I haven't even seen the damn beach!

Nothing like a 6-hour time change to screw up your circadian rhythm. I woke up at 5am, bright-eyed and ready to go. I used the time to unpack my bike and re-assemble all of it's components, which only took about 30 minutes. I made myself go back to bed until a little before 7 and finally gave up hope of more sleep.

The main order of business this morning was pre-employment junk for the hospital, all of which had to get done today if I'm going to start on Monday. Unfortunately, this involved another hike to Wal-Mart so I could print off documents at the Kinko's around the corner. Good thing about all of this walking is that I don't feel guilty about the lack of workouts.

Next hurdle...conquering the bus system. Had to drop off some documents in downtown Honolulu...definitely too far to walk. Made it without trouble and managed to find time to wander through a little open-air market. Bought my first trinket....a flower necklace that looks so much like the blossoms I've been picking up off the sidewalks (where they fall from the trees).


The afternoon found me hunting up an air pump for my bike tires, since I didn't bring one. I thought the scooter shop around the corner could help, but no go. They were nice enough to lend me a scooter (free of charge!) so I could zip up to the local tri shop and get a pump. Met some awesome people and found out about a century ride on Sunday. Yay, right up my alley!! By the way, the scooters are SUPER fun and I'm going to have to rent one soon.

It's now mid-afternoon of day two and I haven't even seen the damn beach yet, for all of the stuff that NEEDED to get done!

Clouds rolled in for the early evening, which cooled things down a bit and made for an awesome evening of exploration. I made a beeline for....the BEACH!! Finally!!

Got a great view of the Diamond Head crater at the opposite end of Waikiki beach...


Saw some storm clouds roll in over the water....

And last, but not least, saw the penguins at the Hilton...

(Yes, there are penguins in Hawaii, although they're not wild. Not the frozen tundra kind....these are the warm-weather cousins...)

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