Month: October 2007

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.

We just got back from the Big Island last night and it was a short compact vacation. This blog entry is going to read more like a travel guide, because it’s a sort of practice.

We reserved our cottage in Volcano Village through Hawaii Volcano Vacations (http://www.hawaiivolcanovacations.com/index.php?inc=rentals). Hale I’wi (http://www.hawaiivolcanovacations.com/index.php?inc=house&id=5) is a cozy 2 bedroom cottage that rents for $140 (+11%) tax for 3 adults. We were lucky this is low season because we booked late and this was the last one available in the Volcano village itself. It has a nice garden full of tree ferns.

Unfortunately, we weren’t so lucky with the rental service. They didn’t give us the Kama’aina discount as promised and we didn’t find the continental breakfast that was included. Several messages to them didn’t get returned, so we ended up buying our breakfasts. And while the house was clean, it smelled of mold when we arrived. Fortunately, the smell went away after airing it out and turning on the gas fireplace, or I don’t know if we could’ve stayed there.

The other cottages I found online are Volcano Village Cottages (http://volcanogallery.com/volcano__village_choice_.htm). The lady on the phone was really helpful and nice, but they didn’t have anything as close or as cheap this time. But this seems like the better agency, which is why it probably books up earlier. I also found Volcano Cottages (http://www.volcanocottages.com/) in the same price range but I never called them.

In the Volcanos National Park, we really liked the Visitor Center movie and information. Last year we saw the Jagger geology museum, which we liked, but we didn’t go back. We did drive around the Halemaumau crater again, stopping at the steam vents and also the rift zone that we missed last time, as well as the inner crater. Then we went in the Thurston Lava tube again with Trude, and this time we took our flashlights all the way to the end of the unlit section.

Then we drove down the Chain of Craters Road to the petroglyphs. Those weren’t as impressive as I thought, but still neat. At the end of the road, we hiked to where the flow covers the pavement and took some neat pictures. The lava there looks recent, with all the cool formations. Unfortunately, we never had the good weather nor the time to hike the Kilauea Iki crater loop-next time.

To top off the vacation (and make up for all the rain) we booked a sight-seeing airplane ride in Hilo on our last day. Since the eruption changed in July, you can’t walk to the lava because it no longer flows into the ocean. The only way to see the flowing lava is from the air, but it’s even more impressive now because it hasn’t made any tubes. The volcano and extent of the flows are really apparant from the air. We went with Island Hoppers (http://www.fly-hawaii.com/above/hilo_tour.html) in a high-wing airplane. It was $155 each +10 tip for the two of them, and then the pilot took me up for free on the next trip. So we tipped him again with our leftover beer from the cottage.

There, do you think I am a good travel guide writer?