Sunday, January 18, 2009
Saturday, January 17, 2009
Bottoms
"Dan, wipe my bottom, wipe my bottom", shouted Alex as he got off the toilet.
Luckily, Dan came to ask me first if he could wipe Alex's bottom. I said no. (Meanwhile, Alex kept shouting "Wipe my bottom". Dan asked "What if I wear rubber gloves?"
I still said no.
Luckily, Dan came to ask me first if he could wipe Alex's bottom. I said no. (Meanwhile, Alex kept shouting "Wipe my bottom". Dan asked "What if I wear rubber gloves?"
I still said no.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Selection of Beasts
Our book told us that when we went to Kapalu'u beach, if we were lucky, we'd see some turtles. So we went there, and saw an amazing selection of beasts.
When we got to the beach, there was a seal lying there, surrounded by cones. The boys thought it was dead, and were very excited, but then they noticed it was breathing. It was, it turned out, a Hawaiin monk seal, which are very rare, and on the Big Island, extraordinarily rare. Because they are so rare, they are loved and nurtured, and as well as the cones there was a lifeguard who dispersed the crowd when it got too big (or took too many pictures.) There are about 1200 of these seals left, and a really small number (like 6) on the Big Island.
A special seal team came (with seal team t-shirts so we knew), and they knew everything about this particular seal - it was one year old, and it usually hung around on the other side of the island, which they (the seal team) prefer, partly because there are fewer people there, and it's not good for seals to hang around with people, and partly because that's where the seal team are based. We spoke to someone else later who'd been at the beach, and apparently at about 6 o'clock in the evening it flopped back into the sea.
After the excitement of the we ventured into the water - and sat there, very close to the beach, in very shallow water, was a turtle. The turtle seemed pretty oblivious to all the people getting excited and shouting 'turtle' and just carried on nibbling on seaweed. It seemed to unexcited that people got bored and wandered away. Then someone new would see the turtle and shout 'Turtle, turtle!', and not understand why everyone else nodded and said 'Uh-huh'.
Plus, it's very, very illegal to touch or 'interfere with' a turtle in any way, so when waves made the turtle drift towards people they had to run and leap out of the way. Apparently turtles can bite pretty hard too, if you piss them off.
The turtle was so exciting that I went to buy a crappy overpriced waterproof disposable camera from a stall on the beach. Results below.
Now that I had my disposable camera, I went out to take pictures of fish, of which there were impressive numbers.
Here is a selection of fish:
Here are some more fish:
Here's me.
When we got to the beach, there was a seal lying there, surrounded by cones. The boys thought it was dead, and were very excited, but then they noticed it was breathing. It was, it turned out, a Hawaiin monk seal, which are very rare, and on the Big Island, extraordinarily rare. Because they are so rare, they are loved and nurtured, and as well as the cones there was a lifeguard who dispersed the crowd when it got too big (or took too many pictures.) There are about 1200 of these seals left, and a really small number (like 6) on the Big Island.
A special seal team came (with seal team t-shirts so we knew), and they knew everything about this particular seal - it was one year old, and it usually hung around on the other side of the island, which they (the seal team) prefer, partly because there are fewer people there, and it's not good for seals to hang around with people, and partly because that's where the seal team are based. We spoke to someone else later who'd been at the beach, and apparently at about 6 o'clock in the evening it flopped back into the sea.
After the excitement of the we ventured into the water - and sat there, very close to the beach, in very shallow water, was a turtle. The turtle seemed pretty oblivious to all the people getting excited and shouting 'turtle' and just carried on nibbling on seaweed. It seemed to unexcited that people got bored and wandered away. Then someone new would see the turtle and shout 'Turtle, turtle!', and not understand why everyone else nodded and said 'Uh-huh'.
Plus, it's very, very illegal to touch or 'interfere with' a turtle in any way, so when waves made the turtle drift towards people they had to run and leap out of the way. Apparently turtles can bite pretty hard too, if you piss them off.
The turtle was so exciting that I went to buy a crappy overpriced waterproof disposable camera from a stall on the beach. Results below.
Now that I had my disposable camera, I went out to take pictures of fish, of which there were impressive numbers.
Here is a selection of fish:
Here are some more fish:
Here's me.
Monday, January 05, 2009
(Not getting to) Green Sands Beach
Today we went to a place called Green Sands Beach. Well, we tried, but we didn't. It's called that because the sand is green - which is kind of unusal.
In our guidebook, it says that you can either park in car park and walk, or if you have a 4 wheel drive car, especially a 4 wheel drive car that you don't feel attached to (because you rented it) you can drive there.
Here's our car, in the car park. Notice that there are only two cars there, and they both have four wheel drive.
We tried to set off from the car park, got about 10 feet, and then reversed nervously.
Bits of the road where relatively OK.
Bits of it were a bit grim:
Bits of it were kind of damp:
And bits of it (and this is the part that made us hit reverse) were just silly.
We tried to walk, but it was very, very windy, and didn't manage.
Thanks to the power of the interweb (and Flickr and Creative Commons) I can put a picture here anyway.
In our guidebook, it says that you can either park in car park and walk, or if you have a 4 wheel drive car, especially a 4 wheel drive car that you don't feel attached to (because you rented it) you can drive there.
Here's our car, in the car park. Notice that there are only two cars there, and they both have four wheel drive.
We tried to set off from the car park, got about 10 feet, and then reversed nervously.
Bits of the road where relatively OK.
Bits of it were a bit grim:
Bits of it were kind of damp:
And bits of it (and this is the part that made us hit reverse) were just silly.
We tried to walk, but it was very, very windy, and didn't manage.
Thanks to the power of the interweb (and Flickr and Creative Commons) I can put a picture here anyway.
Saturday, January 03, 2009
Lava Tube
We were on the way to a beach, when we saw a lava tube. A lava tube happens when lava hardens on the outside (where it's cool) but keeps flowing on the inside, until it's all dribbled out, leaving a huge empty pipe made of rocks. The boys and I went to investigate it.
Here's the entrance (click on pictures to embiggen).
In some places there seemed to be two channels, here's one. The boys thought that the route was through the hole (that I wouldn't fit in) and climbed in when I wasn't looking. It's lucky Susanne wasn't there.
Here's another alternative route they found. I couldn't fit through (at least, not without a lot of pain), but I could stick my camera in the hole they were heading out of.
In places the roof had collapsed, leaving rubble all over the ground. Here they are climbing up one such heap of rubble.
And down the other side:
During this time, Susanne waited relatively patiently next to the car. When we climbed out at the end,I took this picture of Susanne. If you look closely, you can see how far away she was. Actually, you can't. If you click on the picture to get the bigger version, and know where to look , you can kind of see something that looks a bit like a person.
Here's the entrance (click on pictures to embiggen).
In some places there seemed to be two channels, here's one. The boys thought that the route was through the hole (that I wouldn't fit in) and climbed in when I wasn't looking. It's lucky Susanne wasn't there.
Here's another alternative route they found. I couldn't fit through (at least, not without a lot of pain), but I could stick my camera in the hole they were heading out of.
In places the roof had collapsed, leaving rubble all over the ground. Here they are climbing up one such heap of rubble.
And down the other side:
During this time, Susanne waited relatively patiently next to the car. When we climbed out at the end,I took this picture of Susanne. If you look closely, you can see how far away she was. Actually, you can't. If you click on the picture to get the bigger version, and know where to look , you can kind of see something that looks a bit like a person.
Thursday, January 01, 2009
Double Photographic Whammy
The first whammy is that Susanne was persuaded bought me a new camera for Christmas (which was nice of her). Whenever one has a new camera, one takes a lot of pictures. Susanne doesn't see what was wrong with the old camera, and so the existence of the new camera makes her feel tired - every time I take a picture of her, she is reminded of this, and so when her grandchildren look at the old pictures, they'll say "Grandma, why do you always look anguished in 2009"? (After they've finished laughing at our primitive technology).
Almost a second whammy (but I've decided not, as then I can't call it a double whammy) is the speed the camera takes photos. If you ask it nicely, it can take 6.5 photos per second. Remember when you took a roll of film on holiday (or maybe a couple), and it held 36 pictures - it can use them up in a little over 5 seconds.
The second whammy is that we are on holiday, in Hawaii. And being in Hawaii, as you'd imagine, gives you lot of opportunities to take pictures.
Combining these two means that you're really lucky that (a) I haven't got a slide projector and (b) you're invited to ourhouse to look at them.
We arrived in the late afternoon, the day before yesterday, and I've take 1,608 photos. You'd be obliged to look at them all, but I'm 'borrowing' the wireless internet connection of someone called 'Francine' (or maybe they call their wireless internet connection that, as some sort of pet name). And Francine doesn't pay enough to make it a particularly fast connection, and has positioned her wireless router in a spot where I have a very weak signal. So you're going to have to wait a while. if you can hold out without the anticipation being too much.
Oh, and if you really, really like pictures of twins running about on cold lava (what's that called, after it's hardened? Stone?), well, you're in for a treat.
Almost a second whammy (but I've decided not, as then I can't call it a double whammy) is the speed the camera takes photos. If you ask it nicely, it can take 6.5 photos per second. Remember when you took a roll of film on holiday (or maybe a couple), and it held 36 pictures - it can use them up in a little over 5 seconds.
The second whammy is that we are on holiday, in Hawaii. And being in Hawaii, as you'd imagine, gives you lot of opportunities to take pictures.
Combining these two means that you're really lucky that (a) I haven't got a slide projector and (b) you're invited to ourhouse to look at them.
We arrived in the late afternoon, the day before yesterday, and I've take 1,608 photos. You'd be obliged to look at them all, but I'm 'borrowing' the wireless internet connection of someone called 'Francine' (or maybe they call their wireless internet connection that, as some sort of pet name). And Francine doesn't pay enough to make it a particularly fast connection, and has positioned her wireless router in a spot where I have a very weak signal. So you're going to have to wait a while. if you can hold out without the anticipation being too much.
Oh, and if you really, really like pictures of twins running about on cold lava (what's that called, after it's hardened? Stone?), well, you're in for a treat.
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