Year: 2007

On the last day we left early, drove to Hilo with a little sightseeing and shopping along the way, and went on an Island Hoppers airplane ride with our pilot Dale. First my mom and I flew while Andy stayed with Leilani, then Andy went with two other tourists. When he came back Leilani happily called out “My turn” and was really dissappointed when she couldn’t go.

The mighty Pu’u O’o which no longer has lava now that it flows out elsewhere:

The Royal Gardens subdivision that was cut off and partially covered by lava in the 1990’s (see maps of past and current flows):

He didn’t do this with me in the plane – guess he does not like to hear women scream…

Andy says: you did too do that…in photoshop!

I suppose this is called a “lavafall:”

Colorful roofs of old downtown Hilo:

The Boiling Pots on the Wailuku River were so pretty from the air…

…that we decided to see them again from the ground:

The next morning it was raining again. We went to the park giftshop, a gallery of very beautiful things, all out of our pricerange. It made me pretty sad to think of local artists, having to live on a very meager income in a state where rents start at 900$, and milk and gasoline are almost as expensive as in Europe, non-profit giftstores trying to promote their items, and still, most of us need to buy at Walmart… it’s so much cheaper to mass produce in the Philippines or China, where cost of living is a fraction of what it is here. OK enough of that.

In the afternoon we picked some Ohelo berries for Leilani, she loves them. They are in the same family as blueberries and cranberries, not as sweet as the former, not as tart as the later. We threw some into the steam vent for Pele too.

More rain for the berry pickers.

Leilani and Andy stayed in the car.

It cleared up briefly…

We went back to the same Thai restaurant in the evening.

On the second day of our trip Andy had planned a hike in the crater, Kilauea Iki, but we got rained out. We drove down the chain of craters road, hoping for better weather closer to the coast.

Our first stop was at the petroglyphs. It was a 3/4 mile hike, although it was raining most the time we stayed pretty dry under our raingear.

Leilani, who in the (non-blogging) meantime has broadened her Nemo obsession to include all sea creatures, especially dolpins, humpback whales and turtles, points excitedly to the petroglyph of a “Honu”. Leilani knows the Hawaiian words for at least a dozend animals.

Later we drove all the way down, to where the lava used to enter the ocean, and walked back to where it swallowed the road. The weather was much better.

In the evening we found a nice little Thai restaurant, much better than the Pizza place we had eaten at the first night. Leilani likes Thai food, but the curry was a little spicy for her taste. We told her it was important to learn to eat spicy food, and to drink plenty of water with it – which she did. She ate most the shrimps in oour food, and loved the Pad Thai.

Unfortunatelly I was so busy that I have not kept up with blogging… So, I’m planning to post 4 sections on our Big Island trip with my mom Trude.

When we arrived in Hilo it was raining. That didn’t change substantially over the next few days…

We went to the nice Japanese garden that we had visited last year…

and had lunch at the same Thai restaurant. Andy and my mom looked at some waterfalls and lavatubes, while Leilani and I napped in the car. I was so tired the entire trip. Next we drove to Volcano. We found Hale I’Iwi not quite as nice as expected – see Andy’s rant. Still… this is what it looked like.

That picture was taken in the carport of the property, towards the pretty backyard (but for the weather we had to wait until the very last day)

Last Saturday, October 13 we went to Koke’e to see the Queen Emalani Festival 2007. It was a beautiful day, and I got to test my new camcorder for a big shoot on Monday… maybe I’ll post a movie later.

As one can see, we have a lot of stuff with us. 80% of it is Leilani’s though (the other 20% were 2 chairs and food :-)

Andy took a great shot of a Halau (Hula troupe)

This year’s queen

We visited the Pu’u Hinahina lookout at dusk.

We are slowly getting paid-busy, rather than just advertising-busy so that’s a nice change, but the stress level around here is very high, reflecting badly on Leilani. She has regressed in several areas, doesn’t eat by herself at all anymore and needs to be bribed for going to the potty.