What a phenomonal weekend. I hope that I can remember everything to put in here. I might have to edit it a few times to make my story complete. Brace yourself... it's a long one.
Thursday night:
We left Honolulu and flew into Kona. Kona is on the west side of the island. As soon as we got our rental car (free upgrade to a never before seen Chevy HHR, well that is until we got to the island. There were tons of these ugly things all over the place). The airport was a good distance from the actual city of Kona, so we drove into Kona and finally located the Hostel we stayed in: Koa Wood Hale Patey's Place. It was a neat little place with people from all over the world staying there. We stayed in a bunk room with a girl from San Francisco who shared stories of her backbacking endeavors in South America... I think I might plan a backpacking trip to Europe next year! :)
We got our room and piddled around downtown... looking at all the neat little shops and watching the sunset. I think we were at least six-for-six on how many honks and "woo-hoo's" we got.. apparantly we stand out? Nah... locals always take pictures of random signs.
We ate dinner at a lovely little place called "Quinns". The food was pretty good; I tried some of Amira's "ono" fish... it was a very white, easy to eat cajun style grilled fish that had no fishy taste. The theme for the weekend was- Amanda tries new foods and new things.
Friday:
We got up at 6am, and left the hostel by 6:15. We struggled to find a place that was open for breakfast or a place that even served breakfast. We also drove around the block a few times trying to find the Walmart for batteries, snorkel gear, and other random stuff. Finally, we found the walmart which had a McDonalds inside.. but they didn't serve biscuits! To me, it seems like I saw a lot of patients with different diagnoses this weekend... but it was probably just because I have been observing patients in the clinic and I am becoming used to it! Our server at McDonalds had Torti-colis, and we later saw a patient with a left AFO (ankle-foot orthosis), and we concluded that she probably had suffered from a mild stroke that ended up with foot drop.
Okay so back on track...
After breakfast we drove twenty miles south to Captain Cook's Monument on Kealakekua Bay. There were only a few people there, which was very nice. We climbed down some rocks and snorkled about halfway out to the monument, but stopped because there was a beautiful reef full of brilliant fish. I am kicking myself right now for not getting an underwater camera at walmart, because as Amira describes it "It was like we were swimming in a special
aquarium, just us and the fish." We saw angel fish, some sort of long and pointy fish, a sea turtle that swam right up in Amria's face, and humuhumunukunuku'apua'a which is the state fish. (seen to right -->).After this adventure, we went a bit further south to visit the pu'uhonua o Honaunau (City of Refuge). The story behind this place is actually pretty amazing: If you were sentenced to death in the old times, which for any crime was punished by hanging or brutal execution, you were given a chance! If you could escape the executioners and make it to the city of refuge before they caught you, all was forgiven. Simple as that.
On the way north, we took a side route recommended by a friend-of-a-friend, and stopped at Komo General Store to get some pure Kona coffee. The town we were in was so "old-timey", with general stores and one-pump gas stations. We were about to stop and ask for directions, and Amira pulled over and it happened to be the place we were looking for! Coffee was cheap and the store was literally something you would see in a very desolate town. After this small stop, we made our way further north for about an hour or so up to Waimea. As of right now, I don't think we stopped anywhere, but I'll update and let you know if we did.
Waimea is a world of it's own. It is the oldest part of the island chain, and it's actually country-western. It was weird seeing historic looking old buildings with hawai'ian plants. There were a ton of country music stations in this area. We stopped to have lunch here, and decided it was enough and moved on. We did pass by Parker Ranch, but we weren't enticed to enter.
After lunch, we started to head south, but to the east side of the island. Our first stop was Waipi'o Valley. This place was struck by the Tsunami of 1946, and wiped out the city. Afterwards, a few locals moved back in, without the luxury of running water or electricity. Some of the houses close to the road receive electricity, but nothing deep in the valley. The view from the top is amazing, but you can't go to the bottom in a regular vehicle because it's a 25% grade (yes, 25% GRADE.... that's like a 45 degree angle) all the way down. I believe a black diamond ski slope is an 8% grade.. 20 degree angle... I'll have to look that up (I just did a report on it). Some people hike it because there is a lot to visit down in there... waterfalls, gorgeous hikes, and black sand beaches, but the downfall (ha) is that you have to hike it back up, and the locals aren't very inviting. So we hiked halfway down, decided we didn't have enough time, and hiked back up. Hah. We took a little breather at the top to recharge the batteries (of the camera, and of our legs), then headed on.
We headed to Laupahoehoe Point. This place was breathtaking in a difference sense; it was very violent surf and had a very destructive history. The Tsunami of 1946 took the lives of three adults and 21 schoolchildren, and to this day there is a memorial standing decorated with live lei's and plants in remembrance.
Next on the list was Akaka falls... which plunges 420 feet from the cliffs above. This was a pretty cool view, and we did the full circle hike which actually didn't take very long (maybe 20 or 30 minutes). On the way back to the highway we stopped and enjoyed some ice cream at "woodshop gallery and cafe" and browsed around the nice (and terribly expensive) hawai'ian wood collection.
We had a random pamphlet about a Vanilla Farm, and traveled up this little windy road up the mountain to find the farm. The products were amazing... I got some vanilla bean coffee and learned about the vanilla plant itself... it only blooms one day throughout the entire year!
After this we were cutting it short on time (the sun was getting ready to leave us), so we picked to drive a scenic route past the Hawai'i Tropical Botanical Garden near Onomea Bay. It was so beautiful.
We finally made our way into Hilo, and went straight to visit Rainbow Falls before there was no sunlight left. Rainbow Falls is in front of a cave, where King Kamehameha is said to have buried the bones of his father.
After this, we were rather pooped, and we still had a 45 minute drive to Volcano Town. We made it there safely, checked into our "Volcano Bed and Breakfast" and went to sleep.
Saturday:
It seems like we didn't do much in comparison to everything we saw Friday, but Saturday was just as amazing.
We started off at the Volcano National Park and visited the Volcano House (a very expensive place to stay). They had a pretty good "crater view", but I'm glad we stayed where we did... plus it was cheap! :)
There are tons of sites around Kilauea Caldera crater. We first stopped at the overlook, which is just breathtaking. The next stop was Jaggar Museum, which had cool information about how they measure and predict lava flow and eruptions, and had a neat little gift shop. It also talked about the different eruptions and the changes in the past three-hundred years. Next, we saw the Halema'uma'u Crater (the crater-within a crater). Apparently Mark Twain described this in one of his stories, but it used to be a fiery pit of boiling lava bubbles. Today it is a plain dried up crater, but it was still cool to see. There are a few more craters... and a few more... they started to become a little redundant. The coolest thing was the Thurston Lava Tube, where you could hike down into one of the tubes formed of cool lava. The first part was lit and ended up at a staircase, but we weren't satisfied. We continued the hike (which is legal and other people were doing it, don't freak out) into non-lit territory... well, we did have flashlights. We hiked pretty far in there... it had the eerie feeling of a dripping cave, but with no bugs or animals. We stopped for a minute and turned our lights off, and let me tell you, that was pitch black. Darkness that I cannot even describe.... it was a little creepy.
After the lava tubes we went back to Volcano Village and grabbed some food and goodies at the General Store (notice a trend here? we are el cheapo's!) and then headed back into the park. We drove down Chain of Craters Road (guess what, MORE craters!!!!) which was about a 30-45 minute drive DOWN the mountain... from 3,800 ft. to about sea level. Crazy.
What we did next will stun some of you and horrify others. Again, it's a weekend for me to try new things! :)
We hiked about four miles out to see lava. (breathe).
......................Yes, I HIKED AGAIN.
.........................................And YES, WE SAW ACTIVE RED LAVA!!!
The first part of the hike was easy... just from where we parked at the ranger station to where lava flow of 1900something covered the road. Part 2 was alright; rangers had set out little reflectors (like those you drive over as you change lanes on the highway) to map out the easiest track on the lava. Pretty cool. Part 3 was awesome: we had to hike from beacon to beacon, and there were six of them spaced pretty far apart... maybe 1/4 or 1/2 a mile? Not quite sure. It was pretty far. We made it past the last one and saw steam coming from the ocean... LAVA!!! So we hiked to the other side so we could see lava flow without the fumes (which only a few people did to our surprise). We saw lava pouring into the ocean. It was difficult to take pictures of because as soon as the ocean water hit the lava, it would burst into steam and obstruct the view. Needless to say, we sat there for about an hour and half just watching the world as it was formed. As we started the hike back right before nightfall, we ran into some people who claimed they saw actual lava flow up close. Cool. So we hiked to that. Look at the pictures... they aren't digitally zoomed... we were really THAT CLOSE to flowing lava! As night began to fall we could see lava flowing down the mountain side and lava red glow through some of the cracks (breathe, we were safe and smart. some dummies were poking the lava with sticks... duh it's going to catch on fire!) We turned our flash-lights on and began the hike back to the car. When we were safe and about halfway through the beacons, we sat down and turned off our flashlights. The view was simply phenomenal. There were billions of stars scattering across the sky, and then we could see a faint red glow of the lava flow. Amazing.
We didn't realize how sore our leg muscles were until we got on flat land. We got back to the car around 8:45pm and realized we were ready for dinner, but Volcano Town was at closing time. When we returned to the B&B we raided the "employee's only" section and ate a ton of mini boxes of cereal. We were pretty much useless for the rest of the night.... slugged around the B&B and watched some TV.
Sunday:
Everyone wanted to hear about our adventures, and they were looking at our pictures and our handy book. We should have charged $5 for advice, because we sure were know-it-alls. We didn't have much left to see, but we wanted to get a good deal out of Sunday. We started by visiting a Natural Lava Steam Room with some locals that were staying at the B&B. This was difficult to photograph because of the steam! Basically, you hike (of course) to this hole. You scamper down into the hole and there is an old-lava rock room. There is a natural steam jet warmed from mother nature that steams the whole little room... it is literally a natural steam room. It was pretty warm... and amazing! After that, we headed south and sort of picked and chose what to see... because we were running low on gas! We saw "star of the sea church", which was almost damaged by the 1955 lava flow but the community was able to move the church in the nick of time. The church is historical in the fact that it has biblical stories painted and described in hawai'ian so that the locals could understand the christian stories.
We then headed to a black sand beach... but we were a little surprised when we got there. It was pretty difficult to access, everyone had to climb down some rocks to get there... but when we rounded the corner to the beach we noticed it was a semi-nudist beach! YIKES!!! I was taking some beautiful pictures of the beach, and Amira says "don't get that nudie in your picture!!" and I was thinking... which one? I don't see a nudie. Sure enough, he's standing there, right in the line of my photo. Great. So you are forewarned. If I forget to screen those photos, there might be some old nudie folks standing in them. Happy Easter Sunday Morning to you too, bright and early and nakie time! (The best was this old naked guy that was not only bending over digging for clams, but also sitting down on the rough lava rocks to sift through them.)
So after that wonderful shocking experience, we headed up to get gas in Pahoa Town, and we took this one lane windy road. All of this part of the island (Puna) is new. We filled up on gas and got a mini-first aid kit... I cleaned up a nasty blister that had exploded on my foot, and Amira cleaned up a battle scar from where she experienced some gravity work this morning (i.e. she fell). The whole area is relatively un-inhabited, very lush forest and very strange locals (if you can't already tell). So imagine trying to find a gas station!! After getting gas, we went to Ahalanui Warm Spring. It is a pool of ocean water that is naturally heated (by some lava steam of course). The pool is safe (there were tons of kiddies playing), and felt a little bit cooler than a jacuzzi. We really wanted to go visit Champagne Pond, which is a similar idea, but the "dirt road" to the parking lot proved to be 4WD friendly and 2WD mistake... so we turned around. We headed back up towards Hilo and stopped at a cool local farmers market and had some smoked beef and pork Hawai'ian style... and luma luma (?)... which is pork and some other stuff wrapped in a tarot leaf (another new thing I tried). It was pretty good... but I couldn't eat a whole one by myself.
After the farmers market, we piddled around in Hilo, which was very limited because everything was pretty much closed. Amira got rainbow fruit bread at a small place that gave you a discount if you use cash (weird). We walked around Banyan Drive, where Banyan Trees are named after famous people who planted them. Amira enjoyed some ice cream and I enjoyed my new-found favorite juice: Passion Fruit, Guma and Orange. If you see it on the mainland, let me know. It's quite yummy.
On the plane ride home, there was a magazine about the islands. The couple sitting behind us was being nosy and was looking at our pictures of lava as we were going through the pictures on the camera. Then the woman flips to a page in the magazine and frantically asks us if we took any lava rocks. I told her "no, because that would make Madame Pele very upset and it causes bad luck". She has a look of horror... and the magazine stated that park rangers receive packages of lava rocks with notes saying "please return this to Madame Pele and ask for her forgiveness."
We did not take any lava rocks. I already have enough bad luck as it is! haha.
I think that's it... I'll update if I think of other things we did. I will post pictures now... but you might want to wait until later this week to view them so I can have time to organize and label them... so you know what you're looking at! Again, be fore-warned... there are a TON of pictures... probably close to 2,000 (yes, I'm serious)... and there might be some with nudies in them. Just so you know. You are warned!!!
I am having a great time meeting new people, and I enjoy spending time with Amira... besides the fact that I burp sometimes and sing louder than the radio, we have similar interests and get along very well.
Love to all!! Miss everyone tons!!!
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