Let the vacation begin!

Aloha,

What an eventful weekend! Although the fun might have kicked off with my bus breaking down mid-trip to pick Jamie up from the airport and a super-human sprint to make the airport transfer bus, it was overall very quintessentially Hawaiian vacation. We rented a car upon Jamie's arrival - a Seabring that we named Peepeopi (thank you, Forgetting Sarah Marshall) - and drove it up to the North Shore. Most tourists stick to Waikiki, which pretty much has everything one might need to be happy from Cheesecake Factory to Cold Stones to, oh yes, Subways! But the 30-45 minute drive to the North Shore is well worth the views and the sunsets!

We began on Saturday with a mound of infamous shaved ice with so many flavors to choos

e from - I personally went with guava, lychee, lilikoi (kinda like a cotton candy passion fruit). The line actually wrapped around the building for it, and it took us a good 25 minutes to order. But it was well worth it! By the time we finished slurping it, it was a race to beat the sun from setting. We parked at the picturesque Sunset Beach with rolling sand and crashing waves. Part of the beach is for surfing and part is for swimming, but we were just chillin. As the sun set, we saw a little cluster of dolphins in the distance! It was almost enough to send me tearing into the water, fully clothed in my plaid shorts to go play! It was EXTREMELY cool and very Hawaiian.

The weekend continued, early (in the single digits!) on Sunday with pancakes and guava juice at a local restaurant. Then we took the meandering coastal road up the east coast to the North Shore where we had an anticlimactic visit to Turtle Bay (the setting for Forgetting Sarah Marshall), which is proof of Hollywood's ability to create paradise... because the hotel was not as cool. Then, we saw the plane from Lost (Nikki!!) and the beach they film it on - it was all closed off, but still so cool to see a little piece of Hollywood in paradise. We continued to see the dock where they filmed part of 50 First Dates with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore, as well as more interesting geological structures formed from lava flow, such as this little mountainous island called "Chinaman's Hat"... ok, so I was the only one excited by that! But we forged on to spend the morning at Sunset Beach, then adjourning to Waimea Bay for the afternoon until sunset. Waimea Bay has gorgeous aqua waters where you can see straight to the bottom and the snorkeling is decent (a few Doris but no Nemos!) Me and my friend Shantel swam across the whole bay, which is impressive and exhausting - who needs a gym when you're in Hawaii, right Kristie?!

Alas, it was time to return the rental car, so we popped into Zippy's (a local chili place - with AMAZING food) and proceeded to get lost finding the hotel and Thrifty! It's not really a road trip if you don't make at least one illegal U-Turn, right?!

I'll post more pictures soon!! Surfs up ;)