DRIVING OAHU, Hawaii

The meeting with running socks is over. It went pretty well. And here we are, Tina and I, trying to get the best out of this few days trip in Oahu. We started driving around. Driving around in Hawaii is definitely one of my favorite experiences. The landscape is wonderful, the mighty ocean is always few meters away. You can stop in lots of beaches. Watch dudes surfing. Stop in small cities and get a coffee or some local food. Definitely a complete drive of Oahu is something you can't miss, if you happen to come here. Some pictures, to give you an idea ...... absolutely stunning ... :)

THE SOCKS SITUATION

This is pretty embarrassing, but this is what happens when you plan a trip half for business and half for fun ... you forget something. In my case I forgot my formal long socks. I had to go to the meeting and I found only my running socks in the the suitcase. And it was too late to go shopping around for socks. So I had to use those. With a pretty embarrassing result ...... all the time during the meeting, I tried to hide my feet under the table, but I am pretty sure my customer noticed it ... :o

HONOLULU, Hawaii

After half day driving around the West coast of Oahu, we finally got to Honolulu. A name that is a synonymous of Paradise. The reality is that it is a pretty modern and tall city with all those skyscrapers. But indeed a city built in a wonderful location. Here some pictures, so you won't be shocked when you will see it ...... but out of the cities that I know, probably this is the one where I would like to live. Just for the fact, that I could go surfing everyday in the warm, gentle and wonderful waves of its most famous beach, Waikiki ... :)

HOMELESS in HAWAII

Even if Hawaii is one of the most beautiful places on Earth, and seems that life is just perfect here, this is not Paradise. There are social problems. Lot of social problems. Especially in the Oahu island, the most populated of in the archipelago. And you can have a feeling of it, if you leave the famous touristic spots. When we got in Oahu we rent a car and we drove over the West shore of the island. Probably the least touristic of all. And there we have seen a lot of homeless. Lot of families live on the beach in camping tents. And from the way the tent are, you can easily figure out that they had been living here for a long time ...... the reason is pretty simple. The cost of real estate here is enormous, especially if you are a native. Lot of people is doing lots of money in the mainland. Is coming here and is buying land and home. And maybe they are using it few weekends a year. Of course the real estate industry sky rockets, and is leaving very little room for the native Hawaiian, who can't afford to buy multi million dollar house. At this point they don't really have a lot of chances. They either leave the paradise, or they are homeless in their land. Most of them leave, some of them decide to stay even if this means live camping on a public beach ... as a tourist I felt guilty to take these pictures, and to be part of their problems ...

ALOHA

Aloha. Here we are. We are in Hawaii. After almost 6 hours flight we got to this small paradise in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. We landed in the Honolulu airport. Approaching the Oahu island (the island where Honolulu is) the view from the plane was absolutely wonderful. Blue ocean, surf breaking over the reef and green trees ...... and of course we are very very happy to be here ... :)

I GOT the GREEN CARD!

I guess this a very lucky period of my life. I got engaged to my soul mate, I am in the middle of two amazing trips ... I get home and I find in the mail my brand new Green Card! Simply amazing! And if you are not familiar with what it is, the Green Card is an almost (i.e. there are some limitations) unlimited work permit in the US ... isn't that cool!?!?!? So here it is ... not really green ... but definitely not even fake ... the blury picture is trying to minimize the identify theft ... ... and the amazing thing is that it did take such a short time to get it. Something like 99 days since I applied for it. I guess the next step will be the US citizenship. I can ask for it, 5 years after the Green Card has been issued. So August 2012 ... who knows where I will be by then ... :D I know I am pretty lucky. And I am happy because of that. And I think it is fair. At the same time I am also sad, for all the people who really need a Green Card, and maybe will never get it. People who came to US with the dream of a better quality of life, and they came with the family and they don't have any realistic chance to move somewhere else. And I am also thinking how strange life is. We are happy when we achieve something that not everybody can achieve. And that means that someone else is suffering for that. This makes me sad. Very sad. Probably I shouldn't be this happy for this Green Card?

ALASKA-LAX-HAWAII

In this map, kindly provided by Google Earth, there is all my excitement and the happiness for my next adventure. Actually our next adventure. NeNe & I, just came back from the Alaska trip, landed in LA, did some laundry and we are ready to fly to Hawaii. We will be in the Oahu island in Hawaii for 5 days ... yeeeaaahhhh ...

... I need to go to Honolulu for a business meeting, but because of the meeting preparation, the post meeting discussion and the weekend, we will be there for 5 days. Of course we will try to have as much fun as possible, we will definitely surf in Waikiki and we will drive all the island. And of course, I will put some pictures and stories on the blog ... stay tuned ... :)

CAMPING in ALASKA

The Alaska trip will be really remembered for the great camping we had ... not really the most comfortable ever, but just great exactly for that reason. Most of the campgrounds didn't have flushing restrooms, some of them didn't even have running water, only 1 campground with shower (coin operated) . These are a couple of pictures from a campgorund in the Kenai pensinsula where we had a very nice old style pump ... we were pulling water out of the well just underneath us ... very funny ... and very cold water ... for the morning face washing ... but definitely memorable ... ... and we did pitch our mighty tent in wonderful places ... national parks, state parks and municipal campsites ...... it was really cold. In Denali NP we had ice outside the tent in the morning ... and our new warm sleeping bags really did help us a lot ...... most of them were in the "bear country" ... and every night we had to store all our food and restrooms stuff in a container ...... cooking was a lot of fun ... we had a lot of soups ... and sometimes we had to cook inside the tent, because it was way too cold outside, although this is not really recommended in a "bear country" ...... what I really loved is the reconnection with the environment around us. I think everybody should try to do some camping. Camping help all of us to understand what is the impact o the environment. You realize how much you can recycle. For example we did all the vacation with a Swiss knife, a couple of fork and plastic spoon that we did wash every night. Normally these are the plastic wear that you use once in a party and you through away ... definitely camping helps to realize that we are just a small animal in the ecosystem ... and that the "trash" is an invention of our modern society ... a shame that is polluting all our wonderful blue planet ...

PORTAGE GLACIER

This is our last day in Alaska. And we have kept a small jewel for the end. The jewel is the tidal Portage glacier, and because it is a tidal glacier, time to time is creating some interesting iceberg ...... and it in in the Kenai peninsula but not very far from Anchorage. To get there either you take a very long hike from Whittier, AK or you take a boat. We decide to take the boat ...... and of course we loved it. It reminded me of the Perito Moreno, the Patagonian glacier ... and how lucky I am to have the chance to see all these incredible natural beauties ...

The TUNNEL to WHITTIER, Alaska

Whittier, AK is an other tiny harbor town that Tina & I visited during this trip. But what make this town absolutely special is its tunnel. Basically to get to Whittier, AK either you get by boat or by this crazy 2.5 miles long tunnel, which is as wide as your car and where you ride 25 miles per hour on a railroad! Yep, crazy. But true. Check out these pictures ...

Hiking BYRON GLACIER

An other day in Alaska and an other glacier hike. This time it is close to the city of Whittier, AK. The name of the glacier is Byron glacier and the hike is not as demanding as the one for Exit glacier. The scenery is absolutely stunning and we definitely had a lot of fun here checking out the ice melting down ...... looking at a glacier it is really an interesting experience. Especially in this period of global warming. While you are looking at the glaciers, you wonder how old is the ice that is melting down in front of your eyes. Maybe is was there since the discovery of America. Or maybe more. Really fascinating ... and sad if you think that this global warming is due to the CO2 of our daily commuting ...