This Time Last Year. . .

 Back in September 2024, DH and I took a vacation to Hawaii, a place we'd both been wanting to go for quite a while.  We did it in two parts: first, the Big Island, and second, Oahu--Honolulu specifically.  When we landed at the Kona airport the first night, we had no idea just how polar opposite those two parts of our Hawaiian vacation would be.

I should note that we did not plan to do most of the things that tourists think of when they think about going on a Hawaiian vacation:

• no luaus.  Partly because we didn't want a 'canned' cultural experience, and partly because for the cost of the luau (including meal) and my picky-eating combined with the things my body doesn't handle well (soy, pork in certain forms, additives, sea food/fish) neither of us felt that I'd get enough to eat in a balanced fashion.  So, rather than a big waste of food dollars and maybe me having diabetic issues or gut issues or a migraine later, we skipped the available luau experiences.
• no tour groups, including whale watching excursions on boats.
• no snorkeling (partly because I'm not a very coordinated swimmer and swimming excursions aren't big desires for me, but mostly because I broke my foot shortly before leaving on our trip and there was no way I was going to be able to wear flippers).

What we did was mostly geared towards our personal preference for self-guided and nature specific sightseeing.  Plus, we tried to 'eat local' although that ended up being challenging since I can't do anything fish or seafood (so much seafood and fish everywhere) plus I'm not a big fan of Asian (soy, vinegar, hot spices) and there was an unexpectedly (for us) prevalent Asian influence to the food at most eating establishments that weren't your chain fast food (also a no).

We flew from MI to Los Angeles, (long flight, but I managed my blood sugar well enough I didn't get sick), then from Los Angeles to Kona on the Big Island (also very long flight, and again pretty successful with the blood sugar regulation--had a really huge and really delicious Greek hummus wrap from a place in LAX during layover).  When we deplaned on the Big Island, it had just gotten dark, so we really didn't see anything on the drive from there to our hotel on the first night.  Waking up in the morning was somewhat like being a kid waking up on Christmas--the delights that awaited us right outside our room!

That room happened to be on the lagoon side of the hotel, and in the lagoon there were dolphins swimming!  From our balcony we could watch them, and even from our bed we could hear them! (Confession: we had the sliding door to the balcony open to let in the breeze and be able to not use the AC system--AC fan noises and blasts of cold air make it hard for me to sleep when traveling.) 

It was kind of wild to wake up in the night thinking I heard deer snorting in the back yard at home only to realize I wasn't home, that it wasn't deer, it actually was dolphins blowing.   Definitely not a sound you normally hear in Michigan!

For breakfast, we sprang for the hotel buffet, and boy, I was so glad we did!  The food was fresh and delicious and I could mix and match offerings to make sure I met my macronutrient requirements plus enjoy what I was eating!  Not only was the food some of the best we had the entire trip, the walk to and from the buffet area was gorgeous.  

We saw all kinds of tropical fish (which didn't take very good pictures), as well as some spotted rays, an eel and a green sea turtle in the lagoon while crossing the bridge that went over to the eating area.  Bonus was the statue of a hippocampus.  A horse-fish.  How could I not love it?!?

After breakfast, we checked out of that hotel, as we'd only booked the first night there (paying with hotel points--frugal!) so we wouldn't use up one of the four nights in our vacation package on the Big Island by sleeping off our long flight.  Leaving the hotel, we did some exploratory driving around to get a feel for the lay of the land.  What we found was mostly rural (HOORAY) and a huge variation in climate.  I think we actually ended up driving about half the island that day before heading to the resort we would be staying at for the next four nights.

Fun facts we learned:

• there are feral goats everywhere.  So many goats.  In fact, you can buy one hunting tag per day year round for goats they are so prevalent.  

Goat in the median at the entrance to the resort.

• There are also feral chickens in a lot of places.  

Chicken at the shopping center we went to for groceries.

• Likewise, mongoose were abundant too, although most of my attempts at getting a picture of one were blurry.  (Teaser, there will be a decent picture in Part 2 of our vacation).
• In addition to goats and chickens, there were also many feral sheep (Mouflon type with big thick curly horns) and feral cats.
• Many, many places had open air dining.  It was a big change from what we're used to in Michigan (where some, but not the majority of, restaurants have outdoor seating).  And part of that open air dining that nobody seemed to blink at were the birds.  Flying through, hopping on the floor, sometimes even on the tables and chairs themselves.  I have to confess that I often got distracted by the birds, especially trying to identify species I hadn't seen before.  Hence few pictures of food and many pictures of birds.

English sparrow who took DH's seat at breakfast when he went to the buffet for seconds.

Zebra dove at lunch by the waterfront in Kailua-Kona

Two big shout-outs on food from this portion of the trip:

1. The Tsunami Blue smash burger at the Big Kahuna Beach Grill.  I am not a burger person (unless they are grilled at home) and 99.999% of the time I eat out I do not order a burger.  That said, the menu's description of this burger sounded so delicious I decided to go waaaayyyy out on a limb and order a burger.  I was so very glad I did.  Without a doubt, this was the best burger I've had in my entire 50+ years of life.  Even better than venison burgers I make at home.
   
   
   
2. Hamakua  Macadamia Nut Company's Butter Rum Glazed Macadamia nuts.  YUM!  Found these on our first grocery store run and bought them as a vacation treat.  They were so delicious that after we got home I wished I'd bought a whole bunch more to bring back to Michigan.  I ended up looking them up online in November, happened upon a Black Friday sale, and ordered several bags for myself as well as smaller cans to give to the kids as Christmas gifts.

 If you've read this far, you're probably wondering what, other than going to the grocery store and also out to eat a few times, did DH and I actually do while we were vacationing on the Big Island.

We went to Volcanoes National Park.  Where I saw more birds I'd never encountered before, such as Kalij pheasants.  Like the chickens, goats, and sheep, these pheasants were long ago (hundreds of years) brought to Hawaii by voyagers and left to populate in the wild as a food source for return trips to the islands.

While at Volcanoes we viewed the Kilauea Caldera, which had quite a bit of steam activity while we were there.  The island was under an Orange Alert for eruptive activity, which apparently meant there was lots of steam.  DH had hoped to actually see magma/lava coming out, but that didn't happen while we were there (it did a few months later and is still happening).  One thing the eruptive activity did was mess up the Chain of Craters Road, making big fissures in it and closing the road the day before we were there.  That was another thing DH had hoped to see, and he was quite bummed out the the road was not open for us to drive.

We had hoped to do quite a bit of hiking while at the national park, but, due to an oversight, my hiking boots got left in the room at the resort instead of being packed into our rental Jeep, and I was only wearing (comfy for the hour+ car ride) sandals.  Which, being that my foot was less that a week into the healing process after being broken, were not supportive enough footwear for hiking.  So we mainly walked from the parking areas to the scenic viewing platforms.

The one 'hike' we did do at Volcanoes was to and through the Nahuku-Thurston lava tube, which was extremely cool (as in interest level, not as in temperature).

Entering the lava tube.

We did drive as far as you can up Mauna Loa, and contemplated attempting to hike to the summit, but, again, my broken foot--and left-behind hiking boots--was a damper on that idea.  So we took some pictures from the overlook at the trail head, and marked that hike as a 'next time' item.

View from Mauna Loa overlook.

While on the Big Island we couldn't very well drive up Mauna Loa without also driving up Mauna Kea.  The plan had been for us to drive all the way to the summit.  However, that got altered when, shortly after leaving our mandatory 30 minute acclimation time in the Visitor's Center (at 9,200 feet), my gut decided that whatever I had eaten that morning was not going to play nice with my digestive system (I suspect I got soy protein in something, as that is a major irritant for my intestines) and we had to turn around and return to the Visitor's Center and it's restrooms.  I ended up sending DH to the summit without me, and I sat at a picnic table at the visitor's center (very near the restroom just in case) and read a book while he continued all the way to the nearly 14,000 ft peak.  Having come equipped with hiking boots that day, it was a bummer that my gut wouldn't comply.

View from the visitor's center, above the cloud deck.

Also driving-rather-than-hiking scenery included lava flows

and distant viewing of Waipi'o Valley.

Back at the resort, we spent time at the end of the day relaxing on our lanai, being visited by the (begging, unsuccessfully as I don't feed wildlife people food) Nene geese.  

There were also lot of myna birds, which I thought looked like pissed off robins.

Why so angry, bird?

Early in the mornings, I enjoyed sitting on the lanai with my new friend the gold dust day gecko who basked in the sun.

We did get to do a bit of hiking, most of which we did at Kiholo Bay, after a local tipped us off that it was a good spot to see green sea turtles.

Before we saw the seat turtles, though, DH almost walked into a sleeping monk seal.  We'd come around a bend and were paying close attention to the loose, rocky footing when he looked up and saw the seal only about six feet away.  We backed up and took a wide berth around it, then continued on to the bay.

Once we saw the turtles, which was difficult at first, because they were in the water and not on or close to shore where they'd be much easier to pick out, we kept spotting more and more and more turtles!  Most of them were feeding, and so you'd see a back foot, or the side of a shell as they were diving and or turning to dive, rather than heads and big rounded backs.

There were also a few lava tubes that were filled with water .  Now illegal to go in, one native lady who was there with her husband and small child at the time we were walking back, said that when she was a small child it was a local ritual to bathe in the particular one in the photo below.

The last night we were on the Big Island, we tried to get a view of the sunset.  We found a not too crowded spot on a beach to sit and waited for the sun to lower into the ocean.  Unfortunately that spot turned out the be the area that the sunset cruises went to drop anchor, so by the time there was actually sunset-like colors it was impossible to get a photo without a boat in it.  

Still, it was nice to sit in Hawaii and watch the sun go down after a relaxing day.

The next day, we had an early afternoon flight from Kona to Honolulu.  Before checking out of our resort, we took another swim in the gorgeous multi-layered pool.  I could wade, but I couldn't really kick to swim, so in the deep parts, DH gave me a piggyback ride around to get to the waterslide, or another, shallower, attached pool where I could again touch bottom and breathe air at the same time.

Then, before heading to the airport for our flight to Oahu,  we did a little hiking at Petroglyph Park to see some ancient drawings.  During the first half of the hike, there would be an etching on a rock here, and another one there, or a cluster of three or four on rocks in another spot down the trail.  There was also a confusing section where the trail wasn't clearly marked and after several false starts that we figured out weren't the right trail, we almost just turned around and went back the way we'd come instead of continuing on to the end of the trail.

But, we persisted, found the correct path, and were very glad we did when we came upon a huge area that had an uncountable number of petroglyphs right there on the ground.  It was like looking at a giant newspaper, there was so much 'writing'.

Just one small part of the petroglyph rock.

After that it was time to head for the airport and board our flight to Oahu.  Little factoid: while bending over and sliding sideways to get into our seats on that small puddle-jumper type plane, DH accidentally stepped down right onto my broken foot.  So that is how part two of our Hawaiian vacation started: with my foot very sore again!