma Bay

Hey Everyone,
Today my friends, Tami and Alex, and I went snorkeling at Hanauma Bay which is a great place to go for beginners and if you want to be guaranteed to see lots of fish. Hanauma Bay is about an hour and a half away on the Bus. We left at 9:30 in order to get there pretty early so we could snorkel a lot. Since we are students we don't have to pay the $5 entrance fee to the park. Everyone has to watch a 9 minute video about the bay and the reef within in. The bay was a volcano that was flooded and sunk in. It took me a little while to get used to being able to breathe under water. Once we were okay with breathing we decided to head out further into the bay. We got to see a lot of fish. Since so many people come and snorkel there the fish are used to it so they will swim right along with you. It was so much fun but very tiring. Once I get my pictures developed from my underwater camera I'll put them in this blog.
Sending you warm wishes and aloha kisses:)
Jessica

Hey Everybody,

So I got the pictures today. So here are my pictures.

This is one of the buses that we took on our journey to Hanauma Bay.Here's Tami and Alex eating snacks before the second bus came to our stop.

Here's the sign as you enter the park.This is a statue of a Humuhumunukunukuapua'a that was where we were waiting to go see the video.
This is the bay.

I hope you all enjoyed the pictures of our trip to Hanauma Bay.

Rainy Weekend on Oahu

Hey Everybody,

So this past weekend it rained all over the island. We decided to go down to Waikiki on Saturday and walk around. We walked down on the beach and that was the first time I had been to Waikiki Beach since the last time I was here. I had my picture taken in front of the Duke statue. When we were walking out to an observation dock we saw an Humuhumunukunukuapua'a (Hawaii's state fish). We then went to Walmart were my friend, Tami, and I got snorkeling gear so we can go snorkeling this weekend. On Sunday we were hoping to go to Waimanalo Beach again but it was raining like crazy. We decided to get on the bus and head towards North Shore in hopes of finding a sunny beach. We ending up going to Matsumoto's Shave Ice and walking around the market place in Haleiwa. I had a strawberry, green apple, and banana flavored shave ice. We actually went the entire way around the island. It's pretty boring after Haleiwa because there's not much to look at. Here's some pictures of my rainy weekend on Oahu.

We ate at Puka Dog(Hawaiian Style Hot Dogs) for lunch as soon as we got to Waikiki.

This is the waterfall and sign at the front of the International Market Place.

This is me in front of the Duke statue at Waikiki Beach.

Here's the shoreline off Waikiki.

This is the Humuhumunukunukuapua'a that we saw at Waikiki. It's right in the middle of the picture and it's black, white, and yellow.

This is a collection of little shops in Waikiki.

This is a picture of the market in Haleiwa.

That's all for this blog. I'll write as soon as I get my pictures from snorkeling from this week. Sending you warm wishes and aloha kisses. Jessica :)

Waimanalo Beach

My friends and I decided to go to a new beach that none of us had been to before. We went to Waimanalo Beach which was about 45 mintues away from campus on the Bus. It was beautiful there and there were not a lot of people which was also nice. Luckily they had not spotted any jellyfish so we could go have a good time in the water. After hanging out in the water we got out and layed out in the sun. Then we decided to walk down the beach where we got to see a Portugese Man-of-War jellyfish that was dead on the beach. The windward side of the island is notorious for jellyfish because the wind and the current bring the jellies closer to the shore. The Portugese Man-of-Wars are not deadly but the Box Jellyfish can be. The Box jellies only come close to shore 8-10 days after the full moon. There were also lots of little crabs all over the beach. We sat on our towels and watched them come out of their holes removing sand. There were funny to watch. We then caught the Bus back to campus and had dinner out on the lanai so we wouldn't freeze in the Dining Commons. It was so nice to go to the beach and relax after having midterms this week and last week. Below are pictures from my day at Waimanalo Beach.

This is me as soon as we got to the beach.

I really do love it here.
There is a crab in the middle of this picture. He kind of blends into the sand but he's there. Below is the picture of the crab that Alex caught. It's at the bottom of the clump of sand where her hands meet.

Here's a picture of the jellyfish we saw on the beach. They're pretty small.

The last picture is of the shoreline. It's so beautiful. It's alright to be jealous of me because sometimes I can't believe I live here. Sending you warm wishes and aloha kisses. Jessica:)