Snorkeling in Hawaii

Last week I visited Hawaii, the island of Kauai.  I went with my two sisters for a week.  I will probably write more about the trip, but I want to start with the snorkeling.  This was my first time ever snorkeling, we went three times to three different beaches.  Kauai has a ton of beaches, below is a map of all the major swimming ones.

We visited a few not listed on this map but didn't swim in them including Donkey Beach on the east side, which was an awesome small beach with some great little tide pools, and Queens Pond, I believe it was called, on the west side that had a 5 mile dirt road to get to it. There where quite a few kite surfers at that one. 

Donkey Beach - East side Kauai

Near Queen's Pond kite surfers - West side Kauai

Poipu Beach

Poipu Beach was the first beach we ventured to snorkel at because it was newbie friendly and since I had never snorkeled before I wanted to try it out there first.  This beach is located on the south side of the island.  It had a "kiddy pool" behind a rock barrier on the left that blocked the waves and a "reef" side on the right that had a bit rougher water.  We went in on the reef side.  I was awe struck right away.  As a fish enthusiast who enjoys viewing fish in aquariums I was very enthralled to be in their natural habit as I felt as if I was swimming in an aquarium.  Most of the fish were very small, and the "reef" consisted mostly of scattered rocks.  However, I saw the most beautiful fish, that quickly became my favorite. They were christmas wrasses.

*Not my picture* - Christmas Wrasse

These fish were very shimmery and had a lot of colors so I really enjoyed seeing them the most.  I also spotted a fish that camouflages really well like part of the rocks, it may have been some sort of stonefish, but I'm not sure.  I was super exited to see that because they extremely hard to spot.  The orange edges of it's fins gave it away, and I saw it swim to confirm. 

Lastly I saw what I believe was a baby snowflake moray eel being pestered by a larger fish as it was trying to make it way under a rock, but was having a very difficult time finding one it could fit all the way under.  This little eel was adorable and I had a very good time watching him.

*Not my picture* - Snowflake Moray Eel

The water at this beach was odd because it had warm pockets and very cold pockets.  My sisters and I enjoyed the warm pockets more of course! 

Ke'e Beach

Ke'e Beach is last beach on the north side of the island accessible by car. The Napali coast is only accessible by a two day hike or by boat/helicopter.  This beach had a splendid coast line as it's leading into the Napali coast. I didn't get a picture of the beach itself cause I didn't want to get my camera sandy, but here is a shot from the parking lot.

View from parking lot Ke'e Beach - North side Kauai

This beach was basically like a cove with rocks along the left going up to a mountain and reef circling around all the way to the shore almost on the right.  We started out on the left side per a tip from the lifeguard.  There we found a really cool school of medium sized fish against the rocks. 

I did have an cheap underwater digital camera so the pictures came out very bad, but if anyone can identify these fish please let me know.

School of fish at Ke'e Beach

Once we got tired of the left side we swam over to the right where we found a legitimate reef.  The entire ground was made up of the reef and there were some cool cracks in it that fish liked to dodge in and out of.  To me it felt rather eerie to swim above the reef because it seemed like it went on forever. I saw some pretty cool fish though and they were much bigger than at Poipu Beach.  The tourist info said Ke'e was a good place to spot sea turtles, but we did not find any which was rather disappointing. 

Tunnels Beach

The last beach we swam at was Tunnels Beach, which is also on the North side of island with a great coastal view.  I got some pictures this time.  This was the only beach we swam at that did not have a lifeguard there full time.  One came by on a four wheeler every once and awhile.

Tunnels Beach - North side Kauai

This beach had a very shallow reef that went all the way up to the beach, and it went out to very deep water.  I started out on the shallow side and kind of freaked out because it seemed like it was so shallow I would scrape against the coral.  So I made my way to deeper water and found amazing very deep looking fissures in the reef, which may be where they got the name Tunnels Beach.  These cracks were so deep they where completely dark.  I swam over them, but it was a little eerie because I could just imagine a gigantic eel or something emerging from the depths.

This reef dropped off into really deep water abruptly.  I swam to the edge and it was way too freaky to swim over the edge because it felt like the edge of the world.  I did swim over a tiny bit later, but quickly returned to swimming over the reef.  I believe I saw a sea lion or seal out there, a big group of snorkelers swam toward it, but I hung back, it's a wild animal you never know what it will do!  I also saw a scuba diver out there.

I swam around a long time, the fish here were bigger than both of the previous beaches the biggest I saw was at least a foot long maybe a little bigger!  

I also saw what I think was an Aha Needlefish.

*Not my picture* - Aha Needlefish

By this time my sister found me and informed me they had found a sea turtle and she would lead me to it.  I swam behind her and the water kept getting more and more shallow and the reef closer and closer to my face.  The water got so shallow I thought maybe they had found a baby turtle.  But when I got there it was a full size green sea turtle I believe. Unfortunately I did not get any good pictures of it.  We were all very happy to see a sea turtle it was hanging out in the shallow reef grazing.  It was really cool to see how it was not disturbed by the waves at all.  Where as I was being tumbled around it was completely chill.  Finding Nemo got their personalities down perfectly! LOL

Here is the best underwater picture I got.  I believe it's a saddle wrasse.  These were also very pretty fish.

Saddle Wrasse

I saw many different types of fish I don't remember them all. I know I saw some yellow tangs, some kind of parrot fish, possibly a baby puffer, and some kind of brown sea slug, I'm not sure what else.   This beach had the strongest currents so by the time we were done swimming were pretty tired out. 

Overall I really enjoyed snorkeling it was quite amazing to see all the fish and sea life.  I highly recommend it if you love fish. 

Avengers Age of Ultron - Review [Spoilers]

The Good 

Overall I liked the movie and found it entertaining and fun enough to recommend it, as long as you've seen the other movies including Guardians of the Galaxy if you want it to make the most sense.  I've seen them all expect Thor: The Dark world oops my bad.

My favorite thing about Avengers Age of Ultron was how well they portrayed a traditional family. Hawk Eye's wife and kids were amazing and he was clearly a good father despite having to be away from home due to... saving the world and all that... for a living.  So many movies today feature broken families or worse promote homosexual families, I thought it was very refreshing to see a traditional loving family taking a central role in the film.  It was also very nice to see that none of the family members were used by Ultron to gain the upper hand like so many other Super Hero movies do.  (Louis Lane, Mary Jane/Gwen Stacy, Rachel Dawes etc)

I also liked Black Widow showing her true colors of caring for a good man (with a large green disability LOL) rather than attempting to flaunt herself toward men in order to control them as she has done in the previous Avengers/Captain America movies. It seemed she really respected Bruce rather than attempting to use or deceive him like she normally tends to do. Aside from forcing him to transform into the Hulk when in a life threatening situation which is understandable.

Of course this movie also had some great action scenes. I thought the Hulk vs. Hulkbuster rampage was the best action scene in the movie.  That fight was amazingly well done because it was funny and suspenseful at the same time. 

The Bad

There were quite a few religious references in the movie, particularly Catholic references and I was very unclear what kind of statement they were trying to make, if they were trying to make any kind of statement at all.  

First of all there was a joke about Catholic rabbits, I thought the joke was hilarious, but at least one of my Catholic friends found it offensive so it probably offended others as well.  

Next there was the fact that Ultron preferred to do his dirty work in a Church.  The denomination of the Church was not mentioned, however, Ultron quotes Jesus, (Matt 16:18) "....upon this rock I will build my Church..."  This is very significant verse particularly to the Catholic religion.  The reason for this quote escaped me. The only thing I could come up with is they may have been trying to imply that Ultron was and anti-Christ character.  However, that still seems very odd to me considering he came into being via a computer program so was really an AI program. 

Lastly when Vision comes into being they ask him who he is and he say "I am" which is the name God uses to describes himself to Moses (Exodus 3:14) The only knowledge I have about the Avengers story is from the movies, so maybe this is explained better in the comic books, but without knowledge of where the infinity stones came from, this seemed very odd to me because from my perspective Vision is an AI infused with an infinity stone.  So it seems odd that he may have a god complex considering artificial intelligence is an and even lower life form than human beings.  Humans are made in God's image, but AI are made in man's image, so they are two steps removed from God rather than one.  

The Meh

I thought the visions the Scarlet Witch gave the various characters were confusing and I did not understand how her power worked.  Did she direct what they saw?  Or was it based off of their emotions?  Or was she simply a telepath?  Iron Man's vision seemed to be his worst fear, but Ultron's seemed to be his desire.  Captain America's vision could have been his doubts or secret desires I wasn't sure what to make of that one, and I had no idea what was going on in Thor's vision, but I assume it's because I failed to watch Thor: The Dark World first.  Anyway the movie did not do a good job explaining how her powers work and I felt that she and Quicksilver should have had their own movie like most of the other characters did so we could understand them better.




Lastly I felt the end fight was too drawn out and was not as impressed by Iron Man's heroics because it felt like it was a copy cat of the first Avengers movie.  I would have preferred to see one of the other characters take the lead role.  Although Scarlet Witch's little break down was dang impressive it left me a little confused as to why she doubted herself earlier during the dialog between herself and Hawk Eye.

Everything Happens for a Reason - The Story of a Car

 The Raspberry

A long time ago in the year 2002.  I was in need of a car so that I could find a job.  I had graduated from High School that year and I did not wish to go to college so I would need to find a job instead.  My dad had retired from the military which enabled us to visit a used car lot on a military base.  They had all manner of affordable cars, but they were so packed into the lot it was not even possible to test drive them.  Being girl of 18 I had no interest in Make or Model, all I cared about was what color the car was.  Being also a strong believer in God even as a teenager I had asked God to help me find a suitable car. There were two I liked.  A purple Dodge Neon and a purple, but more pink Chevy Caviler.  I like the Neon's color more, but the Caviler was more comfortable.  It didn't take long to decide and the 1996 Caviler was mine for $3000.  Raspberry was the official color in the paperwork.   The poor thing had to be jump started and driven straight to the mechanic to get her up and running.

For nearly 2 years that car drove me to and from work 40 miles one way 5 days a week.  Through freezing ice storms and all kinds of mid-western weather, the most trouble I had was a slight fishtail one night on the icy highway.  After having had my fill of tornado ally, I was off to the desert to attend college and made the trek from Kansas to Arizona.  For 8 years the little raspberry endured the never ending sun.  The sun paid it toll causing the paint to begin to blister off.  The blazing heat and crippling passage of time caused many other trips to the mechanic.  The alternator died in a Taco Bell drive through so we pushed it down the street in the middle of the night to nearest mechanic.  One day arriving home from work I noticed the tire was quite low so I drove it right over to the discount tires which I happened to live directly behind.  Then after returning home from an erred one day I returned home stopping at the front office to pay my rent, and upon returning found the car no longer started!  Never once did she die in traffic however,  she always seemed to die in a safe location in which I could arrange to have her taken care of even if it seemed like quite the inconvenience at the time.

That car had such a good time in Arizona, showing up as a prop in my college music video,  used as a bus to squeeze in more students than seats on occasion, and of course providing transportation for endless adventures.

In 2012 it was time for a break from the Arizona sun and it made the trek to Montana where it sat resting in the snow on the side of the road for 9 months just sleeping away, as I carted my youth ministry team around in the giant van we called The Gladiator.

The Raspberry was no worse for wear after being neglected in the snow for so long, and happily took me through the Nevada wasteland full of aggressive dirt devils and tumble weeds nearly the size of that little car, all the way to southern California. For nearly a year the old Raspberry braved the California freeways.  The old country car was 18 years old now and had seen much of the world.

In April 2014 I prayed for safety driving home from work as I always tried today and jumped onto the freeway cruising home at 65 in the slow lane.  I saw headlights in my side mirror and continued singing away as I waited for them to pass on by.  But, they didn't pass by, I heard a loud bang on the left side of the car and felt the car begin the slide.  I thought to myself very clearly, "I'm in an accident."  I didn't know what to do, I was on a section of the freeway that had 5 or 6 lanes and was always congested.  I closed my eyes and began to pray, "please protect me Jesus." I imagined my self going off the freeway and hitting a tree, I feel the car spinning and simply waited for it to stop.  Finally it did stop as I slammed into something and the air bag hit my face.  Slowly I opened my eyes to get my bearings.  The car was dark and full of dust from the air bag,  I rolled down the windows, I didn't feel hurt, I wasn't bleeding.  I looked around to find myself facing the cement median in the car pool lane!  I found the emergency lights and switched them on and called 911.  The woman on the phone advised me not to get out of the car and to wait for the police.  She asked me if I wanted an ambulance but I didn't know if I needed one.  After that she hung up leaving me as cars raced around me some honking as if I was an inconvenience to them.  I knew I was at great risk of being hit again sitting facing the wall like that in the carpool lane.  I turning on the interior light to try to make the car more visible.  It felt like I waited there forever.  I tried to pray the rosary, but I couldn't remember the prayers quite right.  I considered getting out of the car even though the women on the phone had warned me not to.  I called 911 again after waiting for quite some time hoping the person on the other end could give me some comfort as I could very well die if I was hit again.  No such luck, the this woman said the same thing, but I did say yes to the ambulance this time.  I didn't see any other cars stopped so I figured it was a hit and run.

Finally after I don't even know how long two police cars arrived driving across all the lanes in zigzags to stop the traffic.  I had never been so happy to see the police in my life.  They had me walk across the freeway as they tried to get my car started, with no luck. They took me to the next exit where a double long semi truck was parked.  That's what hit me!  The driver did not even see or feel my little car he claimed on the police report, but he admitted fault.  I sat in the back of the police car as I waited for my boyfriend to show up to give me a ride home.  The ambulance never arrived.

The car of course was totaled.  She was too old to be repaired and worth too little.

The Mysterious Miracle 

It is a miracle I that I was almost completely uninjured, aside from some seat belt burns, a sore face from air bag, and my left pinky finger was very sore for about a month, but not broken.

The two police officers who were both very kind, said they were amazed that I was not hit again. They said they expected that I would be.  They had served people in accidents for many years on those freeways and knew this from experience.  They said I was lucky because I and the truck driver were going "slow."  I driving 65 which is the speed limit on that freeway.  I don't consider that to be slow, but when I tell others the stories they all agree that it is. 

I very much wonder what the truck driver saw.  He said he did not even feel his truck hit me, and yet he stopped and claimed guilt for the incident.

I do not know how the other cars didn't hit me as I spun across all of the lanes of traffic or while I was sitting in the car pool lane.  I would like to see a replay of this someday because I'm certain Angels or Saints or both prevented me from colliding with any other cars.

When I was hit I had cruise control on and when I stopped against the cement wall, my foot was on the gas.  When I think back on this incident I sometimes think maybe if I had not closed my eyes and had tried to stop the spin by turning the wheel in the opposite direction as they teach you to do when learning to drive, maybe I would not have crashed and only had the small dent in the left passenger door.  But then I think no... what I did was surrender completely to Jesus in that moment.  He could have taken my life, but He spared it.  I do not know why.  All I know is the lack of injury after being hit by a double long semi can not be good luck or a mere coincidence.  It was not my time to go, which is all I really know.

Shiny    

 

I spent a full year saving up money for a new car.  After going into much debt from student loans, I am against taking out loans unless there is truly no other option.  I have a friend at work who I would sit with at lunch from time to time and tell her about my plans to buy a car and such.  Recently she decided it was time to move nearer to her family in Australia.  She sold me her car, Shiny.  The car is a 2009 Toyota Corolla.  When I was researching cars I decided I wanted a 2008 Toyota Camey or Corolla.  Yes, I prayed for this car as well and God delivered.  He not only helped me but I'm sure he helped my friend too because I no doubt gave her more for the car than a dealership would have.  It is quite amazing to me that I was able to save up just enough money for this car at the right time, and it was fitting the specifications I wanted, even better in fact!

The Reason

I do not know the reason why I had to lose my old faithful car.  But then gain an even better one.  I don't know what I have learned spiritually from this experience.  However, I have no doubt that God is using all of this to help me in some way that will likely be a mystery to me during this life time.  I could tell you that I know exactly why this happened and try to make up some spiritual benefits I have received, but the truth is, "God's ways are not our ways," and thus I take comfort knowing that God saved me from death that night for a reason, so my job is not done here yet.  I only hope that I will live up to his expectations.