Notes on Hawaii

Here are some notes about my vacation in Hawaii. Because it was such a great vacation that the memory is fading fast......

7/27 (Fri): I and my husband left home around 4:30am and headed for BWI by Super Shuttle. We flew with Continental Airlines via Houston to Honolulu---3 hours plus 8 hours, terrible food (e.g. frozen pizza) and no alcohol. Gah. We arrived in Honolulu International Airport around 2pm. We waited for my family (my parents, sister, her husband, and two lovely nieces) who had arrived there 3 days before from Japan. I assumed my job as a tour guide…since my family doesn’t speak a lot of English. But my mom can communicate with anyone from any country in Japanese. And my dad doesn’t hesitate even for a second to talk to locals in any country with his broken English. I love them. Anyways, then we took 40 minutes flight to Hawaii Island, a.k.a Big Island.

We arrived in Kona Airport around 6pm, rented cars and headed for a house we rented for a week. The realtor noticed us in the last minute that the house we had reserved had some sewage problem. He took us to another house instead. It turned out that we were lucky. The house was huge and gorgeous. Five bedrooms with full bathroom each, a huge swimming pool and ocean view. We were exhausted, but I couldn’t go to sleep without beer after the long day. So I took my husband to a super market nearby and got some beer and food. Then drank, ate, and went to sleep.

7/28(Sat.): I woke up very early because of the jet lag. I flip-flopped for a while, and got up around 5:30am. I heard nothing but birds singing. It was cool, around 70F. Sea breeze. Hmmm….I stepped out to the front yard and saw a mongoose. A tour guide later told me that mongooses were introduced to Hawaii to have them catch rats, which were brought into Hawaii by outsiders. But they didn’t hunt rats but instead started eating eggs of indigenous birds which became an endangered species. But the mongoose was cute and my nieces were crazy about them.

7/29(Sun): My sister’s friends arrived from Japan and joined us. But their luggage did not. Somehow their luggage stayed in Honolulu because of some lazy TSA officials. Fortunately they arrived at night after hundreds of phone calls. In the afternoon, we went to a coffee plantation owned by a Japanese coffee company, Doutor. The plantation has a beautiful garden full of exotic flowers and fruit trees. We planted a coffee tree. We hope someday we can go back there for a harvest and roast our own coffee.

7/30(Mon): My father and my sister’s friends joined a tour to Mauna Kea mountain. The rest of us enjoyed relaxed time on the beach and snorkeling nearby. We met some sea turtles there. They looked nice.

7/31(Tue): We visited a painted church and another coffee plantation. I and my husband prepared BBQ for a dinner. My sister’s friend, a hula dancer, gave us a lesson. We all had fun.

8/1(Wed): We joined a tour to the volcano area. Unfortunately there were no lava flows, but the tour was interesting.

8/2(Thu): We joined Kealakekua Bay snorkel cruise. The bay is an underwater state park and natural sanctuary. It was great. When I was snorkeling, because of the up to 100 feet underwater visibility, I felt like flying over coral reefs….super beautiful. Crew boys were super cute. And we saw dolphins, too! Their morning cruise is more popular because the afternoon weather tends not to be great in Kona area. But we enjoyed a lot, and considering that the afternoon cruise is cheaper, we thought we made a right choice.

8/3 (Fri): We said bye-bye to the gorgeous house and flew back to Honolulu. We all thought we should have stayed in the Big Island two more days instead of spending time in Honolulu.

8/4 (Sat): I took my mom to a Hawaiian massage. We saw a free Hula show on the beach. We decided we would skip Honolulu next time if we ever had chance to go to Hawaii again.

8/5 (Sun): My family left in the morning. We became a little emotional. My nieces cried. So did my husband and I. We spent the rest of the day on the beach. We had a lunch at a Japanese restaurant “Sushi-Ko.” Highly recommended. Sushi was excellent. The atmosphere and service were also great. We had some Mai-Tai again and headed for the airport…..