June 18 We are scheduled to do a horseback ride in Waipio Valley today. At least we thought we were. Our ride was scheduled for 11:00. We had a leisurely morning and I headed out for a three miles run. So humid but so beautiful. Ran out to the end of the road where you could see the 2000 foot cliff that has been our view every morning. Such a privilege to run here. We had our requisite coffee and headed down the road to our meeting place. Found out that we had signed up for the shuttle tour and not the horseback ride. Oh well. We adjusted quickly as David and I are good at doing. The shuttle ride was incredible. The guy giving the tour had grown up in Waipio and still lives there. These are sacred lands and was the home of King Kamehamema. There was once 10,000 people living in the valley with a whole town. It was wiped out by a tsunami. Today, about 100 people live there farming taro and they are committed to preserving the valley. The beauty there is beyond belief. Waterfalls, w...
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June 16 I did head out for a run in the rain. Ran along the river and it was exquisitely beautiful. Truly running through the jungle. Came back and swam in the pool and sat in the hot tub. We had a little breakfast at the AirBnB and then got packed up and hit the road. First stop was the Hawaiian Botanical Bioreserve and Garden. What an incredible place! Flowers and trees that continue to blow your mind. It is so well maintained. The guy that started this bought 17 acres and cleaned up all the trash, old cars etc on the property and created this garden. You walk through the garden down to a view of the ocean. So beautiful. Just loved it and took a lot of flower pictures to prove it. Nothing like tropical flowers. They are so unique. After leaving the Garden, we drove to the Akaka Falls State Park. This is a 442 foot water fall with cliffs on all sides. No way to hike to it but the trail gives you a beautiful view. Short hike in and out but well worthwhile. Stopped for a latte at a...
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June 14 We finished off the day with dinner at Jackie Chen's. We learned our lesson from the day before and made reservations. The restaurant was a bank in 1910 and still has the vaults from those days of banking. David loved that. The meal was extraordinary. Appetizers of wonton chips with Ahi and wasabi. We both had panko coconut crusted swordfish that was indescribably delicious. We had sorbet for dessert which I really can't eat. Too sweet. It didn't do too much for David either. Headed back to the BnB for some relaxing TV - watching the ridiculous Rebel at the moment - and into bed. June 15 Today was our day to explore Puna. We first had breakfast at the Booch Bar which I had read about. You've never been any place like this. Never. They are all about everything being healthy and they serve all kinds of Kabocha juice - fermented teas with cane sugar. We had omelets that were of course, unique. I had a Ruben omelet. Never in my life on the planet had anything like ...
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June 13, 2021 We left Kona yesterday and began the long drive to Hilo. It is about 80 miles but took a couple of hours. Driving across the island showed many different kinds of vegetation. At one point, it reminded me of EskDale. Just looked like the desert. This drive is miles and miles of nothing. No houses and no services. But Hilo is lush and green. They get a lot of rain here and you can tell. We checked in to our Air BnB which is nice and comfortable and headed into old Hilo to have some lunch. Hilo looks like a dying town with many boarded up stores and most of the shops in disrepair. This place is nothing like the towns we've visited on other Hawaiian islands. It is quiet and commercialism is literally completely absent. This was a thriving sugar town at one time but with the lost demand for Hawaiian sugar, due to being able to obtain it elsewhere at a much lower cost, this town looks like the land that time forgot. When you get away from the heart of the town, there are s...
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June 13, 2021 We flew from San Jose Airport to Kona Island yesterday. Very early trip. Got up at 4:45 AM and made the drive to San Jose. When we arrived in Kona, it was only 10:00 with the time change. We felt like we'd already lived a day. Beautiful island with so little commercialism compared to the other airlines. We are staying at the Royal Kona Resort for our first night. After picking up our car with a price tag of $775 (and that was cheap and required considerable digging for me to find), we headed to the Resort. We got a Camaro which has tiny little windows and kind of a weird car but we adjusted quickly. The Resort allowed us to check in right away which was great. We had a very delicious lunch at the restaurant. They did lose our ticket first so we waited a long time and both of us were starving. It was 1:00 here but 4:00 at home and neither of us had eaten. But it was worth the wait. Great restaurant and we ended up eating dinner here too. I ate fish tacos and David had...