First off, Hawaii is amazing!!

Our first week was spend on Oahu, which is the island where Honolulu is. Here, a lot of time was spend on diving; Gry, Stefan and Martin spend 4 days getting their the PADI Open Water Certificate, and on one af the days I went with them. The guys’ diving instructor took some great shots of us underwater, which you can see here.

The rest of the time was spend on just strolling around, doing some shopping, relaxing on the beach and of course a visit to Pearl Harbor. 

Waikiki beach

Waikiki beach

The USS Bowfin at Pearl Harbor

USS Arizona Memorial Site at Pearl Harbor

USS Arizona Memorial Site at Pearl Harbor

USS Arizona Memorial Site at Pearl Harbor

USS Arizona Memorial Site at Pearl Harbor

USS Arizona Memorial Site at Pearl Harbor

Honolulu and Waikiki beach seen from above

Diamond Head volcano crater seen from above

Next we headed to the Big Island, where we are now. Here we’ve experienced the diversity this island has to offer – this is the only island in the world which has four eco-systems (rainforest, desert, vulcanos and the sea). We spend a day going to the top of the highest vulcano in the world, Mauna Kea, which is 4200 meters above the ocean and had the most amazing view over the entire island. Then we’ve spend a day hiking in a lush walley, seeing a waterfall and a black sand beach.

And yesterday we went diving with manta rays – first a day dive, where we saw all kinds of different fish and was lucky enough to be accompanied by two manta rays at the end of the dive. After an hour or so and the boat, watching the sun set, we jumped in the water again to do the famous manta ray night dive! Divers and snorkelers from the different boat all jump i the water around the same time, and gathers around one spot, pointing their lights in the same directions, so we all forms a sort of light-cone. The lights attract plankton which attracts the manta rays, who feeds of it. The entire dive was spend in awe, just sitting on the bottom gazing at the magnificent creatures that floated around in the water, doing flips and looking like they were having the time of their lives 🙂 They came so close that we could touch them and some of them actually touched us, hitting our lights or our heads with their giant wings, nothing harmful of course. It was an experience of a lifetime! We’ve bought a video of us down there, which we’ll be happy to show you when we get back. If you can’t wait, you can catch a glimpse of the manta rays on the dive shops homepage.

Manini’owali Beach

Clouds on our way up Mauna Kea, which is Hawaii’s highest peak

Gry and Stefan in front of “Moon Valley”, the place where the Apollo astronauts rehearsed with their lunar rover before their journey to the real moonscape

auna Kea, the highest peak in Hawaii

The view from Mauna Kea

The view from Mauna Kea

Gry and Martin on our way down the peak

Waipi’o black sand beach

Waipi’o Valley

Going down into the Waipi’o Valley. The road was very steep

Hi’ilawe Falls, Hawaii’s highest free-fall waterfall at 1200 feet. Unfortunately this was the closest to it we could come

A dragonfly up close

Waipi’o black sand beach

Waipi’o black sand beach

Waipi’o black sand beach

The sun setting on our drive back

Gry and me coming up after our first dive

A manta ray seen from the boat. They were attracted by the light of the boat, which meant you’d have to keep an eye out before jumping into the water

Smoke coming from the Halema’uma’u Crater, after the eruption in march 2008

The Kilauea Iki Crater. In 1959 this whole crater floor was a bubbling lake of molten lava – now the hardened surface makes for a good hike across the crater

Gry and Stefan on the Kilauea Iki trail

Kilauea Iki Crater

A lava rock in the Kilauea Iki Crater

Kilauea Iki Crater

Kilauea Iki Crater

The Thurston Lava Tube. Lava tubes are formed when the outer crust of a river of lava starts to harden but the liquid lava beneath the surface continues to flow through. After the flow has drained out, the hard shell remains, leaving these beautiful tubes

Thurston Lava Tube

Holei Sea Arch

“The end of the road” – eruptions send flowing lava down towards the sea, covering this road

“Walking on lava” – Martin walking on the hardened lava. In the background the smoke from the ocean entry (where lava runs into the ocean) is visible

Pu’u Loa Petroglyphs – ancient drawings into the lava

The smoke from the Halema’uma’u Crater glows a bright orange at night

Martin and me in front of Akaka Falls

Akaka Falls

A little gecko sitting on the bamboo

Hiking towards the ocean entry – where flowing lava reach the sea

Hardened lava

Near the ocean entry. In the crack we could see the flowing lava underneath us, glowing bright orange. Surrounded by the dark and the heat of the lava beneath us, it was a bit hard to capture on camera though

The smoke from where flowing lava meets the ocean turns bright orange at night. This is how close we dared to go, about 25 meters or so from it

This is the best shot I got – in the background is the orange smoke from the ocean entry and in the foreground the glow of the flowing lava in the cracks beneath us

Visiting a Kona coffee farm

Kona coffee