Hawai'i, The Big Island

We are down to two days before we leave for the big island and I can't wait. I'm not really looking foward to the plane ride but I know it'll be worth it when we get there.
My wife and I are going to celebrate our eleventh anniversary. We were going to go to St. Johns last year but the economy tanked so we decided to wait and see what was going to happen. Now, with all the stimulus and buy-outs etc etc. we find not much has changed, other than the fact that we just got a year older. We decided not to let that happen again and planned on going somewhere for sure this year.
My wife started looking for places and then I suggested Hawai'i. It's going to cost a little more than we were planning on spending but we decided to spend it before Uncle Sam spent it for us. That, or he asked us to help him repay the debt that the idiots in washington continue to build.
Ah yes, that's another reason to get away. Away from the madness and callousness that society is becoming. Away to sit on a black sand beach and just reflect on how lucky we really are. To really slow down and enjoy each other and see the beauty of nature. To see her in all her glory, the ocean, the earth being born, the flora and fuana.
I'm lucky in another way too. My wife knows my passion for the sport of disc golf. She used to call herself a disc golf widow but understands it's what I really enjoy. It's healthy and I'm not somewhere in a bar sitting on a stool being a tool.
She also knows about the two courses I found on the big island and that I'm taking my discs, or at least a few of them, with me. She knows I've already found a couple local golfers there and plan on playing the first day we're there. But in fairness, I am only planning on playing two courses and more than likely only one round on each, but I'm not ruling out that second round either.
She really likes to read and be outside so she's okay with me playing golf. She's just going to chill by the tide pools or walk down to the ocean as the house we're renting is only three hundred feet from the ocean. She can sit and read for hours on end. Don't get me wrong as Stephen King scribes it, I am constant reader, but she is Evelyn Wood. LMAO.
We're not the usual tourists so we decided on the east side of the island rather than the more populated, big hotels, white sand beaches side of the island. We like to slow down and would rather hike the rain forest or a lava tube.
She reminds every time I see something that I think we should add to the itenerary, to just remember her down days.
Her down days are my golf days and it works out really well for both of us.
It's one of the reasons our eleventh year together feels like our first or second. We are happy and don't need someone to make us happy. That and we don't ever make each other unhappy.
I bought a new digital camera for the trip since my old one is a little heavy and older. The new one is an Olympus and is waterproof to ten meters, but just to be safe I also bought a divers case for it. Once the camera is secure in the case, it's safe for dives to forty meters although we don't plan on scuba diving. I figured it was a good idea to get the case because of the salt water. You can never be too safe when it comes to electronics and salt water.
I did pack all of our snorkel equipment too. Better to have ours as we know how it fits and everthing is in good condition. I'm really excited about the snorkeling because we're staying right on the tide pools of Kapoho.
The house we're renting even has a tide pool on the property that is thermal and gets replenished every day by the tide. It's like having a hottub outside, even though there is also a hottub on the lanai.
Well, I'll follow this up in a couple weeks with our adventures. I'll post some of the pictures too but just a handfull as I usually take quite a few. I'm like that.
More to come.

[Nascar Dave]

Well ,I just found out that we're doing a roll out on our new SAP system in a couple months. Corporate sent an email this week that stated no vacation time in August, September, or October. Mostly training sessions and getting ready to go live. To make it worse, we can only take a couple days of vacation at a time between now and then.
We were planning on heading out to Rio Rancho for Memorial Day to see my dad and now that looks like a four day weekend.
As far as the Big Island goes, we'll just have to wait till November but this year will probably be for two weeks or so.

[Nascar Dave]

So I made my wife an offer to rent a large Rv and do a two week drive around the USA. Mount Rushmore, Pikes Peak, The Grand Canyon, Yosimite, The petrified Forest, The Badlands, The Tetons, Great Sand Dunes, on and on and on.
That or go back to the Big Island??? She didn't even hesitate before answering.
HELLO PAHOA!

[Nascar Dave]

September 2010, I do believe my wife and I will be back on the big island for a week or two. It was real hard to convince her we needed to back for vacation this year. Oh well, the sacrifices we have to make in this life.

[Nascar Dave]

K, I sure would love to fly back over for the Big Island Open, I almost hit you up for a place to stay for that weekend but my wife would probably kill me if I were to come back without her, lol. Are you going to play in the BIO? Good luck if you do, tell Castaway Dave and the others aloha for me when you see them.
Peace brother.

[david k. reisner]

aloha dave, good to hear your home safe and sound, and already missing paradise. i had a good time showing you around, and i hope all the directions i gave where easy to find. your welcome any time, as long as you can handle the long flight. talk with you later. aloha bro.

[Nascar Dave]

All in time brother. I have to download them from my camera to a disc, there's close to six hundred pictures. Then, I want to create albums to seperate the snorkeling, volcanoes, flora and fuana, etc etc etc.
That's just on my camera, there's probably close to that number on my wife's camera too.

[Barrlee]

Sounds great, would love to go, but can't handle that long on a plane. Where's the pictures?

[Nascar Dave]

As for the sites, from Mauna Kea to South Point and everywhere in between, I cannot accurately describe them here, I could try, but you really would have to experience them for yourself. There's nothing like standing on South Point and looking south out across the big blue, the color of the ocean there is really incredible. The Green Sand beach is a place where you can spend all day, which we tried to do. The surf was up and it was dangerous to go in the water but I had to, so I did. I wayched some of locals spear fish for a while and decided to enter and exit the water in the same manner. I like to think I'm an excellent swimmer and one thing that stuck in my head was NEVER turn your back on the ocean, especially when it was in that state, so I didn't and I never stayed in long enough to tire at any given point but to feel the raw power of the ocean in that spot was truly magnificent.
Mauna Kea when you look at her from a distance you don't fell her majesty but she stands almost fourteen thousand feet tall. When you're in between her and Mauna Loa it starts to hit home just how huge these two volcanoes are. Then, when you start to drive up her flank and you drive through and above the clouds it starts to really sink in. And the temperature starts to drop by the quarter mile, or seems to anyway.
The trip to the active valcano was the highlight of our trip, Kilauea left me speachless at times. Part of the Volcanoes National Park were closed due to the high levels of sulphur in the air but most were accessable. We took a hike through the rainforest and the sounds were a collection of beauty. Along the trail we passed steam vents that would fog your sunglasses. We also passed the Sulphur Vents and when it rains the rains goes into the ground and comes back out as steam, when it does it creates sulphur crystals that are a beautiful yellow. We were lucky because this was one of the few times that Kilauea was erupting from two completely different spots on the volcano, one we couldn't get close to because of the closures.
The other was the actual lava flow and there is something about watching the earth remake herself that is undescribable. We had to drive about fifty miles from the park, all the way back past where we were staying, circling around to come up from the east where the lava was flowing into the ocean. We drove out where part of the roadway was flowed over a few years ago, and then parked and walked about another half mile where you sit on an old lava flow about a quarter mile from the current flow to watch. we arrived around 5:30pm and for the most part it was steam as it hit the ocean, occasionally giving a glimpse of the red lava, but as night fell the show began. The flow came down the side of Kilauea visual in a few spots but mostly in tubes before splitting just prior to getting to the ocean. It split right on the point and the right flank we couldn't see directly but could see the sparks as the explosions occured shooting lava into the air. The left flank was clearly visual and only got better and better as night set in. It would build ledge after ledge and when the weight became too much, it would fall into the ocean showing all the magma inside. We watched, mesmerized for a few hours before we drug ourselves away and headed back to the house. Great timing too because as soon as we got to the Jeep and started it, it started raining and the dive nack along the coast was slow but beautiful.
We stayed on the Kapoho tide pools and I've never seen so many fish of so many colors and species, even morays. They take special care to prtect the coral there which is also abundant and colorful.
We also visited a black sand beach where the sea turtles were sleeping on the beach and swimming just off the beach, oblivious to you if you didn't approach too close.
The plants were too many too list, the waterfalls tall and beautiful, the ocean so so blue.
I found myself repeating the same descriptive phrases after a while on the island and so I do now as well, so I'll stop here, sure that I've missed something. Only this needs left to be said, if you've never been to Hawaii, you need to try and get there, it left me near speechless, lol.

[Nascar Dave]

Back home in Texas and the only thing that was less than spectacular was the flight home. Seven hours in the cramped confines of coach really can blow. We landed at DFW Int airport at 5:20a, picked up the Cherokee and drove home. I dropped my wife off and headed to meet my buddies at the course for their usual Sunday morning round. I was wiped out from the flight and still managed to win a buck from everyone. Then I went home and crashed hard, completely exhausted.
I tried to watch the Nascar race and made a few laps before lights out. I woke up late afternoon, got something to eat, took a shower, adn slowly started to regain my former self. Then, later in the evening, I tried to watch Sunday night football, Coyboys/Giants, but couldn't stay awake for that either.
Was it worth it, being so wiped out? Absolutely, and I'll do it all over again. I got to play a couple rounds over in Hawaii, the first at MacKenzie which is right along the ocean. The views were awesome as the surf was three to five feet and when it crashed the rocks some fifty feet below, the ocean spray would come all the way over the top. This is the reason they tell you not to walk along the outcroppings. I got completely drenched one day by a rougue wave, and if it weren't the spray from it, I'd probably be halfway to Tahiti right now. There were also lava tubes on the course, many of which you couldn't see from the teeboxes. One in particular took me two throws just to get back out of it and on the fairway, and I took a five on that hole. There was so much to look at that I really didn't concentrate too much on the game itself. Pineapple growing wild in the rough on a few occasions. Speaking of the rough, there really isn't any as we disc golfers on the mainland know it because the plants don't have any natural enamies so they all let the guard down long ago. The nettles, they don't itch, the briars, if that's what they were have NO thorns. The rough can be thick but it is complately harmless unless you happen to fall into a lava tube or big crack. I finally had to ask Kirk to let me know of any hidden dangers from the teeboxes after a couple excursions. Thanks Kirk for a great time and one of the best rounds I've ever had the luxury to play.
A couple days later I met Kirk over in Hilo at the Wailoa course for another round with Castaway Dave and five other locals whose names now escape me, sorry guys but a huge mahalo for the round. This course was mostly wide open in a park by the bay of Hile with the river running through it. The views of the bay were gorgeous and I saw the biggest ficus tree I've ever seen. The other sights in the park were the Vietnam Memorial with it's constant flame burning and memorial markers in a row of palm trees. The statue of King Kamehameha, which I can now say properly without fumbling through it a couple times first, lol. The other thing that was kind of cool was you could still see some debrees in the bottom of the water from the sunami that hit Hilo in 1946? I think. Kirk gave me a nice warning that if I did throw in the water to be careful while retrieving my discs because of it which I'm happy to say I didn't need to heed, although I came close a couple times.
Hey guys, mahalo for the good times and the discs from Hawaii, I can't say enough.

[Nascar Dave]

Yeah, I bought some stuff called Jungle Juice from REI. It's 98.11% Deet with a serious warning on the label. It's sold in a 2oz bottle and says no more than four sprays per application and do not re-apply.
I'm bringing it as a precaution, not going to apply it until I have too because of the chemicals.