Day 6 – Skydiving, Waikiki Beach, Pool, Dinner and Shopping

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Bec and I were up early today as the alarm was set for 6:30am for our 7:00am pickup. We got picked up about 7:15am and did a few other hotel pickups before making the hour journey up to Waialua, on the North Shore. We arrived and watched two videos (one was purely to say that they were not responsible at all if you get injured or die). Then we waited around for a bit before our name appeared on the board and it was our time to jump. We were harnessed up and did some quick photos with our respective photographers before walking across the paddock and boarding our small plane. This plane looked in much better condition than the one I went in out in the Yarra Valley back home.The climb up was smooth and the views were beautiful; breathtaking.Bec and I compared our hearts rates with our Fitbits as we continued the climb. Hers went up slightly, mine went down but no extremes. It then came time to jump. One guy went out first then I was next. The photographer climbed out first and hung from the side of the plane then Big Jim and I climbed on down to sit on the edge. We got into position as shown on the ground, then out the door we went. The air was really cold, we didn't have suits here like we did back home, just what we showed up wearing. As we dropped though, the air warmed rapidly. After a bit of posing for the cameraman it was time to enjoy the view as the shoot was pulled. Then I got to have a bit of a chat to Big Jim as we sailed slowly down. He even let me steer for a bit as he said being that it was the third time I'd done it I “was basically a pro”. So as we sailed down I found out Big Jim was originally from Southern Indiana and he had being skydiving since 1994. I asked how he started and he said he jumped once and that was it; he moved to Hawaii and never looked back. He said he would never be moving back to Southern Indiana. We also discussed the landscape below; the reef and how the snorkelling is fantastic there during summer but has big waves during winter. Eventually Big Jim took over the steering again and we landed safely, standing. Even though we were second to jump we were the last to land which was pretty cool. We did our celebration photos and made our way back to the office where I reconvened with Bec to see how she went. As it was her first time she did extremely well. She said it was fantastic and would definitely do it again. We unharnessed, thanked our guys, received our certificates and got to view our photos. We then got to sit briefly before getting back in the minivan for the hour drive back to Waikiki, which we managed to sleep most of. We got dropped back at the hotel at 12:15pm, then walked up to Subway to get some lunch as we hadn’t had breakfast. We then walked back to the hotel to meet Marnee in the room, had a quick chat, ate and Bec and I decided to go and check out Waikiki Beach. Bec’s not a fan of being eaten by sharks so we went to the area that has a fence dividing the ocean and the beach. We stayed there for a little bit, took some photos, basked in the sunshine and swam in the beautiful water. It really is quite a lovely beach. After that we rinsed off the sand in the beach showers and made our way back to the hotel to sit by the pool. We sat there for about 2hrs before making our way to the room at about 4:15pm to get ready and head off earlier then we have been. We walked along the beach and then cut up onto Kalakaua Ave and called into a few shops before walking down to Ala Moana Shopping Centre. We did some shopping, I got some Panda Express for dinner then we walked across to Walgreens to get a few more things. From there we walked the 30mins back to the hotel but stopped off at our local ABC Store for yoghurt and granola for tomorrow morning as I had to be up before the crack of dawn for my sunrise photography tour. Total steps for the day: 27,855<br style="line-height: 21.77px;" />Total kms for the day: 19.33

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