My brush with death and a sea turtle

Alvin recommended a great place for breakfast. He's practically a local and if he knows anything, it's eating! We went to a little, tiny place called the Gazebo with a very long line out in front for what are arguably the best Macadamia Nut Pancakes in Hawaii. Even the rain did not deter. They have umbrellas on hand and as you are seated inside,(euphemistically speaking as there are no walls) you pass the umbrella back to the end of the line.

After breakfast we proceeded to the beach to snorkel with sea turtles! It's a nice little bay with calm waves, but waves nonetheless, so I took charge of Regan and Tim took charge of Chandler. We swam past a coral reef, which went the length of the bay, forming a wall which sometimes rose above the water and continued past to the sea turtles' caves. We saw at least four, some claim more! One was particularly brave and swam right up to us. I don't think you are supposed to touch them, but he seemed to enjoy the attention as we petted his shell and head.

It was SO COOL!!

Swimming such a way out was tiring, but not too bad. So after a while, we headed back with my dad leading the way. He barely made it over the reef and called back that it was too shallow: we needed to go around. Regan got out in front of me and I told her to come back, that we needed to go around, but she wasn't coming, so I tried to catch up to her. Soon I was approaching the reef. It was shallow, I had a about a foot of clearance, but I figured I could make it. Suddenly, it jutted out of the water and the waves were pushing me into it. I quickly tried to back away by swimming backwards. In the process, I scratched my leg and lost my fin.

Here is where I started to panic. I was tired and now without one of my fins and the waves were still pushing me into the coral. I was swimming as hard as I could while my dad was still yelling to go around. I was making almost no progress away from the rock. My mask was full of water and my tube kept filling up as well. I couldn't do anything about any of that, but suck in water and keep spitting it out while frantically swimming away from the rock.

I began to get desperate. Looking around, there was no one near and no life guard on the shore. I yelled to my dad that my fin was gone. I guess it was my way of letting him know I needed help. Finally, in desperation I yelled help. I knew this was only something you yell when you are serious and I was serious. I wasn't sure exactly who would help me however.

I summoned all my strength and kept swimming. Finally I cleared the coral and barely made it to shore. Behind me were Tim and Chandler. I was so scared she would end up where I was and the truly frightening part was that I knew I was too exhausted to do anything about it.

My poor dad spent the entire episode wondering who to help - me or Regan. Thankfully, he stayed with Regan. He sent Alvin after Chandler, but by the time he got out there, they had cleared the coral and were fine.

I crawled up on the shore very shaken, vowing not to do that again. I now see how people drown and how they lose the strength to even try to save others.

Very scary.

On a lighter note, here are the girls playing in the water later in the afternoon. We ended up just fine, but no more swimming out past the coral.