So here is the first update from the road, Twelve days in and it has been a trip of extremes, towns to countries hot to cold. This is what has happened.
On leaving the airport and mum and dad teary eyed (realising they love me) we took our seats at the back of cattle class with air NZ. We had a look at Fiji on the way, and then got on Jim Beams, we were offered water somewhere over tonga and on meeting Matt a big wave charger from Chch we got stuck into the beam more and had a fun flight. He told me of the boards he was taking, all over 6'8 and talked up a massive swell coming. So this made me and my single 6'2 feel a little inadequate, like I had just taken a piss next to Ron Jeremy at the urinal.
We taxi'd to the mighty Aqua Continental and arrived to our room which was what you would expect of a $50 a night twin share, but it was good on the bank account. We put a dent in the Duty free beam and then down to dukes for our first cocktail on the beach. Then after talking to nice young hawaiin lass we headed down to lulu's. On the way meeting a couple of guys from Tampa. They were good cats and he had a few of the local brews, finding out that one of them was the Kicker for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. I found out the NFL wasnt exactly like any given sunday, and I resisted the temptation to tap into Nick's mindset and discuss the technicalities of striking an ioval ball with your foot. We suned and swam the next day and met up with the boys agian this night we went to Mooses which has $1 drinks on tuesdays. This was good fun, however it ended up being alot like the set of a 50 cent music video as you will see by the photo's. Jeez can thouse yank girls dance, on the d-floor you here so much "beep beep beeping" as the reverse up onto and grind any guys on the dance floor. It was pretty cool. Two days in town and I was itching for a surf and wanted thorny to see pipe, so we organised a shutle and accomodation at a backpackers on the north shore by waimea bay. We arrived to a massive heavy 10-12 ft swell which was a little stormy, it was mental. Pipe was blowing up with only a few body boarders tackling it. See foto's> We hired bikes, some cool cruiser type ones and we used these to ride the 7 mile strip most the time to check all the spots. I had a few sessions over the 6 days at 4-6 ft pipe, and also surfed rickies, back yards and v-land at 3-4 ft, I surfed pebbles (inside waimea) it was breaking 8 ft out back, and then had a look at the shory. The waves are so fast and so powerful, I would never go back without boards to handle it.
The back packers was an interesting set up with all these little cabins between trees, it was pretty rough, the shower was so shit but your there to eat drink and surf so uit didn't matter too much. It did make m realise how luck I was to have had the white house in whiti though. We had an awesome crew at the place with a german, 2 assie and two norway guys. They were all mad as hell in their own way and we had a good crew to go surfing with. Ditching the ikes for the Germans rental car, a charge. We survived on beer and pizza andhad an interestg night when we wee told of a Bazillian paty in Haliewa (brzillians....my kryptonte). We got a few beers on us and jumped on the last bus running at 945pm. We arrived to a qiet town...what the hell. We th found aall with some peopleround, they were pcking up and it looed like an interesting crowd. We asked the "where is everyone, where is the party at now?" he told s it was pretty much over but it was a "great gatherig of christians from all over the island"....Skunked...realising or predicament that there was going to be now horizontal samba, noway too the lead nd told us to clasp ur hands together as he told the manhat we were christians from over the world and were eager to meet the community. There was methd to his madness having caught the st bus it was ahitchhike or 1.5 hour walk hme. He bought it and geerously gave the four of us a lift back, explaining the history of christianity in awaii on the way. We headed to a cafe for some ive music and cava with the hippiees.
