Kona Day 1 - Travel

From 12:00am to 12:00am it was a 30 hour day factoring in the 6 hour time change. After a late night Monday arrival into Chicago (1:00am) with an early morning departure to O'Hare (4:00am) it was indeed a long day. I knew of about 20 of us all traveling to Kona today, and I believe that we all as a collective unit traveled through each main airport west of the Mississippi. How many possible flight routes can you take to Kona? Quite a few.

You can call me a nerd but I have always enjoyed new airports and new airport codes, or whatever they are called. Today's itinerary was: ORD-->DFW-->HNL-->KOA. Usually I hope to sit next to some beautiful woman, strike up conversation, or meet someone with great stories to pass the time, but today was a bit different. On my flight from Dallas to Honolulu I was in a row with 2 soldiers just coming home from Afghanistan after a year absence from home. Really puts things in perspective when a 200 pound man is sitting next you crying as he is watching video of his kid's first steps, words, and just about everything else he missed in his child's life that he was about to rejoin after a "short" 8 hour flight over the Pacific. While I thought I was excited to get to Kona, both these men had me beat. Last flight was Honolulu to Kona with about 50% of the flight being triathletes. Sighting of the day was at DFW with a guy dressed in IM gear head to toe with his Compex muscle stimulator going on waiting at the gate. I think the kids a row over though he was some sort of fictional movie character.

After 16 hours of travel while reading two books simultaneously I finally made it to Kona only to be whisked away right into town for some fish tacos at Killer Tacos. We all got together shared travel stories (Lindey's story wins with jet fuel on the runway) and headed to the house that sits onto of the Queen K and looks over the town and ocean. Ben, Tyler, Lindsey and I sat outside in perfect weather and enjoyed the end to a long day of travel, this house and view is BALLIN'! We also made post race plans: Top of Muna Kea, cliff jumping, surfing, possible parasailing....life is good!

Tomorrow is Wednesday and the first full day here on the Big Island. Early morning swim at the Kona Aquatic Center with the sunrise followed up with breakfast at the famous Lava Java, and check out the expo as well. I am going to try and head out for a run in the energy lab with some friends and then end the night at the Slowtwitch Gathering. We will also have our GoPros out as well for some good video.

Sorry far too tired to post pictures tonight and my head really isn't thinking straight anymore