Pacific Wake Up Call

After quite a late night of getting to Kona at 4am CST and getting to bed at 5:30 CST, we slept for about 3 hours and awoke to the vibration of Steve's phone ringing with a boat customer call (not the vibration that I would have had in mind for my first morning in Kona ;-) anywhooo....we rolled over after deciding the customer really shouldn't sell his boat trailer and slept for a couple more hours. I finally rolled out to the deck of our condo and did a little Skype homeschool with Cade while watching the palm trees sway to the thunder of the morning surf rolling in.

After a little middle school math and some amazing Kona Mountain Java, my adrenaline was ready to start the day. Toni and I left OSHA 1 and OSHA 2 in charge of putting my bike together and headed for the the parking garage to find the car. 15 minutes later :-) we found it and left for the pier to swim.

The water was really rough for the first 800m or so and then opened up so the silt settled down. It was like swimming in an aquarium; yellow, blue, striped fish, blue fish and even a turtle. I sawm out to the half way buoys, visited with a gal working the course in her kayak and then swam back in. There was a bit more of a "push" if you will, coming back. I sighted the cell tower to find my way to the end of the harbor and rode the last wave almost to the wall leading to the infamous steps leading back up to the pier.

Check. Survived the first ocean swim. No sharks, but no dolphins either. Sad face. Actually, word has it a group of us from Austin are swimming with dolphins tomorrow on a charter - should be a blast!

I made my way to the 'lube' table to coat the raw spots I already got from my speedsuit rubbing my neck (you forget how abrassive salt water is), met my friend Toni, who had just experienced her first swim in a washing machine, then headed to peel and go pick up my race packet...for "Ironman Kona"...good gracious, pinch me again, I still cant believe I am doing this!!


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