Hawaii - Part II: Things no one tells you about Hawaii

 Things no one tells you about Hawaii:

1) The traffic is horrendous. There is not a good public transportation system, so you really need a car to get around.  Because everyone is driving a single-family car and the roads are mostly 2-lane, there are traffic back-ups everywhere.  Instead of it taking you 30 minutes to drive 30 miles, figure on doubling that time. 

2) The roads are not graded well.  Meaning: they built the roads on the natural curvature of the land instead of smoothing them out.  There were many times that I thought I was going to be car sick because the roads jump you around so much it's like you're riding a wooden roller coaster.

3) The wild pigs.  There are wild pigs on every island I believe.  We saw them even at the airport.  Not sure how they became wild because I am pretty sure they are not native to the Hawaii islands, but they are everywhere and they are very destructive.  We talked with a girl at the coffee farm we toured and she said that if they didn't have their dogs patrolling the property at night, the pigs would destroy their farm in one day.  Also, it seems like you can pretty much hunt them when ever and where ever to help curb the population.

4) The wild chickens, rats and some kind of mongoose/ferret.  The story we were told is this:  Rats came over on ships.  Nothing eats the rats, so the rat population exploded.  Then the humans decided to bring over this ferret to eat the rats. Apparently, the rats and the ferrets live on opposite schedules, so the ferrets didn't eat the rats.  Nothing eats the ferrets, so the ferret population explodes.  Then someone decided to bring over chickens to eat the rats.  But no one bothered to figure out that chickens don't eat rats.  Now there's a chicken population explosion.  So now, all three populations are running rampant throughout the islands.

5) The salt air destroys everything.  We stayed in a condo on a resort when we were in Lihue, Kauai.  The condo was great, but we could see rust on everything.  The water heater that was tucked in a closet inside the condo had rust all over it.  The screen door to the deck was all rusted and could hardly be moved.  The key box on the door had disintegrated from rust.  One of the condo employees told us that the rust will destroy everything in about a year's time.  That means your fridge, dishwasher, TV, air conditioner, car, etc.  When we were out on the beach, you could see the salt in the air.  To combat the salt, we saw that some units had air conditioners inside, with an exhaust hose running out the window.  Also, most people do not have a garage, so their cars sit outside all of the time.  We noticed a lot of people would put blue tarps over their cars to try and save the paint.

6) The volume of tourists in Honolulu is unimaginable.  And I want to make sure that I note that we were there when the tourists were still not at their peak levels because of Covid and it was summer.  And I STILL thought the number of tourists was incredible.  You thought getting in to a restaurant was hard in Michigan, try getting into a restaurant in Honolulu.  3 hour wait easy.  And we put our names in at multiple places.  I know that places were struggling to get workers, just like around here.  However, when you add no workers + insane volume of tourists, that equals long long looooong lines.

7) The native Hawaiians do not like 'colonists'.  We did never saw any violence or encountered anyone that was rude to us.  In fact, everyone was overly friendly and helpful.  However, we were told that there are some areas of O'ahu that you should not go if you are a tourist and are white.  A friend of mine from high school is in the military and lives there right now.  He is Hispanic and his children took Hispanic.  He said that having darker skin does help him 'pass' in public, but the second he speaks and they hear his accent they know he's not local.  

8) Outside of the city areas, there are not as many street lights as you need to see so it is pitch black and hard to navigate while driving.

9) Since Hawaii is pretty much on the equator, sunrise and sunset do not change much over the course of the year.  Almost always 6am sunrise and 6pm sunset.  This was odd because we traveled to Hawaii in June when the sun does not set in West Michigan until 9-10pm.  We went from that, to having sunsets at 6pm in Hawaii in June.

10) The abandoned, burned up cars along the roads:  We saw these EVERYWHERE.  Some where flipped over in ditches.  You could tell by the rust that a lot of them had sat there for a long time.  When I asked my friend what was the deal with all the burned out, abandoned cars, he explained that a) if your car breaks down, it's crazy expensive to tow it and dispose of it. 2) some locals will steal cars from tourists, go on a joy ride around the island, then torch and abandon the car.

11) The cost of everything.  Everything was crazy expensive.  I would compare Hawaii to New York City, San Fran or Switzerland expensive.  And I think NY, SF, and Switzerland were much nicer.

Don't get me wrong, there were a LOT of things I thought were really cool about Hawaii.  However, it just wasn't for me.  I would say that if you like to lay on the beach and stare at the ocean, then Hawaii is for you.  I feel like I can do that here in Michigan and I would rather go somewhere more adventurous.  I did love the chocolate farm, the coffee farm, hiking around the volcano, the hiking trails, the volcano tubes, and the helicopter ride.  But be prepared for the things that no one ever mentions!  

Hawaii Vacation: 6/24 through 07/04 2021

Finally getting around to post this!!

This was Gary and my first big vacation since covid hit.  At the time, we still could not leave the country and the farthest we could go was Hawaii.  I would have rather gone to Alaska, but Gary is not really into that.

Our trip consisted of us flying into Hilo, Hawaii, staying there a few days and me running an ultra-marathon.  Then we were to fly to Lihue, Kauai and stay a few days there.  Our final destination was Honolulu, O'ahu where we were planning on staying one day and meeting up with an old friend and his wife from high school.

Day 1 - Getting to Hawaii

The first thing to go wrong was even before we left for Hawaii.  About 2 weeks before we left, I realized that I had forgotten to rent a car on the island of Kauai.  In normal circumstances that probably wasn't a big deal, but as I looked for cars to rent I realized that there were no cars available anywhere on Kauai.  I tried cars, vans, mopeds, and motorcycles.  Anything and everything was unavailable.  I thought for sure we were screwed because you cannot get around Hawaii without a car.  I ended up contacting the person we were renting the VRBO from and asked if there was anyone they would know that we could rent from.  The guy says, 'Sure, I know a guy named Tom who rents his van out to tourists.  I'll give Tom your number".  Tom calls me and we chat about renting his van.  He said he was going to pick us up from the airport, we could drop him back off at work at Home Depot, then we could have the van for our time there.  He would arrange for us to drop off the van later.  You may think this sounds insane and it was.  I was completely trusting that this guy was legit and not going to scam us.  I sent him $100 deposit over Venmo and prayed to the powers that be that he would be there to pick us up when we arrived in Kauai.  Crisis avoided for the time being.

Also before we left, we had to have a negative covid test within 3 days of arriving in Hawaii.  About a month before we left, I took a practice covid test to see how it went, how long it took to get results, etc.  My test run made it easier for us to figure out how we could time our covid tests and get the results in time for our flight.  So, on Monday, June 21st Gary and I signed up for covid testing.  AND in case the one Wallgreens screwed up or if one test was inconclusive, we actually went to 2 different Wallgreens to get 2 different Covid tests on the same day.  Once we received our results, we had to upload them to the Hawaii government website.  Once they were uploaded, you received a QR code that you had to present to the airline along with your ticket in order to board the plane. There were so many steps and procedures because of covid, I was scared to death that we would get to the airport and be turned away at the gate!

We fast forward to the day we are leaving....

Thursday, June 24th: Because our flight left super early from Grand Rapids, we had planned on getting up around 3am.  We woke up, Gary jumped in the shower and I just happened to check my email.  That's when I saw that the car rental that I had reserved over a month ago for the Big Island was canceled out of nowhere.  I thought I was going to have a stroke.  What I found out later was this: when the whole country shut down, a lot of car rental places sold their vehicles off their lots to keep making money when they weren't making money from rentals.  When things started to open back up, the car rental places could not purchase new vehicles because of supply chain issues and the fact that we are unable to make cars.  Add in the fact that this is a remote island in the middle of the Pacific ocean.  So basically, even though places were taking reservations, it was a crap shoot as to whether or not they would have a car for you.  It was happening on all of the islands too.  ALL of this I found out after the fact.  At that moment however, I was flipping out.  Thinking that maybe I'll get lucky again, I contact the person that we were renting the VRBO from on the Big Island.  She said that she did not know anyone renting their vehicle, but would let me know if something came up.  I searched and searched, but all the of the car rental places were unavailable.  As we were sitting in the airport waiting to board our flight in GR, Gary's friend told him about an app called Turo.  It's basically like VRBO or air B&B but for your personal vehicle.  So I quickly download the app, enter information and I am able to secure a vehicle in Hilo at the airport.  And PS, renting vehicles in Hawaii is hella expensive.  $100 per day minimum.  Anywhere you try that's what you are going to pay in 2021.  Anyway, 2nd crisis avoided for the moment, now I just hoped and prayed the guy showed up at the airport like he said he would.

Anyway, we get on our puddle jumper flight to Chicago with no issues.  Once we get to Chicago then the real fun begins.  Not surprisingly, our flight was delayed in Chicago.  Flights are always delayed in Chicago.  The flight was delayed long enough where we knew that we were going to miss our connecting flight to the Big Island after landing in Honolulu.  Anyway, we FINALLY were able to board the plane.  You had to get in one super long line to show your QR code and get a bracelet to board the plane.  Then you had to get in the 2nd super long line to get on the place.  This bracelet indicated that you passed all the covid restrictions.

The flight to Honolulu was fine.  No incidents there. The first thing I had to do once we landed was contact the guy in Hilo about our car rental!  He probably thought I was a scammer.  He had no idea that our flight was delayed and I had no way of letting him know when we were in the air. Luckily, we chatted and I let him know that as soon as we got to Hilo I would text him so he could drop off the car.  Then, we had to find someone who could help us get a flight over to Hilo because we had missed our connector.  It seemed like everything was closed and there were no workers.  We just happened to see this girl go behind a desk.  We ran to her and begged her to help us and she did!  She logged onto the computer and printed new tickets for us on the next flight to Hilo.  Luckily, there are lots of puddle jumper flights in between all of the islands so we only had to wait an hour or so for the next flight.

FINALLY, we got on our flight and made it to Hilo.  Once we landed, Gary went for the luggage and I contacted the guy about the car.  He had his assistant drop off the car.  She handed me the keys and I was like, "that's it?".  "That's it", she said.  "When you go to leave just park it here in the airport and let us know what spot you left it in.  Fill up the tank and you're all set".  (Side note:  We did get ahold of our insurance and talked to them about the Turo app.  We got extra insurance riders just in case we got in an accident with their car.  I don't know how Hawaii insurance it, but I did not want to get sued if we got in an accident).  Anyway, just when we thought we could finally drive to our VRBO, we find out that our luggage did not arrive on the plane that we arrived on.  Fantastic.  So we had to make a claim and they said that they would deliver our luggage to us as soon as it arrived.  It was supposed to show up on the next flight and we had about an hour before it got in.  Gary and I decided to run to the store and grab some food and drinks to have at the house.  We got our groceries and got back to the airport just in time to pick up our luggage!  We could FINALLY get to the house and relax!!! 

Our adorable VRBO rental!

Most homes have these cisterns for collecting rain water.  Everything is insanely expensive.  In our VRBO instructions the owner really wanted us to conserve water and electricity.  Hawaii has the highest prices in the nation or world.

Never have I ever seen a pineapple bush or tree or whatever you call it.  This was the cutest little pineapple I ever saw!

First Full day in Hawaii - Friday, June 25th, 2021

Friday, 6/25/21 - We did a helicopter ride with Blue Hawaiian helicopters.

As we were waiting for our helicopter ride, I was smelling these flowers outside of the building.  I wish I could smell this picture because the flowers smelled like a bottle of perfume!

Our pilot was telling us how most of the 'traditional' Hawaiian products are no longer grown in Hawaii (pineapples, sugar cane) The land has been flipped to more profitable crops.

It's very strange how on the same island you can see lush, greenery and then landscape that looks like the moon!

This is the only or one of the only active craters on the big island.  The last time red lava was seen was a few months or a year before we were there.  The lava is right under the top black crust.  Later on, we hiked some trails around this crater

The last sight we saw during our helicopter ride was this waterfall.  During the circling of this waterfall is the point where I was going to hurl.  But I made it back without barfing in the cockpit!

After the helicopter tour, we went into Hilo for some lunch.  We had the best food from this place!

Pretty sure this was the water fall that we saw from the Helicopter ride

We were driving down from the Akaka falls and we saw this roadside stand selling coconuts and fresh pineapple.  We stopped to check it out.  It did seem funny to me because most of the time in Hawaii, people acted very very scared of being around tourists and covid.  However, there were roadside stands like this everywhere selling pineapples, pig's meat and tamales.  No one seemed scared to run these road side stands that seemed to not have the best sanitary conditions, but I digress.....  We got the pineapple and it was amazing!  We also tried sugar cane.  You don't eat it, you just chew it then spit it out.  It's like chewing sugary fibrous wood.  It takes pretty good! 

We kind of accidentally found these trails out to the ocean.  We must have entered the back way because we actually did not see this sign until we popped out at the end.

Last thing for the day were the lava caves. These caves are formed when the lava flows cool and they leave behind these caves.

It seemed like the Hawaiian people were very superstitious.  We saw quite a few of these kind of offerings around or near the volcanos (not sure what to call it).  

After our long day of touristing, we stopped at the grocery store for some evening food.  Some of the food they had at the stores made it seem like we were in another country!

Saturday, June 26th.

There was a small ocean view public access just a walk down the road from our VRBO.  There was a little piece of grass you could sit out on.  The view was amazing.  And it crazy to see all that lava rock!

The next morning we saw that one of the palm trees dropped a palm frond.  I thought that this would be light as a feather.  I have to tell you, if one of these dropped on you, you would be seriously injured.  It's incredibly heavy and not like a feather at all.  The expression on my face is because I cannot believe how heavy this thing is!!

Down the road there was a highway that was closed off because the lava crossed it some years ago.  Very strange to see!

There was another area where the lava crossed the road, but they plowed through it and rebuilt the road. There were lava fields on either side of the road 

so technically, you are not supposed to walk on the lava rock. There are hollow areas you could fall though.  It's very crispy when you walk on it. It definitely feels like rock that has been burned to ash.  We did not take any lava with us though.  That is a no-no and you will be haunted by Pele. And anyone who has seen the Brady Bunch episode where they go to Hawaii will understand too why you cannot take lava from Hawaii!

By the road that is covered with lava, is a part you can walk through to see these strange formations.  Apparently, they are left over from trees.  The lava rushed through, covered the tree, the tree burned up but left this tubular looking thing when the lava cooled.  The park is filled with them.

We then headed to Volcanoes National Park.  This place really reminds me of Yellowstone in both the good and bad ways.  The good way is because the landscape and earth formations are amazing.  You have steam vents that smell like sulfur.  You have this ginormous crater to look out over that doesn't seem real. It's really cool  2) The bad thing is that this entire park is built to drive, park, see the sight, hop back in your car and repeat.  I HATE that kind of tourism with a passion.  Yellowstone is the exact same way.  A ton of people all in their single family cars, driving in a parade from one sight to the next.  The parking lots are too small and people just drive around the lot until someone leaves or they park along the road causing more of a traffic jam.  The ONLY way to avoid that, is to put a little bit of effort in to your day which will deter almost 95% of the tourist.  YOU WALK.  

Gary and I parked the car, we had our day packs with food and water and we actually used our legs and walked a very easy gravel path around the outside of the crater.  We probably encountered 10 people during this 4 mile hike.

We did fly over this crater during the helicopter ride

A very nice lady took our pictures for us

This is another 'offering' that someone set up.  There were a couple of Asian women sitting and burning the incense and humming or singing to themselves.  You could buy these bunches of biodegradable flower arrangements all over the place in town.

This is the same day as the picture above!  After we did volcano national park, we headed to Mauna Kea to see where I would be starting my Marathon that evening.  We drove up the mountain and had to pass through the clouds and fog.

This is the visitors station about 1/2 way up.  It was WAY cooler up here.  The visitor center is around 9000ft and that is high enough to feel funny when you get out of the car and walk around.

Be aware that your car could catch on fire!

One of the reasons that everyone drives a jeep in Hawaii.  A LOT of roads have guard shacks that they will NOT let you drive through unless you have 4wheel drive.  We did not have 4 wheel drive so the visitor center is the highest point we could go in the car.  In order to drive to the summit, you needed to have 4wheel drive.  They will not let you pass.  It still is very possible that your car has issues like this one see above (small engine fire - nothing to see here).  If your car dies on one of these roads good luck getting a tow truck to come and help you.

At the bottom of the Mauna Kia access road was this 'tent city'.  I did not understand what was going on, but it appeared that people lived here.  They had tarps and tents, some had cars, some had port a johns, some had mailboxes.  Someone told me that these people may have been indigenous Hawaiians that were living here for some reason but I really don't know the whole story.   

The Big Run:  One of the things that I was going to do in Hawaii was run a mini ultra marathon.  It was going to be 30 miles and it was going to start at 10pm.  It was called 'Under the moon' ultra marathon.  I was really excited for it at first....then everything went downhill.

1) I was really uncomfortable finding out that the race started across the street from the tent city that is pictured above.  Gary was planning on dropping me off, but he decided to stay and follow me along the route.

2) At some point I found out that the race did not run back towards Hilo like I thought.  We ran away from Hilo and towards a different town called Waimea.  I thought I would be heading back towards Hilo where Gary could pick me up at the finish several hours later.  Waimea is 60 miles from Hilo.  Like I said earlier, 60 miles does not equal 60 minutes.  It would easily take Gary 2 hours to come and pick me up at the end and then 2 hrs to drive back.  Another reason Gary decided to just follow me in the car.

3) Alyx is the name of the lady that was organizing the race.  She had let us know that the race was not supported.  I took that as being no water or food during the race, which I was prepared for.  However, when she said no support, she literally meant no support.  There were no signs, no mile markers, no emergency services, not even people on bikes riding the course.  I might as well have ran completely on my own.  If we were to have an emergency, we were supposed to text her.  Gary and I already knew that texting in these mountains was spotty and you could not get a good signal sometimes for miles!! This is completely unacceptable and dangerous!

4) When we arrived at the parking lot, she was sitting in a pickup truck with her infant baby.  I was like, "is there a packet pick-up or anything?"  She's like, "no, this is it".  I didn't even have a number with a strip to track my time!  this is when I told Gary that I did not have a good feeling about this and I wasn't sure I wanted to run anymore.

5) There were about 25 of us running that evening.  Around 10pm, she honks her horn, hands her baby off to some girl sitting in her car, and shouts for all of us to gather to start the race.  I believe I asked her at this point where the turn was (there was one big turn in the race).  She just said, "Oh you can't miss it".  Then she gave some pep talk then shouts "Go!" and that was the start of our race! WTF!!!

Gary took one picture of me waiting with the other runners to start the race.

Once we started, Gary said that he would drive up ahead of me until he couldn't see my lights anymore.  Then he would wait until I got to him, check in with me, then drive farther on.  

Since there were not many of us runners, we spread out very quickly.  This meant that I was alone, in the pitch black, running on the shoulder of a dangerous road.  Gary and I did the leap frog thing for about 2.5 hours before I finally had enough.

I'm not sure who did this, but someone said that if anyone needs water that they placed water bottles along the way for the taking.  These water bottles were only in the first few miles and that was it. 

The final straw was at a point where I was running along and all of a sudden I saw movement out of the corner of my eye.  Since I had by headlamp on, I turned by head to 'shine' at whatever was making the noise.  I almost jumped out of my skin when I saw 1000 eyes at thigh level staring back at me.  I ripped out my headphones so I could hear better and I shouted, "What the fuck!".  That's when I heard the chewing noises and 'baaaahhh' sounds of goats.  It was a herd of wild goats that were grazing right along the highway.  that's when I decided that I had had enough.  I ran up to Gary over the next mile or so and told him that I was done.  I think he felt bad, because he kept saying 'are you sure?'.  I texted Alyx to let her know that I was ending the race.  I did ask her, "Is there a medal or t-shirt that I am missing out on?".  Her answer was something to the affect of "don't quit, I have beer at the end".  That answered my question right there.  There was no medal or T-shirt or anything for my efforts.  I told her that I was done and Gary and I drove back to Hilo to our VRBO.

As we drove back along the road that I had just ran, we passed a few other runners.  Some were completely alone and Some didn't have much lighting on them either.  When I was texting Alyx, the texts would not go through for miles.  What if someone had an emergency?  there would be no way that they would be assisted in a timely manner.  I was pissed at how dangerous this race was!  Furthermore, Gary and I went along the road where 'the big turn that you can't miss' was.  That road was more dangerous then the road that the race started on.  there was NO shoulder to run along and it was a hilly, winding road that went through the countryside.  Gary was glad that I quit when I did because he flat out said that there would be no way he could park along the roadside because there was no roadside.  It went from skinny 2-lane road to ditch on both sides. Anyway, the whole race was a bust and I was pretty annoyed that this was even considered a real race.

June 27th 2021 Exploring Laupahoehoe Beach Park and Waipio Valley Lookout

The next day was supposed to be my 'rest' day after the race, but since I only ran about 15miles, I didn't have to rest much.  We hopped in the car and headed out to explore more of the island.

It's me!

Something that was buried by a past hurricane or water surge

As we were headed out of the state park, I saw a small cemetery with a dozen or so graves.  It seemed like if you weren't wealthy enough to have a proper grave covering, then they would use lava rocks.  

 

Next stop, black sand beach

Next stop, Waipio Black Sand Beach, Big island, Hawaii.  We are standing at the lookout point.

I'm guessing this rooster has been fed before.... He was like a dog begging for food!

The road down to the black sand beach was steep enough that they had a guard shack at the top and would only allow people with 4-wheel drive down the road.  We couldn't drive down, so we decided to walk. This is one of those times where it paid off to walk because most people only went to the lookout and then left.  Going up and down this road weeded out a lot of tourists.  I know that pictures don't do it justice, but the road was so steep, it was easier to walk down in a zig zag motion, than walk straight down the road.  And going up was a way more difficult then I thought.  We were drenched in sweat and had to take breaks.  But it was worth the effort!

Wild horses

There were not a lot of people here, which was great! I really loved this beach!

Because people feed the horses, they are pretty aggressive and try to steel your food.  The girl had to push the horse away from her sandwich!
Also, I'm not so sure the locals liked tourists at this beach.  I say this because at one point a guy buzzed by several times on his quad obviously kicking up excessive amounts of dirt and dust around people eating and picnicking. 

I have no idea who this girl is, but I thought the picture was really cool.  There is a river there that feeds into the ocean.  This is looking back at the valley towards where the river is flowing from.

There were horses all over down at the beach and walking around.

Picture taken about 1/2 way along the road 

Good to know!

06/28/2021- Kona Coffee Tour 

I think our tour started at 10am.  We were maybe 5-10 min. late because we had to travel clear to the other side of the island from Hilo.  We apologized for our lateness.  The girl giving the tour kind of laughed at us and said everyone is always late everywhere because you are on 'island time'.  We came to find out that was pretty true.

They were a very small, family farm.  Coffee can only be called Kona if it is grown in the Kona region of the Big Island. They had 3 dogs on the farm.  The dogs help protect the trees from the wild pigs.  She told us that the wild pigs could destroy the whole farm in one night. 

We got a tour of the farm, an explanation on how they grow the beans, how they harvest the beans, and how they roast the beans.  We also got to do some taste testing.  We were so high from the caffeine! lol

They were roasting the beans here.  It smelled like burnt popcorn! lol

After the Kona Coffee farm tour, the girl at the tour told us to stop here for authentic Hawaiian food.

There is chicken rolled up on the leaves ( I think they were banana leaves?).  Anyway, the food was great.  Except the tomatoes kind of had a fishy smell.  Then Gary kept saying that the tomatoes smelled like fish.  Then it got in my head and I almost puked! Not because the food was bad, but because all I could 'smell' was fishy and it grossed me out. oh well!

The girl at the Hala tree Kona coffee tour told us to go to this beach.

Because of Covid, the tours and live action activities were canceled, but this 'village' was supposed to represent indigenous Hawaiians lifestyle and beliefs and living situations.  There were plaques explaining the carved wood statues and everything.  But, it was insanely hot and I didn't feel like reading.  Besides, it wasn't real.  It was a replica of a long lost village which I am sure was destroyed by colonists.

See all the people in the background?  There is a perfect spot to get into the water there.  There were tons of people getting in and out with snorkeling gear right there.  However, the rocks are lava and very sharp.  You had to time getting into and out of the water with the waves.  when the waves came in high, you got in.  when the waves went out, it was a big enough drop that you had to wait for the waves to come back in.  At one point, there was a little girl with her dad trying to get out of that area.  The waves were tossing her around like a rag doll! I helped grab her and get her out of the water.  Somehow I became the hall monitor and got in a position where I was helping people in and out of the water for a bit.  I was probably there when Gary took this picture! lol

Gary liked this beach the best.

Seriously, there are animals roaming everywhere

It was very odd to see where the path of a volcanic flow just plowed through everything to reach the ocean.

Status of King Kamehameha - way on the North side of the Big Island

Keokea Beach and Park.

Near the beach was another small, creepy cemetery.  The Kohala Hongwanji Mission Cemetery.

This was our last day on the Big Island. The next day we traveled to Lihue, Kauai.

06/29/21: Travel to Lihue, Kauai.  Meet up with Tom to rent his van!

We arrived back at the Hilo airport to fly over to Kauai. Everything in Hawaii is outside, including the check-in desks at the airport, which completely confused us.  We thought that we needed to go in to the airport to check our bags and get our tickets etc before going through security.  At the Hilo airport, all of that is situated outside.  Not understanding the setup, we did not understand why our luggage was being pulled apart and disassembled before we even walked into the airport.  They kept telling us we needed to check our luggage.  We kept telling them that we were planning on checking our luggage.  After going round and round, we finally understood that all of the gate check-in were located outside and you needed to hand off your luggage prior to even entering the airport.  It was such a pain trying to put everything back together again, but as soon as we dumped our luggage we had a pretty easy flight from Hilo to Honolulu to Lihue!  And we did luck out in regards to covid testing.  About 2 weeks before we were scheduled to go to Hawaii, the government dropped 'inter-island' testing.  We would have had to have negative covid tests prior to flying from island to island.  Thank goodness we didn't have to coordinate that!

Once we landed, I texted Tom to let him know we were at the airport.  True to his word, he showed up at the airport with the van we were going to rent!  He was super nice and gave us a bunch of tips for local restaurants and places to hike.  We dropped him back off at Home Depot and he just handed us the keys and said to have fun and let him know when we needed to head back to the airport.  I could not believe how trusting he was.  He said that's the Hawaiian way!

Thank God we made it

We took a break at Duke's Kauai resort for drinks and lunch before we could check in to our condo for the day. Recommendation from Tom!  This is Kalapaki Beach

The beach at our condo! It was very nice

Our condo was in the Kauai Beach resort and spa. It was a gated community with it's own pool/resort area but it was also right on the ocean.

06/30/21:  Hiking day.  

The first big day in Kauai, we (well I) wanted to go hiking.  We were planning on driving up to the Kalalau Trail which is on the North side of the island.  We could not have been 30 min. from our destination when we hit a road block.  The one and only road that went to the Kalaulau trail was closed because of a mud slide.  The road was only a couple of hours in the morning and a couple of hours in the evening and that was it.  We had just missed the morning cut off.  Completely defeated, we turned around and decided to hike to the Queen's Bath.  We arrived around 9:00am and hung out there until around 11 before taking off.  The problem was with the parking.  There were about 10 parking spots there and you were not allowed to park on the side of the road.  Some people just sat in line waiting for one of the parking spots to open up.  We drove back to the main road and found that the local golf course would allow you to park in the parking lot for the day for $20.  We paid the fee, parked and walked the short distance to the Queen's bath.

This was the trail to the Queen's bath.  It was so eroded from tourists hiking it.  I should have stood in a rut so you could see how deep they were.

It's a fairly dangerous place to swim.  Especially with the waves coming and and going out so hard.

Sea Turtles

It was kind of difficult to walk down here in crocs, but it was so refreshing!

This was the super dangerous area.  The kids swimming were getting tossed around like ragdolls from the surf, but they didn't care.

Around 11am we were done and decided to leave.  As soon as we got to the main road, it became very clear that we were lucky to have gone to the Queen's bath early in the morning.  There were 30 cars in line waiting to park.  It honestly looked like a bus load of people got dropped off at the trail head.  There were so many people I was shocked.  As we passed the line of cars waiting for the coveted 10 parking spots, a dad asked us how long the wait was.  we told him that he could park just up the road for $20.  He appreciated the knowledge and said he might do that.  We walked back to our car and we decided to take our parking pass and give it to someone who was waiting in line.  We drove over there and the dad was still sitting in line waiting for a parking spot.  His family had gotten out and decided to walk to the bath, leaving him to park the car.  I just gave him the pass and told him it was good for the rest of day and to use it for easier parking.  He thanked us and we went on our way for the day.

After the Queen's bath, we decided to do a different trail for the day that Tom told us about.  It was called the 'sleeping giant' trail.  There's an overlook where the mountains look like a person laying down and sleeping.  That trail was really nice. Not too difficult.  Just a few miles long.  It was hot, but we were in the shade quite a bit.  There were signs talking about hunting the pigs.  It seems like you can just hunt them anywhere, anytime you want.

On the Sleeping Giant Trail overlooking the town of Wailua

The sleeping Giant - do you see him?

Another 'offering' someone placed in a tree

Hiking on the trail was great.  I was happy to actually be able to hike on a tail in Hawaii! However, just when we were halfway, my right foot felt funny.  I looked down and noticed that my shoe was literally falling apart!  Just my luck, it started to fall apart when we were only 1/2 way. Anyway, I kept walking until the sole of the shoe fell off.  That didn't happen until we were about 1/2 mile from the end.  The lesson here is: Dry rot is a real thing.  Make sure to check your shoes BEFORE you decide to hike miles and miles in them!

07/01/21:  Chocolate farm tour - Lydgate Farms

The chocolate farm tour was by far my favorite thing we did.  It was so interesting learning about chocolate and how they make it.

This guy owns and runs the farm. I think his grandpa started the farm and he eventually took it over.  I had never even seen a cacao pod until today.

They grew vanilla beans on their farm too.  I remember him saying how hard they were to grow. I think they have to pollenate the flowers by hand or they won't grow beans on their own.

another surprise, inside the cacao pod are these weird, white 'seeds'!  we each tool one to eat.  first you suck on them. the outside has a slimy texture, but it is sweet to taste.

The inside of the 'seed' is purple!  What the heck nature?  You can eat the seed, but it is very bitter.  The bitter didn't bother me, so I just ate the seed.  But most people spit it out on the ground. lol

I can't remember what this crazy thing was called, but they had a lot of wacky flowers and vegetation growing on this farm.

I don't know how people discovered that you can take these white coated, bitter purple seeds, ferment them for weeks, roast them, grind them up and mix them with sugar and milk to make delicious chocolate.  We did some chocolate taste testing and tried a whole bunch of different chocolate flavors and styles.  this pure chocolate must have been packed with caffeine, because Gary and I both felt weird and light headed after the tour.  I guess we are lightweights!

The last thing we tried before leaving was this Ono Pop.  It's made from the cacao nectar.  They are  white frozen popsicles.  Kind of a gooey texture when it starts to melt, but it tasted good.

07/02/21: Our final day in Kauai we didn't do much except hang around the beach until we needed to get to the airport to fly to Honolulu.  First we needed to drop off Tom's van.  Tom was busy so he had us pick up his friend Judy at her house.  Once we got to the airport, then she would take Tom's van back to Tom.  It just seemed so strange to trust everyone at face value, but we did.  Judy was super nice and we talked about her career and living in Hawaii until we made it to the airport.  She dropped us off and wished us safe travels.  Once we arrived at Honolulu airport, we grabbed an Uber to the Hotel.  My friend from high school and his wife lived in Hawaii at the time.  I had made arrangements prior to our trip to meet up Friday night for dinner, drinks and to catch up.  He was able to pick us up around 5-6pm and take us to a brewery in Honolulu.  It was great to sit with them and hear about their family and lives since high school.  We learned a LOT about living on Hawaii and got a lot of our questions answered in regards to what we were experiencing on Hawaii.  My next blog post after this will be strictly information that I learned in Hawaii.

Me, Gary, Gretchen and David

07/03/21: The next day our flight did not leave until late afternoon.  The first thing we did was try and get breakfast.  Even though we were up early, we could not find a restaurant that did not have a 3 hr wait. I'm telling you, the shear volume of people in this area was incredible.  The sad thing is that we didn't even bother to go see the WWII memorial to the war ship The Arizona because we figured it would be packed AND it was 4th of July weekend so getting in wasn't going to happen.    We spent the day walking around Waikiki Beach. ented city bikes to ride to diamond head.

After eating we walked up and down Waikiki beach.  There were a lot of surfers.  The beach had a lot of homeless people sleeping in the area too.

One of the hotels had a Koi pond.  They allowed you to feed them and you could touch them.  These guys were huge!

I guess people must store their boards here or it was a rental place.  Not sure but it looked cool.

This was some famous pink hotel that I never heard of! haha

We rented bikes to go up to Diamond Head, but that was a bad choice!  The bikes were so rusted from the salt air that it made it impossible to ride.  We powered through though.  However, once we reached Diamond Head, we noticed that even if you WALKED into the park, you still had to pay to go up the stairs.  Gary and I said "F this" and rode the bikes back in to Honolulu

If you like beaches that are jammed packed with tourists to the point where there is absolutely no open space to walk or lay on the beach, then Hawaii is for you.  People are packed as close as their umbrellas will let them be.

Something I actually liked in Hawaii!  These were the absolute best cookies and they came in super cute tins.  I bought a bunch back to give away.

Last picture in Hawaii before we flew back to the mainland.  Pretty sure Gary liked it better then me.  I didn't hate Hawaii, but I'm not sure I see the appeal and I don't ever expect to visit there again. The next post will be alllllll the things that people don't tell you able Hawaii.