Day 14: Last Day was a Blast, Yay!

The last day of any vacation always has this pressure on it, more so than any other day. Most of the time this pressure is good, it stops you from going home with regrets about how you spent your time. I would have had regrets if I didn't go on another hike, so Tayla offered to take me to a spot with a waterfall and cliffs to jump from. I accepted and we set off on a journey to absolutely ruin the interior of her roommate's car.

We took the dog to chase away other hikers

I'm going to leave out a vast majority of pictures here for the sake of dramatic tension, also because most of it was taken on Tayla's GoPro and I'd rather let her reveal it. You guys will get the inside story, lucky you.  Or unlucky you, if you enjoy pretty pictures of nature. If that's more your style, just google "Waterfall", you'll find better pictures there anyway.

The hike was more difficult than originally thought, which was indicated by the amount of hikers meeting us from the opposite way and asking how much further they had to go. There were about four seperate groups, all of them covered in mud and soaked head to toe. Even though they were exhausted and missing shoes, I could still see the signs of pride and happiness in their eyes. This waterfall was worth it, I thought, but I need to be careful with my sneakers. 

Shit

I started a game, how long could I keep my shoelaces clean? I made the initial mistake of taking a clean pair of shoes on this hike without knowing how much mud I would be dealing with. Surprisingly, I went nearly the entire way there without getting a speck on them. What I had in cleanliness I lost in speed, though, and was almost left behind due to how slow I was moving. Then we hit a point where I no choice but to step into the river, and I did. I had a good run, but I was no match for nature. 

After I got my feet wet a little bit the whole hike got easier. I took it as a metaphor for life, you know? You can take your time trying to do everything perfectly and avoiding mistakes, that's fine. But if that's your main focus than you'll fall behind. The only way to move forward is to step in the mud a little bit. There's no way to keep your shoelaces clean. You gotta be willing to have wet socks. Keep pushing until you are all gross. Always be willing to get your shoelaces dirty. I don't really know what I'm talking about anymore, but there's some sort of motivation if you look for it. Anyway, my shoes got all fucked up.

It's like, a metaphor, bro

We got to the waterfall and admired it's beauty. I admired it so much that I took literally zero pictures of it. Don't be mad at me, it was crowded by teenagers and you had to swim to get a good shot anyway. Unfortunately, me and my crew were on a time crunch and could only spend about 20 minutes at the waterfall. On the GoPro we got some cool footage of people jumping off the cliff and nothing else. Now that I think about it, twenty minutes is about the maximum amount of time you can spend at a waterfall without doing the same thing over and over again. Waterfalls are like the Kardashians; They're nice to look at, but they're hardly worth a half hour.

After making an active decision to make my blog worse by not taking pictures we headed back to the car in unspectacular fashion. We passed more hikers going the opposite direction, only this time we were the experienced ones. I made sure to really put on my best exasperated face with the goal of getting at least one person to turn around and go home. That didn't happen at all, though. I guess I underestimated people's obsession with waterfalls.

We got back to the car, went home, and showered immediately. When I got out of the shower I had this great feeling in my body, my bones, my muscles. Just then I had a flashback to years back, long ago, to the last time I exercised. I was in shape, running every day and having a sense of pride in my body. The vision whirled in my brain, jolted through my eyes, and suddenly I was back on this mortal realm, disoriented but inspired. I was so enlightened by the experience that I layed in my bed and did nothing for the next two hours. The next thing I did was drink three rum and cokes before leaving for town. Nothing had changed.

I know some of these words

I struggled to comprehend the ramen menu so I just ordered the one with chicken and grabbed a beer. Tayla was DDing for the night, so I guess she also had an epiphany of how to take care of herself, but actually followed it. I was bored and lacking pictures for the day so I told her to look at the receipt as if she spent too much money on my dinner and I would take a candid shot of it. I think I overestimated her acting abilities.

Looks like she was kicked in the shin

Our post-dinner plans were kareoke and drinking, as we are unoriginal and living in the past. A short walk later and we were there, but the whole place was empty. That's okay, at least nobody was singi- what the hell is that? I don't recognize the song, nor do I think any notes being sung were real notes at all. After some expert investigating I discovered that this kareoke bar was unlike the last one, in that you could take the mic and sing from wherever you wanted. Game changer. 

As embarrasing as it is to admit, I think I sang about seven songs at that bar. They ranged from The Joker, to Roses, to My Shot from Hamilton. I would have sung less if people stopped giving me free drinks after my performances. I also would have remembered more. Regardless, it was an amazing start of the night that cemented my love for singing in front of strangers. It also goes to show the value of learning at least a couple of rap songs as a white dude. 

I told him he was "killing it" as in the integrity of music.

More and more of Tayla's coworkers showed up during the night, and since it was industry night, they knew how to party. It makes sense, they get out of work between 11-12 and start their shifts at 4pm, so they can be out all night and still get enough sleep for the next day. They didn't grab the mic at the first bar which disappointed me, but they did feed me drinks all night, so I felt like we were all friends. They wanted Tayla and I to do a duet, so we rounded out the night with another performance of Bohemian Rhapsody that got a much better response than Australia. By that time we had to bounce, so I finished up the last of my drink and wings and we left. 

I have no idea why these were a theme of the trip

There's an old saying that nothing good happens after 2am. Or maybe it's 3am. Regardless, I can confidently say that nothing good happens for sure after 4am. Luckily the next kareoke bar closes at 4am, so we had nothing to worry about! Tayla bounced before the bar closed, which should have been my signal to leave, but I wanted my last day to count! 

Immediately after my DD left I bought a round for the room that went entirely underappreciated. That's okay, I can at least sing some kareoke that nobody really listens to! One song lead to the next and somehow it was 4am already. Ah well, that was fun while it lasted. Time to go home, right? Guys? Home time? Nah, they said, the night has just begun. You know, I hate when people say that, because it could not be further from the truth. If it's 4am then, realistically, the morning has just begun, and the night was about to end. It was just a weird thing to say.

Who knows why I thought this was important. Although we did become Facebook friends!

I won't go into detail about what we did after that, mostly because I don't really remember. I know that we were talking about philosophy and ethics and our futures but there was no way that it was actually intelligent conversation. Or maybe it was, who knows. All I know is that the coffee we had was a mistake, because we definitely did not need to extend the night. We ended up at one of their houses just hanging out until an uber came around and got me home. I got home at 6am, a new personal record and an embarassing fact to put online for my parents to read. I crashed the second my head hit the pillow, and sadly only had five hours to sleep before having to wake up and fly home.

It was a wild last night, and a good way to end the vacation. Even thought it wasn't specific to Hawaii, it was still cool to get a legitimate night out on the town and see what a new place is all about. And just to put my family at ease, I'm not trying to make a habit of late nights and heavy drinking. But come on, it was my last day.

I want to thank everyone who stuck around and read this blog from the beginning. It was an interesting experience that really enhanced this once in a lifetime vacation. Some point soon I will make a last post to wrap it all up and give closing thoughts. Thanks again!