Kūhiō Beach at Waikīkī, along with its two walled ponds, is often misunderstood. It is frequently lumped together with the rest of Waikiki beaches and dismissed as eternally crowded - "like a zoo", as they say. In reality, each beach along Waikiki Bay has its own distinct vibe, shaped by differences in location, reef structure, parking access, and proximity to oceanfront resorts.
Surfers begin gathering at Kuhio Beach well before sunrise, paddling out to Canoes, arguably the most popular surf break along all of Waikiki beaches. Long before swimmers arrive at the walled ponds, surfers are already catching waves on the reef just outside the west pond. Even after sunset, silhouettes of surfers can still be seen braving the break, moving against an ocean painted with the fading afterglow of dusk.
I don't know what Kuhio Beach looks like in summer or during the holiday season, but I can describe what it feels like to stay beside it for a week in November. The experience was noticeably different from influencer videos that highlight midday crowds during peak months. It also felt less touristy than portrayed by websites written by people who have something to sell to you.
Life around Manhasset Bay
I have been taking pictures around Manhasset Bay for quite some years now. Except for a few that I uploaded to Wikimedia as an Wikipedian a decade ago, most have never seen the light of the day. I dusted off a bunch of these and re-processed them. I hope they capture a glimpse of the life around the bay that fictionally separated Jay Gatsby from Daisy Buchanan.
The truth is that many people around the bay have very little idea how their towns look from the water. And those not addicted to examining satellite pictures are often unaware of expansive waterfront properties.
Most water-fronting mansions are shielded from unwanted street views. But all of them are clearly visible from the bay, for obvious reasons. After all, if you can’t see someone’s bedroom window from a kayak, then they can’t see the water either from their bedroom.
The bay comes alive in summer. Sailboats, kayaks and all sorts of watercraft abound. Yacht clubs hold races that draw sailors from all around the bay, and often beyond.
Hanauma Bay for the chronically overprepared
I enjoy writing about things I can’t find online. Here I wrote a snorkeling guide to Hanauma Bay for those of us that must obsessively research before our trips. I wish someone had written one before my trip.
Kayak to Kaneohe Sandbar – sunken at high tide
On a windy and rainy day in November, I rented a kayak from Go Bananas, and drove to He’eia Kea Boat Harbor. I launched off towards where I thought the legendary Kaneohe Sandbar would be.
For the entire trip to the sandbar, I paddled alone in a foreboding ocean. Perhaps "bay" is a more accurate description. But from my low vantage point, it looked as if I were in the middle of the wide wide sea under dark clouds. I aimed for Kapapa Island as told. And that was good advice. Because from my kayak, all I could see were breaking waves in every direction, except for that tiny speck of an island in the distance.
I kept turning my kayak back towards the harbor, second-guessing the sanity of my choice. I saw dark clouds pouring rain over entire towns. I pivoted back towards Kapapa Island and paddled some more, all the while frightened to the core and utterly alone.
I reached the last boat in sight, hoping to find tourists having a great time. But it was empty, silent and moored in deep water. No sandbar to be seen. I swung back facing the harbor. I again turned towards Kapapa. I kept going.
After what seemed like a lifetime, I sensed a change in water color. Shortly the sun poked its head out from behind clouds. And magic happened. The sea all around me turned turquoise as soon as sunlight touched them, revealing that I was merely a foot above the sand now. I got why this place is also known as the Sunken Island.
Why does my snorkel mask fog up?
In the year 2025, there are plenty of resources online that answer the question: why does my snorkel mask keep fogging up? Before my 2025 trip to Hawaii, I consulted numerous YouTube videos and Reddit discussions on this topic. Chiefly I wanted to avoid repeating my sub-optimal snorkeling experiences from the 2015 cruise trip and the 2009 trip to Trunk Bay and Caneel Bay. One regrettable aspect of these past trips was that I couldn’t stop my lenses from fogging up when snorkeling, despite having done what I perceived to be adequate preparation.
Not surprisingly, today’s online resources are actually worse than in 2009 and 2015. Blogs with insightful resources have gone dark, long replaced by either inaccessible tribal social media, or exceedingly-short clickbait clips tailored to today’s audience. Chiefly the latter peddles quick fixes showing the “hows”, but not the “whys”. The thing is, lens-defogging, like most things in life, follows Tolstoy’s law – that every happy family is alike, but every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. There’s a long list of things that each alone can fog up your lenses. You need to remediate each and every one of them, to get to the “happy path”.
During my 2025 trip, I finally attained defogging nirvana. I experienced crystal-clear views from my mask for two hours of snorkeling at Hanauma Bay, for the first time in my life. Nobody had told me that this was the norm for snorkeling. One shouldn’t have to stand up on shallow reef mid-snorkeling to address fogs, ever. Until I had this experience, like countless new merrymakers all around Waikiki, I did not regard having to deal with fogging every 5 minutes as anything unusual.
Waikiki & Honolulu landmarks seen from departing flight DL650
Delta 650 took off from runway 8R at Daniel K. Inouye International Airport due East at 5:15pm local time. Our pilot seemed to have made a point of banking the aircraft to trace the southern coast in the first 4 minutes of the flight to afford those seating on the left side a great aerial view of Sand Island, Honolulu downtown, Ala Moana, Waikiki, Kaimana, Diamond Head, Kahala, Hawaii Kai, Hanauma Bay, and Koko Head. Then the plane turned East again and flew towards the mainland.
Unlike the JFK arrival video I recorded, I was able to recognize all landmarks as I looked out of my window seat. This is largely due to my month-long research into Oahu before our trip to the island. But still, I figured I would write a post showing these famous Hawaiian landmarks. Here is the recorded video.
Actual landing flight path of Delta 650 at JFK runway 22L
I've always chosen window seats on flights whenever I could. And I never grew tired of watching my plane take off and land. Possibly I am just fascinated with flying, whether it involves model airplanes, computer simulations, or actual planes. But with only a few exceptional landmarks, I could almost never identify in realtime what the plane was flying over. It amazes me that I can't recognize locations that should be familiar to me where I've driven by countless number of times.
The truth is that aerial views often looks quite different from ground views. Even though I kept thinking that I could mentally reconstruct a god's eye view of my neighborhood, every landing proved me wrong. And my last trip was no exception. As I the plane readied itself for landing, I looked out of the window and couldn't tell where the plane was. I put my phone against the window pane for the first time, and recorded the entire landing path.
I played the clip backward at home, and fired up Google Maps with Globe View to rotate its map to match the window view of the terrain. Painstakingly I retraced the flight path backward from runway 22L. This turned out to be the quickest way to reconstruct the landing path. In doing so, I've joined a bunch of nerds like Joseph Gunn who document, among other thing, flight paths. In fact, I consulted one of his blog posts on flight patterns to confirm landing paths at runway 22L.
Wesley-Anny Wedding: Making of a Photo Shoot
This page hosts pictures taken a few weeks prior to the wedding, documenting the photo shoot session Aaron ran. Most of these are my pictures. Some where I make an appearance are taken by Elisha. I suppose you could call those pictures "Making of the Making of a Photo Shoot". Most of these pictures will be turned into slideshows for use on wedding day. See previous location recon pictures.
2018 XiSheng RC Extravaganza 西盛遙控飛行嘉年華
New Taipei RC Flying Extravaganza (西盛遙控飛行嘉年華會慶) organized by NTAMA (新北市航空模型協會) took place on Sunday, Nov 4th, 2018. It was joined by flying enthusiasts from all over Taiwan. I went with friends from the RC club from Kaohsiung 高雄市遙控運動協會, courtesy of 陳振國.
This article hosts pictures I took and edited of this event. Perhaps I'll come back and finish it with additional descriptions. Perhaps I won't. It exists for now as a place for enthusiasts to browse and download pictures I took of them, or their planes. I compiled two YouTube videos: a shorter one comprising video clips I took that day, as well as a longer slideshow highlighting some of the many exciting moments I captured in still pictures. As usual, some of the best pictures will eventually end up on Wikimedia.
NorCal for the model aeronautically-inclined
This is a guide and a preview to upcoming articles I'll be publishing, on Northern California through the eyes of a New Yorker, with an inclination to see things from a model aeronautic perspective. It is similar to my model-aeronautic take on Ogunquit and its bipolar beach. Here I'll examine various Napa Valley and Sonoma vineyards on their applicability to flying, while accompanied by my brother's family. I'll show you where to find legitimate flying fields manned by AMA chartered clubs, as well as secret flying places that fanatics frequent. We toured San Francisco, Golden Gate Park, Half Moon Bay, Point Lobos, Fort Ord Dunes State Park and the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
3D selfies made in Fantasitron at Madurodam
Writing a computer program to map 2-dimensional drawings to 3-dimensional models had once been my obsession. This stemmed from the endless hours I spent drawing, by hand, orthographic projections of 3D models, and vice versa. While this was condemned as a chore universally by my classmates at Escuela Técnica No. 28 in Buenos Aires, I quite enjoyed it. After my family moved to New York, I no longer had to make these homework drawings. Instead I wrote a C program to generate 3D polyhedrons from 2D polygonal views. The long paper I wrote alongside this program won the gold medal at the New York Math Fair.
That seemed like a lifetime ago. In between then and now, algorithms had been invented to generate 3D models of people in color and with great details, all from simple 2D photos. But it is only in recent years that such technologies started to become commoditized. Just a month ago, Elisha and I stepped into, for a few seconds, a photo booth the size of a restroom, at the miniature park Madurodam. Three weeks later we received an exquisite 3D selfie printed by Shapeways.
Droning at and around Ogunquit Beach
This article is a part of the Ogunquit in September Guide I am writing, for the model aeronautically-inclined. It is the main and the last installment in the series. Together with the modern beach equipment installment, it details everything you will ever need, before you head out to fly a drone or two in this beautiful beach town.
Ocean Terrace Rooms at Cliff House
This article is a part of the Ogunquit in September Guide I am writing, for the model aeronautically-inclined. This installment is about the Ocean Terrace Rooms at Cliff House, near Ogunquit. We stayed at this place during the second leg of our trip. And I had a good time flying my model sailplane, while standing on perilous rock formations, with multi-person-tall waves pounding on these same rocks.
We called the booking service of the hotel directly when making our room reservation. The agent convinced me to book a room at the highest floor available, for it afforded the best view of both the ocean and the cliff, despite its higher room rate. But I read afterwards on TripAdvisor that some of the rooms on the higher floors actually had balconies with partially blocked views. Some rooms were situated directly behind other buildings, so they looked over ugly rooftops instead of the ocean and the cliff.
I agonized over this issue before the trip. The uncertainties tortured me. There wasn't much useful information and pictures to be found online, to ease my mind.
Those who have read the previous article on Tidal Rooms at the Norseman can be forgiven for thinking that I have the buyer's remorse syndrome as a chronic condition. This article is born after the trip, partly because I am anal, and partly because I want to help the next guy in my situation.
If you landed on this article during your research for a room at the Cliff House, then you have found the right resource. Most of pictures showcased here are taken by Elisha Huang.
Tidal Suites at the Norseman Resort on Ogunquit Beach
This article is a part of the Ogunquit in September Guide I am writing, for the model aeronautically-inclined. This installment is about the Tidal Suites at Norseman Resort we stayed at, during the first part of the trip. As is usually the case, I spent time writing this article after the trip, because I wished someone had written something about this topic, and had posted some pictures of this place online. It would have helped me tremendously during my trip planning. And it would have eased the anxiety I continued to feel until the day of departure. But there was very little information to be found online about the resort, and almost nothing about the new Tidal Suites.
Modern beach equipment for the model aeronautically-inclined
This article is a part of the Ogunquit in September Guide I am writing, for the model aeronautically-inclined. Obviously, those who enjoy flying radio-controlled planes at a beach will find this article useful. But I am also certain that any modern man or woman planning a trip to the beach will not want to miss this one.
I know it, because I've spent countless nights before the trip googling for the best beach equipment to bring, to no avail. If you are looking for novel contraptions that solve known problems with ancient beach equipment technology, you will not be happy with what you find online today. Even Google isn't smart enough to weed out hastily-assembled, so called "top ten beach equipment" websites that simply scout Amazon for highest-ranking sales. YouTube is full of computer-generated videos with screenshots stole from above-mentioned "top ten beach equipment" websites. And most search engines nowadays only want to show you online shops, because... that's how they make money. This leaves old fashioned research work as the only option. I read and combed through tons of user reviews, and wrote notes. The trip proved that I did find the right beach equipment to buy.
Ogunquit in September – for the model aeronautically-inclined
This is a guide to upcoming articles I will be publishing, on Ogunquit, a small town at the southern tip of Maine. The guide serves as a preview to these articles, before they are written and published, showing this beautiful river, the town and the beach named after it, in September. This was when kids had to leave the beach, to go back to school, and just before the autumn arrived in full force. Some articles will explore the Marginal Way, Perkins Cove, Cape Neddick, York, Wells, Kennebunkport and plenty of public beaches in the area. Some will focus on hotels we've stayed at - the Tidal Suites at the Norsemen and the Cliff House at Bald Head Cliff.
I've also brought the current obsession of my life together with travel and videography. Most of these articles will be of interest to those who are model aeronautically-inclined. While I did not have room to bring big model airplanes, I did pack two micro airplanes and a variety of kites. While flying a sailplane on the peaceful and expansive Ogunquit Beach proved to be a relaxing pastime, fighting the precarious Bald Head Cliff in inclement weather against a stormy sea turned out to be quite challenging.
Did I mention that I adopted a pet seagull during this trip?
Pictures I've taken on a meager iPhone will be culled in time, and the remaining usable and useful ones uploaded to Wikipedia for illustrations on various relevant articles, continuing my series of Wiki Vacations (from here and there).
Restaurants – Sarasota wiki vacation part 5
This is part five of the Sarasota Wiki Vacation series. This trip to the Sarasota barrier islands yielded a large number of pictures which I've added to various Wikipedia articles. The unusually-long post I wrote became too long and unfocused. It is about 90 pages long. I am now breaking it up into specific posts by location and theme.
This one is about restaurants we we stumbled upon in this trip. I loved them, and their food. In the order we visited them: Mar Vista, Phillippi Creek Oyster Bar and Ophelia's on the Bay.
Siesta Key – Sarasota wiki vacation part 4
This is part four of the Sarasota Wiki Vacation series. This trip to the Sarasota barrier islands yielded a large number of pictures which I've added to various Wikipedia articles. The unusually-long post I wrote became too long and unfocused. It is about 90 pages long. I am now breaking it up into specific posts by location and theme.
This one is about Siesta Key. We visited three beaches on this barrier island: Siesta Beach, Crescent Beach and Turtle Beach.
Lido Key – Sarasota wiki vacation part 3
This is part three of the Sarasota Wiki Vacation series. This trip to the Sarasota barrier islands yielded a large number of pictures which I've added to various Wikipedia articles. The unusually-long post I wrote became too long and unfocused. It is about 90 pages long. I am now breaking it up into specific posts by location and theme.
This one is about our trip to Lido Key, comprising an ecotour in the morning of the Sarasota Bay and its red mangrove trees, and a visit to the Lido Beach in the afternoon.
World’s Largest Miniature Circus – Sarasota wiki vacation part 2
This is part two of the Sarasota Wiki Vacation series. This trip to the Sarasota barrier islands yielded a large number of pictures which I've added to various Wikipedia articles. The unusually-long post I wrote became too long and unfocused. It is about 90 pages long. I am now breaking it up into specific posts by location and theme.
This one is about The Howard Bro. Circus, undisputedly the world's largest miniature circus, located within John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art.
Anna Maria Island – Sarasota wiki vacation part 1
This is part one of the Sarasota Wiki Vacation series. This trip to the Sarasota barrier islands yielded a large number of pictures which I've added to various Wikipedia articles. The unusually-long post I wrote became too long and unfocused. It is about 90 pages long. I am now breaking it up into specific posts by location and theme. This one is about Anna Maria Island, also known as the Anna Maria Key, where we explored Coquina Beach, Cortez Beach, and marveled at cast-net fishing at beautiful sunset.
Sarasota, Florida 2017 – an iPhone Wiki Vacation
Here is the latest installment of my series of Wiki Vacation posts, from a short stay in Sarasota, Florida. The timing could not have been better - daytime temperature was around 85˚F. Not too hot - a quick application of sunscreen was good enough for walking on the beach all day long. And not chilly - Gulf water was warm enough for swimming.
The range of day trips covered Siesta Key, Lido Key, Longboat Key, Ana Maria Island, and Sarasota City itself. Activities included paddleboarding by the beach, tunneling through red mangrove trees on kayaks, looking at manatees at the aquarium, and marveling at the world's largest miniature circus at the Ringling museum. It's amazing that we managed to visit 7 beaches in just a few days: Coquina Beach, Cortez Beach, Lido Beach, Siesta Beach, Crescent Beach and Turtle Beach. In addition, we also packed fine dinning into this busy schedule. For lazy people who woke up every morning to look at a tourist map gotten at the airport before figuring out where to go, this trip was a resounding success.
Jenn’s Wedding: Saint Thomas 2009
This is an offshoot of a series of Wiki Vacation posts from my tour of the US Virgin Islands in 2009. The series covers Saint Thomas, Trunk Bay and Caneel Bay. This article documents the main reason we were there in the first place - to be at Jenn and Chris' wedding.
Wiki Vacation 2009: Saint Thomas
This article is part of my Wiki Vacation series of posts from my tour of the US Virgin Islands in 2009. The first leg of the trip was to Saint Thomas, where we joined a destination wedding. A short detour to Trunk Bay was documented here. And the second leg of the trip to Caneel Bay can be found on its on article.
Wiki Vacation 2009: Trunk Bay
This is a mini-post, a part of the Wiki Vacation series of posts from my tour of the US Virgin Islands in 2009. The trip to Trunk Bay was our first visit to Saint John, and was limited to half a day, where we went with family and friends. Our second trip to Saint John followed a few day after, where we went alone, documented on the post on Caneel Bay.
Wiki Vacation 2009: Caneel Bay
I dug up more Wiki Vacation pictures from my 2009 to Caneel Bay, following the first in the series from the trip back to Taiwan. Caneel Bay is a resort on the northwest side of St. John, one of the US Virgin Islands, with seven private, picturesque beaches.
My Favorite Wiki Vacation Pictures: Taiwan 2009
I've been uploading vacation pictures to WikiMedia since 2015. I call some of my vacations Wiki Vacations, because I go to places with an explicit intent of taking pictures, processing them afterwards, and then uploading them to WikiMedia, for use on Wikipedia articles. I don't actually know how other Wikipedians refer to this mode of vacation. But I do know the official definition of WikiBreak, nicknamed Wikivacation, means almost the opposite.
Regardless of the terminology, I do find the experience rewarding. As reported earlier in Some of my Most Popular Pictures, time spent getting good, useful pictures for Wikipedia is more than made up by seeing some of these pictures widely distributed online, with or without credits. Here I posted a few of my favorite Wiki Vacation pictures. Not all of them are well appreciated though. But it doesn't matter. At the end of the day, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Hot Air Balloons in Search of a Landing Site
Flipping through pictures on my iPhone, I found a few interesting ones taken in August 2015. They were from an unexpected encounter with hot air balloons while I was visiting Lancaster, Pennsylvania. It turned out that they were from a balloon ride tour agency with a misleadingly official name, The United States Hot Air Balloon Team. Nonetheless, I found the ground crew to be professional, and the pilot to be knowledgeable and helpful. I uploaded some of these pictures to Wikimedia, as I often do with useful pictures taken in my free time.
Winter Ice Skating at Mohonk Mountain House
The Mohonk rink is comparable in size to the Winter Village rink at Bryant Park in NYC. This rink does expand greatly the variety of possible winter activities, at the mountain resort where TVs are conspicuously absent in guest rooms. A single rink alone provides three different types of activities. There is the traditional "I just want to skate" type of activity. More inspired folks try the role of chariot horses. But in this case they are more like mules than horses, and push chariots from behind. Less mobile folks may play chariot drivers, except they have little control over their destiny, and must rely on verbal signals which mules may or may not honor.