First of all! I want to talk about first world problems. Wah wah wah, it took nineteen hours to get to paradise! Wah wah wah, I'm tired and cranky, oh yeah, stinky too. I feel a tad foolish about my whiny blog yesterday. I was so burnt out that I only half posted. I shared it on google, but forgot to facebook it till this morning. My apologies. We are three hours behind here as well. Slept like a baby last night. I crashed about 1am local time and slept through to 9am.
That's a good long sleep for me.
I was up before Lisa and put on a pot of Kona coffee. The condo is a studio with a full kitchen. It didn't take long for the smell of brewing coffee to nudge Lisa awake.
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| One side |
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| The other side |
We had a cup or two of coffee and I made breakfast for me, Lisa had a yogurt and we were on the road by 10:30.
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| Sausage and eggs |
One of the reasons Lisa and I travel so well together is neither one of us ever makes a plan. We drive until we see something interesting. A sign, a beach or even just a dirt road heading who cares where. Much easier since we got the GPS. Today we went less than a mile before we made our first stop.
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| I was trying to hang ten but look more like I'm hitching a ride! |
It was a beautiful beach, but no sand so we moved on. We followed the coast as far as we could then the road took us uphill. At the top of the first hill we came upon a funky looking antique store.
Thirty-five dollars for a rusted potato masher. What a turkey!
Which run wild on the islands after being introduced by the U.S. in 1817. We kept going uphill and found ourselves in coffee country.
Free Kona Coffee Samples the sign read. They had me at free!
They also had samples of everything they sell. The girls working there were really sweet and Lisa bought three kinds of Avos, two kinds of Macadamia nuts and some fruit that was sour and made me curdle right there in the middle of the store. FYI I don't like sour or bitter. Lisa does!
When we left the Kona Pacific Farmers Collective, forty bucks later, Lisa was chomping down on Ice cream bananas and grinning from ear to ear.
We took a side road towards the ocean and found a place the locals call Two Steps.
Two lava plates form a staircase into the water. Salty and warm and lots of fish.
We snorkeled for about ninety minutes. I think that counts as exercise. I have no Iron Maiden or Don't Tread on Me Mill to abuse my body with. I'll just walk instead. I still did my Four Stair Stretch. Only I used a stool from the condo because there are no stairs. Crunches, ten sets of twelve. The last two sets were very hard. Now that I think about it, maybe it was my groaning that woke Lisa not the coffee aroma!
After we licked the salt off each other and hydrated we continued to drive south staying to the back roads we were rewarded with some fresh Hawaii road kill. Two mangoes and an Avocado. Yes, we now own four giant avocados. There was so much to see and we took almost three hundred pictures. Here's just a few of the things we saw.
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| Road kill Avocado |
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| Mangoes Man |
We stopped at a fruit stand set up by two teenage girls. They were selling mangoes and a thing they called a winter apple. We had mangoes so we asked about the apples, "One dollar each" they said without flinching " They're fresh, we just picked them this morning" pointing at the tree across the road. Why don't I just walk over there and pick one myself?" I asked " My dad will shoot you!" she said as I gave her the two bucks.
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| Her Dad has a gun! |
As luck would have it we came across a commercial strip when we turned back onto the highway. It was mid afternoon and the free samples were wearing off so we stopped for lunch.
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| Everyone says this is the best |
I don't know why they call it Barbecue. Everything on the menu was deep fried or grilled, served over rice, covered with gravy, macaroni salad and usually an egg.
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| Typical Hawaiian meal |
I didn't eat the rice or the macaroni salad. No wonder I see so many Fat Bastard Hawaiians.
We decided to go to the Fairmont Orchid to see how the other half lives. We got the condo for a week, for less than it would cost for two nights at the Orchid. I'm not only a Fat Bastard, I'm a Cheap Bastard too! When we are on holiday the last place you will find us is in our room. It was a thirty-six mile drive through the lava fields.
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| Lava field for miles |
When we got there we drove past the hotel parked and went down to the beach. We never did see Nin and Krista. Instead we saw a guy with his daughter and three four week old puppies.
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| Gratuitous puppy picture |
We found a trail that ran along side the beach when I had to pee. I stepped into the bush a couple of feet, all ready to go, right into a giant spider web. I'm not ashamed to say, I screamed like a little girl.
Partly because I don't like spiders, and partly because I peed on my hand! We saw some weird things on that trail. Black bumble bees for one.
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| Not the best pic, but a black bumble bee! |
And lots of big spider webs, made by big spiders!
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| Boris the Spider |
After I washed my hands in the fountain in front of the hotel we headed for the condo. We only made two stops on the way.
The first was a funky roadside thrift shop/fruit stand.
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| Oregon Hippy Store |
Even cooler it was in an old theater and was owned by a hippy couple from Oregon.
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| Good use of an old theater |
Lisa bought two custard apples and I bought a Hawaiian shirt. Total cost, seven bucks.
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| A Saputo also called a Custard Apple |
Our last stop before home was a lava field that was riddled with caves.
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| A giant lava cave |
I'm not saying that Americans are mentally challenged but.....
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| No caption necessary |
What if they can't read? Only the Shadows know!
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| Me and my shadow |
Of course I was being a poser. I'm starting to feel better about how I look. All the hard work is paying off.
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| Feeling good about life |
We made our way home, showered, changed into my new shirt and got ready for dinner. Lisa posed with our road kill.
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| Hawaiian road kill |
Then we went to a joint called Laverne's sports bar. I was resplendent in my new shirt.
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| My new shirt |
And Lisa was, as always beautiful.
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The lovely Lisa
I had a very good burger with salad and Lisa had fish and chips.
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| A most excellent burger. |
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| Fish and chips. |
It was an excellent day and we had a ton of fun. Tomorrow I am going to throw a virgin into a volcano.Yeah, like there's a virgin in Hawaii!
Sorry this one got away from me. It's longer because we were doing stuff .
That's all I got.
Till next time
Peace Out Y'all
©2014 Dave Squatch Ward
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