Aloha!  We are into 3 weeks of this years Yoga Teacher Training and everyone is doing great!

New Students practicing with some Locals

 

 

 We have had 2 classes with Local folks here on the Island.  Everyone has learned so much.  As a reward we took a day trip to the Hawaiian Volcano Park.  We hiked several miles down the crater and then entirely across, back up, and over to our starting point.  It was a great hike.  Once down in the crater we stopped at a steam vent, did some yoga, performed the hula, and left her (Madame Hele) some flowers and incense.

Finished the hike down, now to reach the other side.

Ginger Plant

From the Jungle to Lava

 It was amazing how the scenery changed from jungle to baron lava.  There were some signs of life on the lava but not much.  We also came across quite a bit of the semi precious stone peridot.  This crater has an abundance of this beautiful green crystal scattered all over it if you look carefully.  We also came across some interesting life in the jungle surrounding the crater.  We saw a beautiful volcanic peacock family, a ginger flower, and natural orchids. 

Hiking

 

Our Offerings

Life amongst the Death

Volcano Offerings from someone

Wild Orchids

 After our hike and lunch we trekked through the lava tunnels and then over to the observatory to take a look at the lava glow from above.  It was a beautiful sight.  It was rainy and cold so we all had hot cocoa and tomato soup in our cars before we road tripped home. It was a really fun day.

Volcanic Peacock

Madame Hele the Volcano

 One of our cooks had to leave so that left me as one of the main cooks for the group.  I have really been enjoying being in the kitchen and learning how to make some great healthy food for a large group of people. Not that I am ready to host Thanksgiving this year, but I have learned alot.  I am happy that I didn't come here with a pre-set idea of how my time here would be spent.  I just enjoy going with the flow and being of service to all the Yoga Gods and Goddess.  As you can imagine the energy here is so blissful no matter what you are doing.  I still make sure I make it for a swim or a snorkle daily and sometimes more. 

Lunch

Gluetan Free Pizza

One of our many little friends

Just a regular Breakfast Day

 

 

Sasha and I cooking DinDin in our matchy uniforms

As you can expect at a place like this I am making alot of really cool friends.  Sasha and I have been having a great time in the kitchen together.  She lives here on the Big Island and has been coming over in the evenings to help with Dinner.  She is so awesome!  She saw my Ocean Beach Peoples Cookbook and told me she has been there and loves that place.  We have been doing some recipes out of that book while here.  Fun Times!

The next few days the students will continue learning Yoga Philosophy and Asana.  Tomorrow we have another field trip to a beautiful beach called Maklavena.  After that our new students will be leading thier own Yoga classes that we will be able to take.  I am excited for some Yoga Asana after all my Kitchen Yoga!

I hope all who is reading this is having an amazing day!  Mahalo!

Time Flies!

My Friend Alicia and I

Wow!  I can't believe how the days at this teacher training are flying bye!  All of the students are absolutely wonderful people.  We have a variety of people from France, Samoa, Brazil, Australia, Canada, Colorado, Oregon, Washington, and Florida.  There are 15 students in total.  I thought I would have a harder time learning everyone's name but they are all so friendly it came quickly.

My intention origianally was to blog every other day.  With the busyness going on there is no way that is possible.  My typical day starts at 6am in the kitchen.  If breakfast is made quickly I may have some time to go into class and re-learn with the other students.  After breakfast we all break for free time.  For me that means OCEAN!  The black sand beach is right down the way.  Lately I have been bringing my pink inflatable raft.  The other day I got to float it around a huge pod of Dolphins and just yesterday a little Honu (Sea Turtle) popped his head up and swam right up to me in my raft.

Nicole and My Tiki Hut "Naia"

View of our Tiki Hut and Bathroom

Anyways, after the beach I shower and prep lunch.  After lunch class resumes again.  Now I only have a little time to enjoy class so that I can assist in the dinners.  We really make some gormet food here.  We also make sure we garnish it beautifully with flowers and in beautiful serving wear.  Sometimes after Dinner we may have some more teaching and I enjoy to sit on in that too.  Since everything is on Solar Power here once the sun goes down, we also start settling down and getting ready for bed.  The internet and phone service here is really spotty. I can really only use it in certain spots, and my room is not one of them.

Anyhow, here are some photo's in my collection from the past 10 days.  Enjoy!  Video of Dolphin I took soon to come.  :)

Kumu Keala teaching us Hula and Traditional Hawaiian Chanting

Kiss the cooks!  Where's Sasha?  She should be in this pic too!

Anatomy class

Ganesh adorning my Fathers Day Flowers.  Karl, David, Bob

Just before our ceremony releasing the flowers into the ocean

My roomie Nicole and I at the Kava Bar

The Kava Tender

Sunset at my friends house

Kona County

All in all I am having a great time here. I am really enjoying spending so much time in the kitchen.  Also, everyone here has so much great knowledge to share about healthy living and eating.  Jons going to be so excited with my new love of cooking when I return! 

Since my time is limited today I am just going to upload some pics I have been taking and add a brief description on each of them.  I have also been posting some of these on facebook, which has been easier than logging in on this blogger site.  I apologize if you have already seen some of the photos from the facebook uploads. Mahalo!

Opening Ceremony

Just an example of one of our yummy salads

Ho'Okeena Beach

Fresh Picked Coconuts from Matt.  He climbed the tree!

Love it!  The straw was made out of Papaya leaf stalk

My Indian Angel protecting me in my room

Enrty 1 Hale Kai Yoga Teacher Training 2013

 

I made it!  President Barack Obama happened to be in Los Angeles on Friday, the day I needed to catch my flight to Kona.  I wasn't aware that just his presence in the area caused the airport to modify all of their flight schedules.  As I arrived to the commuter flight terminal in San Diego a little over an hour hour early, I proceeded to the check-in counter to check my 1 (big) 43 pound bag (I did good, thanks Jen!).  Anyway, as I was walking up to the check-in I heard my name over the loud speaker.  I told the woman who was casually talking my bag and requesting the $25 fee that the name they were announcing to immediately come to the ticketing counter was me. Why? I'm over an hour early, did I goof up on times?  She told me that my flight looked quite delayed and they needed to let me know.  Huh?So she sent me to security and told me to go straight to ticketing after I get through security.  As I was taking out my laptop and removing the sunglasses from my head to put in the security bins they called my name over the loud speaker again!  I was really getting anxious at this point. I yelled out a little "I'm here!" And proceeded to get looked at by security with a "who the ***** cares" look.  Once they were content that I didn't have any liquid or gel contraband, I made it through security and ran straight to ticketing.

Out of breath from frantically gathering my stuff and running to ticketing I got up to the counter and told her who I was.  "Oh no," she said!  "Not good, " I thought.  She picked up her phone and dialed someone and then ran around the corner and looked outside.  She came back to me without saying one word other than "oh no." She then tells me she was trying to get me on that plane outside because mine is delayed and won't get me to LA in time to catch my Kona flight.  "What?!!"  Unfortunately it was too late though.  The flight doors were closed. On a side note, that is so stupid.  The plane was sitting right there why can't they just re-open the doors?  It's not like the plane would malfunction if the doors opened and closed one more time.  Really?  So anyway, clearly I was upset and stressed.  The nice lady really wanted to help.  She mentioned since I was traveling alone she may able to help in some other way.  Good news! She was going to put me on another airline carrier that was already 2 hours delayed and would be taking off next.  Yay, how nice, I will make it then!  As I got on the little propeller plane and buckled in, the pilot got on the loud speaker and announced the president of the United States was at LAX and about to take off in his plane and because of that we were grounded in San Diego for 45 minutes.  Oh no!  My flight to Kona boards at 4:20 and I was set to arrive at 4:20.  Hopefully the terminal is the same and the gate nearbye.  No such luck!  Since I was on a different airline carrier I now had to get to a different terminal and I was about 45 gates away.

Once I got there at 4:20 I ran out of the plane to the ticketing counter out front and asked for a shuttle.  She told me to go to gate 65 to catch that shuttle.  She pointed me in the direction and suggested I run. Ok, so I was at gate 87 and needed to run to gate 65 to ultimately shuttle me to gate 43.  This is literally miles in LAX.  Not to mention my 2 heavy carry ons and my flip flops being an issue, I ended up taking my flip flops off to better "run" to gate 65.  What seemed to take forever, I finally made it to gate 65.  Get this, lady at gate 65 almost didn't let me get on the shuttle because it was for Alaskan Airlines travelers only.  Luckily she did let me on and I was quickly shuttled off to terminal 4 gate 43.  The shuttle bus driver told me I had 3 minutes to make it to my gate before they shut the doors and gave me directions to run.  As the shuttle pulled up to terminal 4 I jumped off the bus and my phone went flying out of my pocket luckily it didn't break.  I flew through some roped off area and completely ignored the TSA as they yelled "ma'am, ma'am stop!"  That was one of my favorite part of the adventure, I felt like such a rebel and they were too lazy to chase after me.  Gate 43 was in sight and I started waving my hands frantically as I was running up to it.  The gate attendant was waving at me, and motioning me not to stop running.  As I made it to the gate she said I had just made it and closed the doors behind me.  And that is how I began my trip or should I say, my adventure.

After all that being said I am overjoyed to have made it here safely.  This weekend we all have been keeping very busy preparing the text books, cleaning, merchandising the store, and preparing the rooms for the guests.  We all celebrated with my dear friend Alicia for her birthday yesterday.  I gave her a facial with my new Ayurvedic skincare products and she loved them!  It was a great day. My roommate Nicole and I are also having alot of fun giggling at night and having fun reuniting after last years teacher training.  Even with all the hard work we all make sure to still have fun.  We have been hitting the beach at least 2 times a day and taking nice long swims in the ocean.  We have seen alot of beautiful fishes and some turtles.  We keep hoping for our lovely dolphin friends to show up.  This evening 3 of our 16 guests are arriving, so it is all beginning!  I am so excited!  To be continued.....