PlatKat.com: I Shot the Ocean, but I Didn't Shoot the Manatee

Thursday, May 12, 2005

I Shot the Ocean, but I Didn't Shoot the Manatee

I recently visited Hawaii, where I did, saw, and acquired a slew of cool things. Among those, I shot guns for the first time at the Waikiki Gun Club. These kinds of clubs are pretty popular in Hawaii, which attracts a lot of Japanese tourists who are not allowed to shoot guns in their own country.

Gus and I started out shooting light rifles comparable to BB guns. Then we ended up shooting a glock and magnum. Gus was on target most of the time. I, however, had trouble lining up my sights, so I ended up shooting around the bullseye. The long rectangular paper target had a picture of a scenic Hawaiian beach around it, and that's where most of my bullets ended up.

We also did some typical tourist stuff. We climbed Diamond Head and went to Hanauma Bay. Diamond Head was worth the hike and yielded some beautiful pictures of the coast. (The link is to the directory with pictures from the whole trip. If anyone out there would like to share a good picture display program with us, I would appreciate it!)

Hanauma Bay was actually quite disappointing. When I was there in 1989, there were fish all over the place that would swim right up to you. You didn't need to go out very far or even use a snorkeling mask. Sadly, the reef has since been damaged and most of the sea life is gone. I feel bad for the folks who shelled out $30 to rent snorkeling equipment for a day. I also feel bad for Gus and myself because we got hellish sunburns that day.

We spent the rest of the time shopping and eating delicious fish around Waikiki and briefly in Chinatown. Chinatown was cool, but kind of dead since we went on Sunday. I got a fortune cat that looks a lot like this one.

For a four-day vacation, I feel like we did a good amount of stuff. If we had more time, I would have liked to do some island-hopping, as is the style of the time.

Sidenote: Before I left, I asked Fongfong if she would mind walking Zoey while I was gone. She pretty much said, "Of course. It's a given." My roommates rawk!

posted by platkat @ 4:01 PM