Posts from — January 2013

Yes, that’s correct, today we attended Ukulele Lessons that were put on by the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center.

Now, I thought, how many people could possibly want to attend Ukulele lessons while on vacation in Hawaii. I’m thinking 8 to 10 people maybe 12 tops; so need to rush to get to the 10:00 a.m. lesson. Well thankfully Brenda was a little more realistic and we did arrive about a 1/2 hr  early……. well it was a good thing.

75 people signed in for today’s Ukulele Lesson. Most brought their own Ukulele which was a good thing because the instructor only has 24 Ukulele’s to loan out. In fact it would have been more attendees but they had to turn way about 10 people because they ran out of Ukulele’s.

As your name was called you went and picked up a Ukulele and a song/chord book.

The instructor was very good and the first part of the lesson was all about the 6 basic chords for the Ukulele and we practiced those for about a 1/2. Then we practiced different strumming of the chords.

Finally we put it all together and the entire 75 Ukulele players played a song about Diamondhead that they had been practicing for a while. Oh and the song was sung in Hawaiian so we went over the correct pronunciation of the words for the song as well. There were also 4 dancers that performed as the everyone played; they are also Ukulele players and attend a lot of the sessions……… it was a pretty neat experience.

The final song we learned and sang was Happy Birthday in English and Hawaiian 🙂 as there were a couple people celebrating their birthday’s today.

We definitely need more Ukulele practice but we had fun 😉

On Sunday we left Kona for Waikiki.

It was a little bitter sweet as we have really enjoyed our time in Kona. We actually enjoyed it more than we probably thought we would and we will definitely return to the Big island of Hawaii and the Kona area.

The Hawaiian Airlines flight was smooth and once we picked up our luggage we caught a Taxi cab to Waikiki. There are airport shuttles available that are a little cheaper, however trust us, spend the bit extra and take a cab.

On Monday after a morning walk and coffee we headed to The Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center for a free flower lei making class. The instructor was Naomi and she has been making flower leis since she was 4 1/2 years old; she is coming up to her seventieth birthday.

The shopping center pays her to put these classes on, she provides all the materials, the instruction and you end up with a flower lei. Tables are laid out, flowers and leaves are distributed and the class begins. There were about 20 participants of all ages and everyone received personal instruction.

In order to make the leis Naomi makes up cotton strings with needle like wires on the end and each person gets one of these. Then she demonstrates how to pierce the flower properly, add a bit of greenery and then finally transfer the flower from the needle to the cotton string. She was very exacting in her work and wanted to make sure we all knew how to make a proper flower lei.

We thought this class would take about 15 minutes to 1/2 an hour. Boy, were we wrong. By the time we were finished it was over 1 1/2 hrs and it was very informative about the culture, the tradition and the correct way to make a Hawaiian Flow Lei.

Attached are a few more pictures.

Us with Naomi and the finished products.

On Friday we had a bit of a laid back day, did a little sight seeing, shopping and going for a couple of long walks.

However, this morning we did one of those things that you check off on your life’s “bucket list” of things to do. After much discussion and debating the pro’s and con’s, on Thursday we decided what the heck…… let’s do it and we booked a 2 hour helicopter tour of the Big Island for Saturday.

It was amazing and as with a lot of spectacular sights, pictures don’t compare to being there. However, we have this once in a lifetime memory locked in our brains.

Paradise Helicopters was recommended by the Expedia Rep at our condo and we were certainly pleased with our tour. Our pilot was Koji and there is a picture  of us with him by the helicopter at the end.

The only bit of a” bummer” was that Brenda got seated in the middle seat in the back which makes it a little tough to see around those on the window seats. They seat the passengers based on weight distribution, so it is a bit of “luck of the draw” and size.

The weather this morning was about as good as you can expect. You will see some smoggy haze in the pictures and that is from Kilauea erupting.

After take off from Kona International Airport we headed towards the Kona Coffee area and between the volcanoes of Mauna Loa (13, 679 ft.) and Mauna Kea (13, 796 ft.). So, pretty quickly you go from a healthy vegetation growing area to miles of barren lava.

Along the way we passed over lines of steam vents that were either from recent rain water falling into the cracks and boiling on the lava that is deep below the surface or from lava that is directly under the surface.

Currently Kilauea is actually a volcano within a volcano and we were lucky that the weather cleared and we got to see the very active hot lava bubbling and spewing. Koji did a great job in getting both sides of the helicopter to see the active volcano activity. AMAZING !

Then we headed for the ocean and hoped to see lava flowing into the sea. On the way there you pass over an area that was wiped out by the last major eruption in 1983. What you see in this picture is a road through a subdivision that goes to nowhere.

Koji did explain that at times the winds are not favorable and although you know there is a lot of activity down below you can not actually see the lava flowing into the sea. Well we got lucky and could clearly see this happening. You will also see people standing on the solid lava near the ocean cliffs, they hiked in about a mile from a small town that still exists without any local services, etc.

After this we headed toward Hilo where they get +300″ of rain each year so it’s not too long before there is a lots of vegetation, etc.

From Hilo we flew to the Waipi’o Valley where there are waterfalls. Actaully we flew right into the valley and the top of the valley was way above the helicopter.

The average waterfall height is around 1200 ft. You’ll notice they cascade down to the valley floor in three of four falls and each time they create a pool. There is one waterfall that is over  2400 ft however, they have had a bit of a dry spell here so there is no water right now.

After this is we headed through the Waimea Valley and out to the ocean. We then did some spotting for Humpback Whales that are migrating through the area. We were lucky enough to see a Mother and her Baby Calf right beside her. From here it was back to the Kona Airport.

Wow! What a day and what a memory of a lifetime.

Today we had a bit of a quieter day. No real deadlines or activities that we had planned to get to. So, we headed south on one of the many roads and ended up at the Greenwell Coffee Plantation.

It is the oldest coffee plantation in the Kona area. As you could imagine they have a lot of coffees to taste and all classify as Kona Coffee. Which means they come from a very specific area of the Kona region and a very specific elevation of the Kona region. Anyway, the coffee is delicious, full of aroma and taste. If you are a coffee aficionado you either love or hate the taste of Kona Coffee.

Coffee beans grow on coffee bushes/trees, all are harvested by hand and it takes 7 pounds of harvested beans to get 1 pound of coffee beans for your grinder………… and there  is your free coffee lesson for the day. Believe us when we say it sounds like a lot of work.

The one neat thing about Greenwell Coffee Plantation is that they originally started out as a cattle ranch and fruit farm. However this was not profitable, so they switched over to growing only coffee. Therefore, there are a number of avocado trees, orange trees, papaya trees, tangelo trees, etc. on the property and the farm has no use for the fruit they bear. So, as the fruit ripens the staff picks it and places the fruit in large wicker baskets near the gift shop and if you are lucky enough to be there at the right time you can get some pretty sweet produce.

Just take a look at the size of the avocado we had for dinner tonight. That’s a full size dinner plate it’s sitting on and a packet of sugar to show you some comparison of size. Yummy!

After the coffee plantation we headed back to Kailua-Kona and even though we were not officially lost; like they had to send search and rescue for us. We did manage to find some pretty interesting scenery and a unique one lane route home through some pretty desolate volcano field.

More adventures tomorrow.

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Well, we are one year late, however we are finally Hawaii bound.

On Monday we drove to Vancouver and stayed overnight near the airport and this afternoon (Tuesday) we fly to Kona Hawaii for 5 nights before we head over to Honolulu for the remainder of our vacation.

Side Note: Is it legal to be on vacation or call it a vacation when you are retired 🙂 Brenda says I am semi-retired 😉

The drive down was beautiful. The valleys were overcast however once up top it was clear and sunny, even all the way through the Chilliwack valley. But, as we neared Vancouver it started to get foggier and when we finally arrived it was totally fogged in. But, you could hear the planes flying, so that’s the good news.

So, stay tuned for more adventures from Hawaii.

Aloha

Below are a few more pictures from Christmas 2012.

The first seven pictures are from our niece Tricia, who kindly stopped by to take some family Christmas pictures just before dinner. Thanks again Tricia……….. they are awesome.

The remainder are from Tamara and Kevin and also Jeff and Lindsay. It is so interesting that we all had our own cameras and came up with such a variety of great pictures.

Enjoy!