Aquariums are wonderlands to me.

Getting to see these amazing creatures is their (somewhat) natural habitats is an amazing thing.

There were all kinds of fishes.

Snakes.

And a giant whale skeleton.

My favorite was this amazing red octopus, but you weren’t allowed to take photos of him, because he’s very sensitive to light. The sharks were also amazing, but they swam too fast (I only have blurry photos).

I had promised myself that this trip to Hawaii would be when I finally learned (or at least attempted) to surf. Sadly, this is as close as I got. Contributing factors were laziness (laying on the beach was just so good), fear of sharks, big wave season (I think I’d like to start with small wave season) and, in the first few days, seeing lifeguards attempting to bring a man just pulled out of the water back to life—not sure if they succeeded, but I really hope they did, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I definitely have an immense amount of respect for the ocean.

Next time, though, I will go surfing, on an actual wave (not a blow up photo-op one).