He stumbled a few small steps forward, his arms outstretched as he tried desperately to keep his balance before he staggered back a step or two as the world around him first tilted wildly one way and then the other. Biting his bottom lip in pure determination he slowly tried to inch forward again, his arms windmilling as the small action threatened to topple him. He regained his tenuous hold on his balance, standing motionless for just a brief second or two before he lost his footing and tumbled head first into the churning water below and disappeared beneath the white capped waves that now surrounded him.

His shoulder and arm screamed in protest as they bore the brunt of the rough fall and the subsequent tumbling along the sandy ocean bottom as he was dragged and rolled beneath the force of the waves. After what felt like an eternity he finally found his feet and managed to stand. Coughing and gasping, he greedily sucked the sweet fresh air into his oxygen starved lungs as he stood fast against the waves that threatened to knock him down again. God, how he hated the beach! But at the moment he decided as he attempted to discreetly shake the irritating sand free from his swimming trunks, he definitely hated the water and the wet sand even more!

"Hey Mister!" He turned towards the grinning young boy who now held the borrowed tormentor in his hands, taking bemused delight at his predicament. "Here's your surfboard."

Managing to mutter a quiet and highly embarrassed "Thank you", he took the offending item and placed it securely under his arm before he staggered back towards the shore only a few short yards away.

Scrapped, bloodied and bruised, he stumbled onto the firm dry sand and quickly looked around, reassuring himself that no-one he knew had seen his clandestine attempts at surfing. He was sure if McGarrett had witnessed this, his risk taking, crazy, irritating, superSEAL partner and closest friend would never let him live this down. This was one crazy sport he decided, as he dropped the surfboard onto the sand and painfully lowered himself onto the towel, that he would leave strictly to Kono and his suicidal partner.

God, he hated the beach!