Success

Today was awesome! Taylor took me wakeboarding. It was an early morning, but they always are when we go to the lake. I set three alarms just in case...I only needed one though. I was able to get a good ride in this morning on the lake before it got choppy. Not to mention that fact that I actually got up. It only took 5 tries (for me, that's good). Then Brandon rode a little, making me look not to great, and Taylor rode the sky ski. It was a tons of fun. Then we went back to shore for lunch and to relax some. We went back out later in the afternoon when the water was rough. I got up 2 more times, so that really made my day a lot more fun. Now, as Taylor and Randy both warned me, I am going to be sore tomorrow and I can already start to feel it. But I don't care, it's definitely worth it. It's been a long, fun day. Enough said.

Early Morning Madness

Robert and I just caught a small rabbit, yes a rabbit, that was in my room. I have no freaking idea how it got there since my dorr was shut all day. I thought I heard something around midnight or a little after. It sounded like a cat was trapped behind my dresser. I had Robert go in my room to hear it, but it stopped making noise when he came. So he says "don't worry about it, it's nothing." I heard the noise again! but ignored it and fell asleep. Then about 2:05 AM I woke up because I thought I heard something move by my window. And when I looked at my window, I thought I saw something move. Now since it's 2 AM my eyes could have been lying to me, and so I double checked simply by staring at the window. Sure enough, It moves again! So I watch this thing move across my window sill and back. Its ears gave it away, that and the small hopping movement it had. I went in Robert's room assuming he was still awake and told him. He looked puzzled when I told him there was a rabbit on my window sill (and he thought I meant it was outside not inside). So yeah, we caught the rabbit...gave it some carrots and lettuce and put it in a box with a little towel to sleep on. That's my adventure for the night. Now it's off to sleep for the second time tonight.

Free Egg

"Want and extra egg? Just ask, it's free."

So much has happened since Thursday. On Friday I went to Berkeley for Robert's graduation, which was Saturday morning. The graduation was a long 4 hours. And I was about the last person to be hit by the sun that morning. But I'm glad I went. Congrats to Robert! Then I helped move some of his stuff, and I ended up carrying his microwave stand from his old apartment to his current one because Lauren's car is too small. And then we went a nice resturant for dinner called The Townhouse. There were 9 of us...it was a fun night to say the least. And not to mention the food was really good. Then it was back to Robert's apartment and then sleep, only to wake up early Sunday and drive home. OH MAN!! (I just remembered something cool) Robert and I went back in Lauren's car, but for breakfast my parents and the 3 of us went to this really cool place for breakfast called the Red Tractor Cafe. It was a soo cool. Then the long drive home began. Sunday night I had a hockey game. We won in a shootout, although we were up 4-1. A win is a win. Then today Roebrt and I played tennis. Robert hadn't hit since...about 2 years ago. It was fun though. And Sonic has the orange cool breeze back for the summer. Yay!

Done!

Wow. It's about time this semester is over. My finals weren't too bad, though I did study for them a little more than usual. But ya, I'm glad it's summer!

Finals

Ya I know, it has been a while since I last updated. Not too much has happened. I've been busy with school and tests and stuff. I guess the newest thing would be I signed up for hockey again and got 2 more hockey sticks. Yesterday was our 3rd game of the season. We won 2-1 last night and actually, that's our record on the season too. Oh! and I got a goalie interferrence penalty with 10 seconds left in the game. Finals are this week. I had my logic final this morning...logic proofs are slightly better than pre-calc proofs, but I still don't like them! Hmm...I think that's everything for now.

Costa Rica

Warning: This is a long post.

Where do I start on this one?? I guess it would have to be with the 1:00 AM flight out of LAX early Friday morning that was delayed until 2:00 AM. I slept the entire flight. And when I woke up, we were over Costa Rica. We got there around 7:30-8:00 in the morning. And straight from the airport we found out taxi driver, Victor, and we to Jacó. Now this drive was about 2 hours, but nothing like what I expected. Costa Rica drivers are crazy, and all their roads are 2 lanes and windy. I'm not used to passing people on blind corners and stuff. It was a bit scary the first time, but I got used to it. The drive was awesome though, just seeing everything. We stopped at the little restaurant for breakfast. That was the best rice I have ever had. And still on the drive to Jacó we stopped at this bridge where there are a bunch of crocodiles. They were huge. The scenic view was also really nice.



Sometime Friday morning around 11 or so we got to Jacó. And basically from there, we jumped in the pool to cool off, got a drink at the bar (I had iced tea, not beer) and then hopped in a taxi and went to the marina (in Los Sueños) to go fishing. We met Rob the captain and Dañello (I'm sure I spelled it wrong) who was the deckhand. Then we went out for some in-shore fishing. Basically fishing for fun fish. Then that evening we went back to Jacó. We cleaned up, went out to dinner, then basically went to sleep. That was ALL on Friday. From the flight to the drive to fishing. It was a long day.

So then Saturday morning we woke up nice and early go get to the boat by 7:30-8. We ate on the boat. Now, this boat, named Lightspeed, was super nice. It is a fishing boat, and like I said, very nice. This thing was fast. To put in comparison, the previous fishing boats I have been on cruise at about 10-12 knots. This boat: about 30 knots. Fast. Anyways, Saturday we went fishing for the big stuff, mainly sailfish. The weather in Costa Rica is hot and humid. It wasn't much different on the boat either. So Saturday was spent catching sailfish. We caught 13. I caught the first one and it was the largest. The fish was 100-110 pounds. By far the largest fish I have ever caught (the picture at the end of the post). I don't know how long it took to reel in, but I do know I felt exhausted after I got it in. Lets just say when I was holding the rod I stood there wondering when the line was going to run out. Seriously, I wondered. The fish took the bait and ran with it. It took more than 300 yards of line. And the whole time the line was going out I was aware that I had to reel it all back in. It was a blast. That was one experience I will never forget. That night we went back to Jaco, cleaned up, went to dinner, and walked around the town. It was like a nightly rhythm we had.

Sunday we decided to go fishing again because we all loved it. We woke up a little bit earlier so we could get to the boat earlier. Sunday the fishing was good too. It started out a little slow, but once it picked up it was great. By then end of Sunday we caught 14 sailfish. The two day total was 27 fish. We let all the fish go. Both days we were 30-35 miles off shore. And 550-600 miles from the equator. The way back to the marina was fun. We, as in me, my dad, and my two uncles were all up top talking and listening to music. Watching the sunset with just ocean in the background was a sight to see. When we got back to the marina we went to the bar to just relax and soak up the weekend. There I had my first beer. I'm 19, I'm allowed to in Costa Rica.

Here's a little more in detail about how awesome the boat was. On Friday when we first got to the marina there were already fishing rods set up all over the place, and Rob had the music playing. It was cool. The inside was really nice too. The kitchen had two pull-out refrigerators and at least one pull-out freezer. And in the room with the kitchen, the two sofas, a table, and a tv was a 5-speaker Bose surround sound system. Wow, just wow. The cockpit was decked out for fishing. It even had one of those fishing chairs bolted down. The helm was incredible. Just to mention a few of the things it had: a large screen GPS (ran by the laptop stored beneath it), sonar, water temp, a cd player (with two speakers outside), and an mp3 player (also with mp3's from the laptop). Here's a picture of the boat.


Sunday night we hit the town for dinner and walked around. Monday was out day for touring before the flight back at 6:00 pm. We had Victor for our taxi driver again. He was cool, and helpful. We left the hotel at 7 am and went to a rainforest. It was freaking humid, but it didn't bother me much cause I was enjoying the rainforest so much. The rainforest was...really green to say the least.

After the rainforest hike we went to a volcano. I kind of wanted to go to another rainforest, but after seeing the volcano it was just as spectacular. And besides, there was a rainforest at the volcano too, which I did walk through. It was cool because this one wasn't quiet as green. It was a high altitude rainforest. The volcano was about 8,000 feet in elevation. The rainforest was dryer, and had more trees, but I still liked it.


Then after the volcano, Victor drove us to a waterfall. It was so cool, not just the waterfall, but driving around the country. Just being able to see all the fields and mountains and counrtysides.

After the waterfall we went to the airport. And from there we flew back to LAX. The flight back was not as great. Primarily because a group of people who had too much to drink, were being loud and annoying. We got back to Bakersfield around 3 AM Tuesday morning. And that was my vacation in Costa Rica.

Costa Rica was beautiful. Everything I did and saw was awesome. I can't describe the overall level of fun and enjoyment I got from this vacation To sum up the it up, this picture says it all. (This is that 100-110 pound sailfish)