FIFTY STATES AWAYThis morning began with an eye-watering early 5.30am start after booking everything very late last night; flights, accommodation, car and car parking for the truck. It was all a bit mental, hard to believe that we could be sat here in California and then just fly to Hawaii a few hours later with no real planning, notice or restraints. After 4 hours sleep we headed off to what we hoped would be a natural and relaxing experience. We’d booked a hotel on the big island that we’d heard brings nature to you and aims to reset the body and mind. We are both tired, Hawaii will be our 23rd state (technically 24), quite a mission in the few months we’ve been out here and we both feel like crawling away for some rest.
We have chosen to fly to the big island, the one actually named Hawai’i. We will fly into the western side of the island to the town of Kona. We have chosen this island because of some of the things we’d like to do and because it is less touristy than O’ahu, which houses the ever fabulous Honolulu. It was a difficult choice to make as we also quite fancied going to the smaller island of Maui. The big island has more cloud cover, mainly due to the vog (volcanic fog) and rains more than any of the other islands, but the temperature remains high. Us being pale people it’s probably better to have at least some cloud protection, however minor it turns out to be.
The flight was just over 5hrs long and relatively painless, the captain was a very straightforward guy. He cut to the chase told the passengers exactly what we needed to know such as expected turbulence, estimated time in his experience as opposed to the 5hr 45mins we were told. It was all quite efficient. We’ve gained a further 3 hours on Californian time and are now in HST (Hawaiian Standard Time) which is a whopping 11 hours behind UK time, hard to imagine our day starting when most people’s are ending.
Arriving at Keahole Airport in Kona was like nothing else. It’s a complete mix of bright tropical fruit and flowers nestled in with black volcanic rock left over from the lava that spewed across the entire island. We debarked on the tarmac and walked into what felt like a very casual outdoor set of sheds, it actually quite reminded me of the wooden buildings often found at a centre parks. After collecting our bag, we headed across the road to get the shuttle round to Alamo to pick up our car. We hadn’t intentionally choose Alamo again (though we would have), we went with a local company on the island. The company could provide us with a great deal and guarantee the suitable car we wished for, but they happen to get these car from the bigger companies. As we went to the lot to pick up our car were were assisted by a native man, we immediately noticed that he was very chilled out and calm, something that we hadn’t seen for a while with the bustling atmosphere of LA.
The car that had been brought over for us had a bit of a problem and we couldn’t open the passenger’s side door from the outside at all. Unprepared to go six days like this we hoped that we wouldn’t have to make too much of a fuss. The native man came over and tried to help solve the problem and when all failed told us to upgrade ourselves free of charge. He looked after the bags, which we’d already thrown in the back of the current car whilst we went around the lot to grab another. We choose basically the same car the we’d been given but a different colour and the slightly larger 4door as opposed to the 2door version. We were ready to roll and anxious to find out of our dear old SatNav that we’d bought way back in Walmart in New Jersey had any of the Hawaiian maps! Quite a gamble that luckily paid off and we were in business!
So off in yet another new car experience for Ben to drive, we carefully selected this vehicle as the terrain around the highest point on the island requires a 4×4. We also plan to go to the national park to visit the live volcano and drive around the island a bit, so we choose a car commonly used here for this purpose the Jeep Wrangler!
It’s quite an overcast day today, but that doesn’t mean it’s cold by any means! The weather is a nice non sun burny 25c (77f) my perfect temperature. After a short drive packed with unbelievable sights and terrifying turns we made it to our home for the next five nights: The Dragonfly Ranch, our room is aptly named ‘The Writers Studio’, I have so much to catch up on 😉 . The ranch is on a road called Puuhonua Ohonaunau, quite a mouthful and not something I can spell without assistance, one too many vowels for my liking, however hearing our SatNav woman say it was hilarious! It will be awkward for us to try to pronounce this to locals so we are hoping that doesn’t happen!
Unfortunately as we arrived the owner was rushing off to catch a plane so we didn’t quite get the welcome we had hoped for. Most of the other guest were out so it was very quiet and empty here. Checking in and heading to our ‘apartment’ was a bit shocking and a lot to take in, we had read that they aim to bring nature to you but it still didn’t sink in at that time that there is no TV, no doors to speak of, a ‘window’ that whilst it provides a spectacular view is just a framed gap with a mosquito net secured, the ‘door’ and attached porch area is much the same, and the most different of all is the shower. The shower is outside nestled in some rocks, it’s screened off for privacy and has the required mosquito netting.
We felt rather overwhelmed with our choice of accommodation, whilst in some ways it’s definitely going to be an experience, neither of us have had enough sleep to find it amusing. We headed out to get some food, along the road was a little native owned cafe called Super J’s, apparently the locals favourite place to eat. We walked in not entirely sure what to expect and we were greeted extremely well! After a lacklustre greeting at our accommodation, the people here really made us feel welcome and really brightened our day and our experience of the island so far. I would go as far as saying it was the best part of the day. We went on to try the local cuisine Laulau chicken, which consists of chicken wrapped in lanei leaf and steamed for 10 hours, accompanied by rice, potato-pasta salad and Lomi (Hawaiian salsa). It was delicious or ‘ono’ as they say here! The chicken here is proper chicken (well they do roam freely all around the island), not like the rubbery excuse for chicken served on most of the mainland US, which doesn’t have a patch on English chicken (sooo craving a roast dinner right now)!
We decided after our ono meal that we’d pop to some of the local shops to get some supplies, on a visit to one small shop we realised that they sold homemade chili and cornbread, after being given a sample we couldn’t resist buying some for dinner later. We made it back to our ranch and got ourselves re-acquainted with our room. We decided after a long warm day of travelling to try out the shower. It was quite dark by this time and I was completely feeling wimpy about the prospect, even though I had suggested it in the first place, so much so Ben went in first to check for bugs as we currently have a little bright green lizard for a house guest, I wanted to make sure he wasn’t having a sleepover with friends! After checking it was OK as best we could in the little light we had we got things underway. During our tropical shower a little frog popped in to say “hi” and sat on the bamboo that screened us off from the outside world, we were much closer to nature than we had bargained for! I was OK with the frog as he was stationary and small but coming out of the shower I was in for the shock of my life! On the outside of our screen was a beast of a spider! I was completely horrified and thankful it was outside! We had been warned Hawaii is home to large but harmless spiders, but crikey.
After this rather unnerving experience we were both a little jumpy, I made us a nice cup of tea and got in bed. I never even got to have a sip of my tea or eat the dinner we bought earlier, I was so tired I nodded off to the sounds of the birds chirping leaving Ben to guard us from the spiders and anything else that fancied paying us a visit!
