Saturday, November 24, 2007

Okay, Part Two. After our JJE dive, we stopped at Kona Bros at the International Marketplace (now that I've had Kona Mountain coffee, Kona Bros seemed inferior), then had lunch at Coffee Shack and stopped at the South Kona Fruit Stand to load up on fruit for the last time and say our goodbyes to Beth. She gave us a huge discount on the fruit and apologized for the busy-ness last time, saying she felt terrible for asking us if we'd wait to be rung up while she went in the back to catch up on the huge smoothie backlog, but she felt like we were more like friends at this point, not just regular customers, and we were the only ones she could ask. Of course we told her we understood and didn't mind at all, and that we just thought it was great she had so much business. I also told her all about finding mangosteens at the farmers' market, and she was super-curious about what they're like. I still can't believe she's never eaten mangosteen and I have!

On the way back from Kona, we decided to continue the Kona Coffee Comparison while Kona Bros was fresh in my mind, and stopped at the Kona Coffee & Tea Co., the Kailua Candy Factory, and Kona Mountain Coffee just to try them all in close proximity and confirm they're my favorites. I would award the best-of-the-best Kona coffees a Crown-of-Thorns. (Because I can't think of anything better than a Crown-of-Thorns.)

Cornwell is only served at the Kohala Coffee Mill, aka the Kope Store, aka Tropical Dreams Ice Cream Parlor in Hawi, so I couldn't include it in the marathon tour (too far away), but I already knew it rated a COT, and named Cornwell Premium Estate House Roast as the first coffee on my list.

At the Kona Coffee & Tea Co., my notes were "very good; interesting flavor on tongue; sharper/beany taste; not bitter, but tiny element of bitter." It was because of this slight bitterness that I was unsure of its COT status at first, but at the end of the day I decided that Kona Coffee & Tea Co. Private Reserve dark roast definitely deserves a . KC&TC is the most interesting and complex of my favorites, and although it's not as drinkable as some, it's a coffee to savor. Also, Dean says their chai is premium and is a chai!

Next we stopped at Kailua Candy Factory, whose dark roast was not nearly as strong or intense as KC&TC's, but, as I remembered, it was veeeeery smooth. It's an excellent drinking coffee. I told the owner, Cathy (who grows it herself) about my competition and that I was considering awarding her coffee a Crown-of-Thorns. After finishing the cup I decided it was indeed worthy--good if you're in the mood for a mild (but still flavorful), relaxing cup--so Robin & Cathy's Estate Grown gets a . Cathy was very pleased to hear this. She has never entered the Gevalia Kona Coffee Cupping Contest because they require that you provide ten zillion (I forget how much, but it's LOTS) pounds of free coffee for the tasting competition. Their estate is so small, entering would be ridiculous! But I'm here to tell you that Robin & Cathy's Estate deserves a Crown-of-Thorns. We bought a bag of medium roast to bring back to the Gs, although I myself tried the dark roast, of course.

Our last stop was Kona Mountain Coffee, which has free samples, so I didn't have to drink an entire additional cup of coffee. Good thing, because I was getting wired at this point. It's the price you pay for a thorough mission! Kona Mountain Coffee Premium Estate Grown coffee remains my overall favorite (I think) and I had no trouble awarding their dark roast a . I also bought a KMC t-shirt. :-)

[Edit: In addition to these four Crown-of-Thorns Coffee Estates, I bought a bag of Fike Farms (rated best according to the Hawaii Revealed guidebook) at the Hawi place to bring my G at Christmas. I got some for Mary last year and she said it was the smoothest ever, but I don't know anywhere that you can actually sample a brewed cup, so I just had to take her word for it. However, the day after Christmas I asked my Gs to brew some up so I could try it myself, and I agree that Fike Farms Extra Fancy dark roast can join the pantheon. (My Gs thought it was way too strong because they are coffee wimps and only like medium roast, even though dark roast has much better flavor!!)]

Posted at 11:22:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Two main big activities today: 1) Our Jeff Jones Experience 2-tank boat dive (had to get up at 6 AM!!) and 2) Our Crown-of-Thorns Best-of-the-Best Kona Coffee Competition.

Our first dive was at Suck 'em Up, and Dean forgot his camera on the boat, so we have NO photos, but that's okay since he was able to experience things directly more, without his nose behind a camera. Plus, Jeff kind of kept us kicking, so there weren't very many opportunities to take photos without getting left behind. There were four other divers besides us, so we didn't have Jeff practically all to ourselves like last time, but it wasn't a bad size either.

The only thing we saw that might've made a good photo was a whitetip reef shark who was blocking the entry to a swim-through that Jeff wanted to take us through. The shark was about 7 or 8 feet long and we got to watch it really close up for quite a while (I thought Jeff was a little nuts taking us that close, but I assumed he knew the shark and knew what he was doing...) It swam/paced back and forth a lot, but finally moved away and we all swam through. Later, back on the boat, the Bottom Time girl was talking about how it was displaying threat postures (arching its back and stuff like that). ?! I don't know anything about sharks, so I didn't recognise them and wasn't scared or anything. (Maybe I should have been.) I think I would have felt a little cornered if I'd been the shark.

While we were swimming, Jeff noticed my dive slate and pointed at it, asking to use it, and wrote "Light?" I directed him to Dean, who he showed the slate to and borrowed his flashlight. He also used my slate to communicate with the other divers when he was trying to show us a certain fish and no one had any clue what he was gesturing towards/about. I wrote, "Fish??" and he answered, "dragon wrass[e] turning to rock mover." They're different stages of the same fish, which look very different from one another, and the fish was at a weird in-between stage. I understood immediately, but I don't think anyone else did.

I also showed Jeff a medium-sized polka-dotted moray eel by using the eel hand symbol, and he immediately understood and spotted where I was pointing, and teased it and got it to swim out. It free-swam all eelishly, which was very cool to watch. It's neat being able to communicate with other divers underwater without talking.

My favorite part of Suck 'em Up was the suck 'em up. It felt really cool to swim through it!

Dive #2 = Koloko Canyons. I found a nice little heart urchin shell and gave it to Dean to hold while I petted a crown-of-thorns, and he accidentally smashed it (not hard to do). Then I found another (larger) one and handed it to him to show him, and he immediately squeezed it too hard and smashed it, then looked all abashed. It was super-cute and I was cracking up so much that my mask flooded. Jeff, who was swimming on ahead and never looking back, didn't even notice me playing with the crown (despite many promises from him about how how he could almost guarantee me COTs on this dive) (he also told the others I was named "Miss Echinoderm Queen of Kansas" or something like that, in the van on the way) but the Bottom Time girl saw and was grinning like mad, thinking it was cool/crazy.

Jeff also showed us orange/golden cup coral that was growing on the ceiling of a cave (one piece had fallen off). I asked him "What is it?" and he answered on my slate. Jeff makes Gs like sixes! Later when I erased my dive slate, I left that one part of the notes, and I was able to reuse it on our next dive when I found (tons better) orange/golden cup coral on the ceiling of a cave at Puako!

The best part of the second dive, of course, was my Crown-of-Thorns "show" (as Dean called it). I found another crown when the others in our group were actually around, swam right up to it, and proceeded to coax it up, very carefully working my hand underneath an arm until it willingly let go with its feet and relaxed, allowing me to lift it and turn it over to reveal the beautiful underside, teeming with big yellow tube feet radiating out around the spiny mouth in the center. Jeff pointed to the mouth and touched some of the feet, showing the young teenaged boy in the group. I then lifted my hand, raising the COT so that it was hanging off my glove with its feet, underside facing the others, who had all gathered around to see. Dean said later that my "show" was "very professional!" and that everyone was all crowded around watching in amazement. I didn't really notice the other people or their reactions because I was concentrating on the crown, paying very close attention to handling it carefully.

I also played with a long-spined uni before ascending for our safety stop, and got a couple of spines stuck in my finger. (Six in my glove, but only 2 penetrated the finger.) I could feel it at the time, but it didn't hurt afterward when I pulled them out, even though I have little dark purple splinter bits embedded in right pinky. That uni was irresistible. I asked Jeff if he saw me playing with it and he laughed and said yes. He asked me if I got stuck, and I laughed and said yes. :-) On both of the dives, Dean and I stayed down with Jeff longer than any of the other divers because they all ran out of air ages before we did. That was cool. On the boat afterwards, Jeff kept making comments about how I hardly use any air (?!).

I liked my hood! I wasn't cold, not even on the second dive!

I'll write about the Crown-of-Thorns Best-of-the-Best Kona Coffee Competition in a second post, because this is getting too long!

Posted at 11:21:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Yesterday (Friday) we checked out the Whale section of Puako (so-called because the first time we went there snorkeling, I got completely beached on the rocks while entering and "whaled all around," getting all scraped up) but, true to its name, it looked way too rough (and it was also way too Blow-a!) so we decided it would be 1) foolish/unsafe and/or 2) not fun to dive there in those conditions, so we bailed. However, we "made lemons into lemonade" (Dean quote) and drove up to Sug (aka Mahukona) instead, wondering if all we had to say was sug. Answer: All you gotta say is Sug!!! Sug was great! It was an incredibly enjoyable dive, one of the very best of the trip. So slow and calm underwater, so easy to move through. I felt like I was weightless, completely neutrally buoyant and able to float effortlessly any way I wanted. I wrote on my dive slate (a note to myself) very soon after I got in, "I like Sug." And we were considering not even visiting Sug this trip!

The best best BEST part was my Crown-of-Thorns interaction. The Crown was totally relaxed, and I was able to coax it up, turn it over, handle it, hold it in my hand thorn side down and reveal the beautiful underside, suspend it solely by its big suctiony yellow feet hanging onto my hand, carefully pry loose the feet from one hand, get Dean to remove my right glove, and touch its underside with my bare hand and feel those best-feet-ever directly with my fingers, even feel it suctioning hold of my bare fingers. Then I even touched the thorns (not the tips, but the sides) with my bare fingers. Not one prick! The trick is to be really slow and relaxed and gentle and careful where (and mostly how) you touch it. And be aware that at any time you could be pricked, and accept that and be okay with it. (I've been pricked a couple times, a few years ago... I know what it's like.) It was totally wonderful. I LOVE crowns. Dean got some good photos; I will post some when I get a chance.

I also found what looked like an anemone (must look in book; we never see anemones in Hawaii!) and a super-tiny white baby dragon wrasse, only about an inch long, flitting and drifting all around like a feather, disappearing and appearing again. It was really fun to watch.

And I found a super cute little spotted moray eel that Dean photographed while I looked at it really close up from the other side. It kept looking over and me and making cute faces. Since the sea was so still, it was much easier than usual to look at/interact with creatures; we could just hover, and not get washed around or currented away.

After the dive, we drove to good old Hawi-town and visited the Kope store for a Tropical Dreams mac nut ice cream (best ever) and a Cornwell Kona coffee (also best ever). Cornwell is very similar to Kona Mountain Coffee, I think. Even Dean liked it! (I had him sample my cup and then it was hard to get it back! I was shocked. He doesn't even drink coffee.) We also bought stuff at As Hawi Turns for the first time ever (a skirt for me and a new Panama hat for Dean, which I kept teasing him by calling a Paniolo hat) (I think I am crazy about wrap skirts now). Persimmon, however, has gone downhill and now has hardly any cards, so I only spent about $5. there!

We picked up new tanks at Kohala Divers and I checked to see if there were any more size small t-shirts (for a kanban), since the one I bought there is my new fav. The store lady said they didn't have any more smalls because I was "the first person to fit in a small." Ak. (I guess I'm not surprised. I am pretty scrawny on top.) But I got a diving hat (aka a beanie) to keep my head warm! Even though I don't really want to wear a hat, I like it because it has cool silver gill-like markings on the back.

We had dinner two inches from Kohala Divers, at Cafe Pesto, and my Paradise Passion drink with li hing mui salt on the edge was the prettiest ever. It was all glowy golden orange with a translucent green lime slice (setting sun shining through), li hing mui pink edge, and matching sun-transparenced umbrella. It was equally as tasty, especially the li salt. (Last lick of li = CRY!) Dean got the Four Seasons pizza - the prosciutto and I got the Lokelani + bay shrimp. It was good! (And very pretty also.)

Posted at 11:18:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Thursday, November 22, 2007

Henry Weinhard's Root Beer = best root beer ever. AND I was craving it madly, AND they had it at Whalers' at 9:30 PM on Thanksgiving night, AND we bought two bottles solely using skim change scrounged from the car. The head is so huge and creamy, it's like an extra extra extra dry cappuccino with highly skilled barista-crafted microfoam.

For our traditional oceanside Thanksgiving picnic on the lava at A Bay, we had turkey sandwiches on croissants (Dean took off his turkey and replaced it with extra cheese and guacamole), taro & sweet potato chips (Kilauea Fire flav, which wasn't very spicy) with guacamole dip, a pumpkin scone and cranberry bliss bar (from Starbucks) and grapes ( = wine). There was a full moon and a soft breeze and we were the only ones on the whole beach. It was dark and peaceful and the waves swished and washed.

Speaking of great foam, we visited the Mauna Lani Starbucks this afternoon after our dive (had to, since we'd never been there, and it's a rule that we have to visit every SBUX on the Big Island at least once), and they made me the best foam I've had in months!! Actual microfoam. I was amazed. There was no one at the Shops at Mauna Lani. It was bizarre.

When we were driving up in Waikoloa (looking for food for our feast, but everything up there was closed), we saw a flock rafter of wild turkeys alongside the road, including a tom with his BIG tail spread out, looking just like a classic Thanksgiving turkey. I guess they were having a parade to celebrate not getting eaten. Either that or staging a protest march. Or something.

(This entire entry is very anti-linear; none of this stuff is chronological.)

Picked up tanks at Kohala Divers (nice 72s, so they're smaller and lighter!) and I got a second t-shirt with something written on it. (It says "Kohala Divers Hawaii" in small letters and has some hibiscus running around on it. And, it's mauvehound colored! I love it and I started wearing it immediately after the dive.) (Note: If only Big Island Divers had a good shirt, I would buy one in a flash. But the only women's soft lightweight type t-shirt they have has mantas on it, and I think mantas are zzzzz. They should get a Black Water Dive shirt with a moon and stars in the sky and jellyfish floating around underneath. It could even be glow-in-the-dark!)

We didn't see anything super-exciting diving at Puako, but I love Puako anyway. I like the entry and exit, which is a little bit challenging and whale-y, in a whirlpool of lava. Dean loves the caves. Caves are okay, but I don't like being in them for too long. When we were in that little one where the air collects on the ceiling, Dean wrote on my dive slate, "Listen to the waves Rumble."

There were a lot of nice unis at Puako, including a bunch of big black unis on sand, one of which I flipped over, and he used his spines to right himself back up immediately, with no trouble whatever! There were also an uncharacteristic amount of those really fine-spined little mauve colored urchins who look like me. I love LOVE them. Dean took a good photo of one, but I have to fix the color before I can post it, and I can't do that here. Under the coral rubble were zillions of legs, disappearing. (Brittles!)

My tank felt really light as we were surface-swimming out. I love 72s! They fit me much better. Oh, we also saw a cool eagle ray flying around (Dean spotted it, and free-dove down to look at it when we were doing our surface swim out before descending via scuba). It had an ultra-long tail--longer than the whole rest of its body!

It was super-windy when we got out. Evil wind NON-friend!! It really hasn't been too bad, though. Today was a very nice Thanksgiving. :-)

Posted at 10:03:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Visited my dear old friend Loli Longs yesterday. After a bit of searching and calling, I found Lols down in a crack between the lava in the wave-crashy area, with a friend. They both had their fancy fluffy tentacles out. It was great to see (and kiss) him again!

We scouted out Pine Trees afterwards, to see if we could figure out a feasible entry, because Pine Trees is right near where the dive boats moor for Pyramid Pinnacles. Pine Trees is a surfer spot (we'd never been there), and it was really cool and Jeepular, with tons of isolated coves and parking areas and roundy places to drive on the coral. There were lots of surfers catching waves. We decided on a potential good entry point where it didn't look too rough (and I found an L.L. variety sea cucumber there!), but it was too late to go diving by the time we'd secured our gear at Big for our second stretch of rental, so we'll have to try Pine another time. Pyramid Pinnacles is a great boat dive, so it would be really cool to be able to do it from shore.

On the way to Big, we stopped at Kona Mountain Coffee's huge new building on Queen K highway, and it IS the same as my old favorite-ever coffee that used to be up in Captain Cook (they sold the cafe to someone else a few years ago, and the new coffee wasn't good and I was sad)! Their new place is very fancy and not as cute and friendly as the old one, but the coffee's just as good! I slurped a fantastic smoooooooth dark roast and also procured a bag of beans as a gift. The best thing is, the new place is before the snail section of the highway! That is key.

At Big Island Divers, I fingered the deep sea jellyfish book trying to figure out what we saw on our dive (I took some notes, and I will write about that later) while Dean and the calm guy worked on getting our gear. No one could find my BCD, and then they figured out that the one and only Jr. size BCD was reserved for a dive on Friday! I tried on a women's XS to see if it would work, but it was huge on me. :-( We didn't know what to do! BUT, Big Island Divers came through!! The owner told the calm guy that they'd just have to get out a new one for me (!!), so they took it right off the sales floor and turned into a rental. The calm guy kept telling the owner what good customers we are, justifying it. (We are very loyal customers... we've been going there since our first visit to Hawaii, did our Open Water training with them, bought our Suunto dive computers there, and have bought tons of gear and gone on numerous dives with them.) Then the calm guy gave us an insanely good deal on the rental, and we don't even know why. Wow. Big took care of us!!

Since we didn't have time left for a dive, we snuck in another Fishaholic snorkel. The fish were playing hide and seek in the coral, and I wrote down some types that I didn't notice last time to check off in my book. I drew a picture of one on my slate because I didn't know the name. Had to erase my slate so I could use it the next day, so Dean rendered my drawing on the computer for me!

 _______
/ o <   \/ <- Pink
\__/____/\ (ASCII art by Dean)

Posted at 10:02:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Here's what we did yesterday after my weird bread product adventures:

1) Checked out Kua, which used to be an old favorite beach of ours, but we've been scared of it since they put in a paved road a few years ago. We figured it had turned into a giant parking lot, a la "Big Yellow Taxi." Well, we figured right, pretty much. Okay, it's not that bad. It's still a beautiful white beach with nice lava and trees and incredibly gorgeous turquoise water, but it's kind of spoiled now because there are people there. :-( It used to be a Long Hot Walk to get there with a reward at the end of an unbelievable beach all to yourself and now it's just too easy, so it's all covered with people body surfing and slabbing on beach towels. (By covered I don't mean truly covered... Kua doesn't even compare to a truly crowded beach, but we wouldn't step foot on a real crowded beach in the first place.) It's still a nice beach, but when you remember it the old way it's just too much of a bummer, so we scrammed and wrote it off our list. Farewell, Kua! It was nice to know you. :-( (Incidentally, the new Paved Road To Kua runs right by the Herb Whump. And I do mean right by. You're almost touching it as you drive past.)

The photo of me above (wearing my one-and-only t-shirt with something written on it, which I bought yesterday at the Kings') was taken at Kua. The other two are from where we went after Kua: good ol' always faithful Tree Beach, where it was nice and cool and shady and relaxing, totally the opposite of hot and glarey Kua. Actually they're from the fun lava tidepooly area to the left of the Tree Beach, where I explored while Dean feeted with a magazine.

Things I encountered on my 'splore: 1) An incredibly cute little eel (head only) between the cracks in a lava tidepool, 2) Two sea turtles (a big one and a little one) basking on the lava, encountered suddenly as I came up over a ridge while walking along (amusingly enough, I later watched two other groups of people walk right by them and not even notice them), 3) A pool of cleaner shrimp guys, black like the place where they live, who I got to go on my hand and clean my fingers, 4) A really speedy snail, who I took a movie of!! Dean deleted the movie because he thought it was too boring. A movie of a snail crawling... HOW could it be boring???! :-)

I also found a beautiful little pocket of sand among the lava flats, with a shady tree growing on it, and a nice empty beach beyond the lava. When I went back to Dean, I asked him, "Want to come with me to a really nice spot?" He agreed, and it turned out he thought it was a really nice spot, too! We lay together on the lava (it was surprisingly snuggly), enjoying this peaceful place, beyond the sight of any other people but so easy to get to if you only walk a bit over the lava.

I wanted to go in snorkeling real quick, so I suggested I could just go in by myself if Dean didn't want to (it was getting late, and cooler) while he watched. I geared up in my little kids' shorty suit that I used to wear, and jumped in off the rocky ledge, while Dean took ten thousand silly pictures. It was cold and super-cloudy (there are freshwater springs there) and I could barely see a thing! The viz was about one foot! It was really silly, but it felt so good just swimming all around, and I played like a fish, swimming back and forth, diving down in the shallows where you could see a little bit, near the bottom. I only stayed in for about ten minutes, but it was really fun. :-)

Afterwards, we TOTALLY turned around the Kua situation and found a whole new area by continuing past the lava and walking on the empty beach beyond. There was a nice deserted beach (not as sandy as some, but we like interesting beaches better than sandy ones) and, farther along, a nice shady tree-y area with picnic tables. There was NO ONE there. Zero! It even looked like it might be a good place to snorkel! And we discovered it was secretly insanely close to where we park the Jeep (tons closer than the actual Tree Beach is)! What the heck, this whole nice empty beach park that's super-easy to get to, and we never even knew about it! We kept trying to figure out why there was no one there, but there weren't any Dire Warning signs or anything like that; in fact, all the signs indicated it was a real park intended for public use. Bizarreness! We will be back.

Posted at 11:08:00 AM by Laura W. Petix.

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

I drove all the way to Waimea this morning. It was about 35 minutes each way, but I had my Guy so I couldn't get lost. I took the Waikoloa Village route on the way there, and the drive-past-Thiebaut's way back. The blue blue ocean way down below was so pretty. You can see so far on the Big Island.

Lava 105's new all-Christmas-all-the-time format was getting to be a bit much (I like Christmas music, but it's not really what I want to listen to when I'm on a tropical island, especially when it's not even Thanksgiving yet) so I found two alternatives. One of them is from Maui, but I can pick it up around here. I knew the first one was good when I tuned in and "Get Off of My Cloud" was playing.

I got some new stuff to try at the Waimea KTA, both of which I've been really curious about but hesitant to actually buy. The first was lavosh, which the grocery stores around here carry about ten different Hawaiian flavors of (Rainbow Falls Connection brand). It looks like a hard dry teeth-breaking bread/cracker thing, but why are there so many flavors unless it's good? I stared at it for many minutes trying to decide (as I have done many times before) but finally bought some later when I spotted a woman getting it and asked her if it's good. She said it really is, and recommended the likikoi butter flav (the only one she'd tried), so I played it safe and bought the same kind rather than taking a chance on the breadfruit variety. I haven't eaten it yet, so I'll report back on its appeal.

The second curious product (also breadular) that I bought are Punalu'u Bake Shop brand taro sweetbread rolls. The store carries a million different strange breads made by this company, including these super-stretchy loaves of fluffy bread that come in white (Traditional), bright pink (Guava), and purple (Taro). The sweet rolls come in the same colors/flavs. They totally intrigue me, so I always stare at them when I'm at the store with Dean, but he thinks they look horrible/scary. Since he wasn't with me today, I bought one! I got the mauve since they're the weirdest, and also since taro is a Hawaiian thing you should eat. (Plus I thought they might be good for Thanksgiving.) We couldn't resist trying them with dinner tonight, and they are delicious! Now Dean wants to try the pink kind, too. Why does Hawaii have all these unusually great bread products??

I also got some Love's bagels and Shrimp Snacks chips, but I knew they'd be good.

Okay, I just can't finish tonight. I'm too tired. But all I have left is Kua and the Tree, so that'll be quick tomorrow.

Posted at 11:36:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Okay, I'm going to get all caught up tonight (not including my night dive/Black Water Dive report), even though I'm tired and want to go to sleep. It's awful falling behind!

Monday I nosed around the Queens' and Kings' in the morning (the new Queens' Persimmon is totally inferior to the branch in Hawi! it only has clothes, not cool cards and stuff), and Dean and I stopped at the new Queens' Starbucks on our way to Iki. I was pretty impressed/surprised when they actually made me good foam!

Iki was nice: the famous Long Hot Walk Through Endless Fields of Lava (it took about an hour to walk to our spot), followed by slounging in the shade on the deserted black sand beach, followed by a too-short snorkeling in Brittle Heaven (we slounged too much and lost track of time). The snork session was really FUN, even if it was teasefully short--200 zillion brittles under every rock and in every crack, and tons of nice blue and banded unis, super close up (I teased one banded uni, and he ran away! I even saw his feet). I spotted this unusual looking tail in the crack between two lava rocks--long and thin, with mauvey purple (poi-colored) horizontal bands. We didn't know what it was at first (Dean thought it might be the arm of an octopus, but I thought the texture looked fishular), but I finally confirmed that it was an eel when I found its head sticking out a little bit on the other side. It had a cute little face with a pointed nose. A purple, horizontally striped eel! I think it was a Slendertail Moray. It felt GREAT to be snorkeling again, moving so freely through the water, and I was swimming all around just for the joy of it.

We had dinner at Merriman's (real Merriman's, not Market Cafe), and I tried the Rooster dark roast Kona coffee French press (I thought it was a little bitter/too strong; next time I should order the Cloud Forest coffee instead!). The best part of the meal, by far, was the unimaginable sweet corn. Get a side of corn!!! We had strawberries with crème fraîche for dessert, which was also completely wonderful.

Posted at 10:17:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Monday, November 19, 2007

Aaaagh, I'm getting so behind! Fortunately, Sunday was supposed to be a slack day, so we didn't do that much exciting stuff. Actually, we didn't get much slacking in--it was mostly errands and driving around--but there's not as much as usual to report about (I hope).

We went to breakfast at Pahu I`a, and their breakfasts are just as Pahu I`a-y as their dinners, with really interesting/unique Hawaiian and Asian influenced foods and tableware, along with impeccable service. (They even offer you reading materials, if you want to lounge around having a leisurely breakfast with a newspaper.) I wrote in my blog notebook, "Wow--the Pahu is living up to its own reputation." (They are our favourite dinner restaurant but we didn't know they had breakfasts as well!) Dean ordered crispy Belgian waffles with macadamia nut butter, and I got lemon-ricotta pancakes. We both had Asian pear/strawberry juice, which was very tasty. (Didn't see any mangosteen.) Afterward, we walked on the Four Seasons' beach a little, in the lava tidepooly area. It was really pretty. The water is so blue and the lava so black. Everything Sunday looked like a super-sharp perfectly equalized photo. But my friend the wind is here now, in Waiko-blowa. (It howled and howled last night when I was working on those ALB posts.)

We stopped off and scheduled our Jeff Jones Experience dive for Saturday, then hit another farmers' market (this one was in the KMart Plaza parking lot in Kona). It was pretty boring with mostly crafts rather than fruit, but we stocked up on strawberry papayas to use with our limes. On the way back from Kona, we took the high road (as opposed to the highway) and detoured to the Cloud Forest!

Weirdly, I was thinking about the cloud forest two seconds before Dean asked me about driving up to visit it. (The reason that's weird is that I had no idea that we were near it, or if it was even in that part of the island.) The cloud forest is nice. It was about 20 degrees cooler up there (65° vs. 85-ish), and all misty with clouds. We drove inside some, and I jumped out to take a movie of them drifting, hovering over the road. It's like flying Tango in IFR conditions, almost! There were pretty eucalyptus trees and also tons of blue hydrangeas (?!).

The non-cloud forest part of the drive was cool too, with great views of Mauna Kea on one side of us (there's no snow up there right now) and Kohala on the other. I like Kohala's dark trickley-downy looking chasms and kept trying to take a picture. We stopped at the Waikoloa Village Market to get groceries and ran into Jeff (!!), there picking up butter to make garlic bread! (He lives near there.) I forgot to tell him about seeing a decapitated chicken head eel, but we did tell him we're going to dive with him on Saturday. That's about it, I think. Then I stayed up way too late working on my catchup blog entries and fooling around making a custom Starbucks card. (GREAT concept!! I love it!)

Posted at 11:30:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.

Painter dude at Oxford Aviation to Dean over the phone: "Paul's been taking pictures like a madman."

Here are my favs: pre-prime (all stripped!) one, two, three, and four (cute!), and getting primed. Poor Tango! Quite the treatment!

Posted at 11:05:00 PM by Laura W. Petix.