Holiday Picture Dump

The pictures below are from travels to North Carolina and Hawaii over the holidays. It was my second trip to Hawaii and this one was, what I called “Locals Immersion”.

Basically, we did some tourists stuff, but I wanted to get a feel for what it’s like as a local- the food, the language, the people, the secret spots. Since Sachiko grew up there (Oahu) and her parents are there, so it was a cinch. Unfortunately, the islands got over 15” of rain (“ua”) between December 27th and January 6th. So, I got a good feel for local TV and the local couch too.

North Carolina came first...

I wish I had pictures from hooking up with my old friend's from college (Danny, Nate, James, Tripp)- who gave me hard time about not mentioning Appalachain State University (where we all wentto college) on this site. So there you go guys...

I always have a good time with my family- we laugh together and take great pride in laughing it each other’s expense. Every year, Santa brings toy guns that shoot the little orange suction dart things. This year was especially good (the guns shot accurately). This is Casey putting the beat down on his little bro Josh.

My Dad, the sheriff of toy-gun-ville.

So this is a fish farm- where my family’s business Blue Ridge Fish Hatchery, grows Koi. We have over 200 ponds like these.

The product.

Off to Hawaii now. We got enough of a break in the rain for us to take a hike near Sachiko’s house- the trail was Wiliwilinui Ridge Trail. Did you know the Hawaiian alphabet only has 12 letters? My favorite word (a town's name) Ka'a'awa. Yup- 4 a's. Then there's "Aiea" the only town in America with a name made of all vowels.

This is a pretty touristy place- the Pali Lookout. But, damn it’s pretty up there.

New Years. Hawaii is one of the last places on earth for New Years- it starts in Australia's time zone and goes all the way around before hitting Hawaii.

Here is Sachiko's brother Mark doing the "Carlton Dance" a la Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. This is right at Midnight from Dukes on Waikiki. We were joined by some folks that went to high school with Sachiko at Punahou School in Honolulu.

Congrats to Maila and Lyon who were wed on January 3rd- It was a Hawaiian Filipino Catholic ceremony- which was a new experience for me. Maila and Sachiko went to high school together and she and Lyon live in the Seattle area now. We had a great time with them and everyone there for the wedding.

We spent one night out at the North Shore at the Turtle Bay resort- our vacation within a vacation. I always love to get out to Waimea, Sunset, etc. to check out the waves and watch the surfers. The North Shore has got to be one of the coolest places on earth.

While out there we did a little tour on horseback. That's me on Casper (the friendly horse) and Sachiko on Chili Pepper.

And spent some time drinking tropical drinks on the beach- it was tough.