Impressions? The food is pretty lousy, much like Alaska. Most restaurants cater to American tourists, so it was difficult to find anything un-fried. The pineapple is always delicious. Kona (relatively major city on the west coast) has great weather – even when it was overcast the air remained warm. We swam in the clear ocean every day, bought lots of souvenirs (tacky and otherwise) and spent a great deal of time in the hot tub. Besides a hot tub, our fabulous rental house had a huge lanai, beds aplenty (both indoor and outdoor), and a little cat named Eddy to keep us company. From Kona we explored the north point, which is windy; so much in fact that it housed wind farms (alternative energy kinda gets me off). We drove inland from Kona, heading north, through a high, winding road, past farms and rolling mountain hills. We also passed vast stretches of lava fields – swaths of land that are covered with old, crumbling lava. They were fascinating, but also a little eerie. While traveling by these, I spotted a black goat standing in the middle of such a field – he was the same color as the lava.
Near Kona we also visited the Pu'uhonua o Honaunau National Historical Park. Translated, the "Place of Refuge at Honaunau" it is a restoration of an ancient Hawaiian religious sanctuary in Hawaii. I have to admit that the cultural part didn’t interest me much, but the sea turtles, tide pools and vegetation did. We returned later in the trip to snorkel off this point. I had never tried snorkeling before and found it utterly addicting. I would do it every day if I could. I got pretty banged up and bloody from the coral reef, but it was worth it. After 4 or so days in Kona, we went around the southern tip of Hawai’i and slightly northward to Volcano, the area where there is an active volcano and many craters from past volcanic activity. On the way we stopped at South Point, which was my favorite part of the trip. We turned off the highway onto a long, narrow winding road on which we passed many little farms (one of which had a pasture full of baby goats), a big wind farm (rowrrrr!) and eventually ended up at the water. Much of this coastal area comprises of severe black cliff walls that meet the clearest, bluest water I’d ever seen in my life. In other places, the rocky “beach” led straight into the water, but the waves were easily 10 ft tall, so we kept a respectful distance.
We spent several days in volcano at another nice rental house – this one was bigger, newer and enshrouded by enormous ferns and vegetation, as this rainforest area is wetter and colder, and of a rather high elevation. We mostly drove around and looked at heat vents and craters. We also walked through an old lava tube (a tunnel forged through rock by volcanic lava from an eruption ages ago), which was touristy, but fun.
Along one of the crater-laden roads, we visited newer lava fields, one of which had engulfed much of a paved road. One of the nights we were there we went to a lookout spot and watched the current lava flow meet the ocean, which results in a dramatic cloud of steam. The darker it grew, the more orange and angry the explosions became. If there were a hell, this is what it would look like. We also visited a black sand beach where we came nose-to-nose to with all the sea turtles that hung out there.
After volcano, we traveled north along the east coast, traveling through another tourist city, Hilo. Along the way we stopped to check out a few pretty, but underwhelming waterfalls. We were back in Kona for Thanksgiving Day and spent the rest of our time there.
Overall, I would move to Hawai’i in a heartbeat, but only for a couple of years. The warm ocean, sea turtles and snorkeling opportunities are a huge draw for me and I miss these things immensely. But… it’s also an island, far away from good restaurants.
So, I’m back at work for another 3 days until winter break. Work is busy, as application season is upon us, so I’m dealing with mound upon mound of mail and tons of emails to answer. Nonetheless, the break did wonders for my morale – I’m very happy to be home (even if I can’t snorkel here); I’m also very glad to be spending time in our new house. We found another bookcase on Craig’s List, so the only thing left to unpack is our LP collection. And despite the rain, I’m very happy to be back on my bike, pedaling everywhere – driving is an out-and-out drag these days. Oh! And I recently joined a new Bikram yoga studio and have been a few times – it feels great to back into it and the hot practice room is a joy, what with our rainy, chilly weather of late. I was sick most of this last weekend (third illness in three months – I think I’ve had my fill, thank you very much), so we cloistered ourselves indoors and watched the tube. Sean rented the batman movie – the recent one. The plot was very intricate for a popcorn movie, I have to say I was impressed. Also, that dead guy is really good in it.
I was really excited to watch Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, which I mentioned in an older blog post. Well, that was disappointing. It’s true, Hunter lived an interesting life and I always find him amusing, but the movie dragged on and there was a little too much blind hero-worship going on. Oh, and the soundtrack was the same shitty one Terry Gilliam used in his 1998 Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas movie adaptation. Speaking of which, inserting full scenes from that movie into the documentary was just sloppy, a truly bad decision. And I really didn’t need a 20 minute recap of the political climate in the 60’s. Vietnam, Civil Rights? Thanks, heard of them; stock footage of dancing hippies did not teach me anything new. Worst of all, the only text of his they quoted were the most over-quoted passages they could find – passages that anyone who’s ever heard of HST knows – talk about laziness. Jesus, I would have lent them my dog-eared, underlined paperback copy if they were that short on creativity.
Do not fear, I drowned my sorrows over this thoroughly mediocre movie by indulging in season 3 of Weeds. Why is it that only cable stations, like HBO and Showtime, understand that television series can be done well? Which is better, The Sopranos or Two and Half Men? American Idol or The L Word? No contest. I rest my case.
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