Heaven On Earth

Since I last wrote,  we discovered some additional treasures with our friends Ed & Jean Morken, including playing golf at the Big Island Country Club.  The course was one of the most interesting we've ever played.  There is a lot of water that comes into play, actually, there are nine holes over water.  The signature hole is a spectacular island green.  The course sits about 2500 feet above the Kona Coast.  The skies were overcast most of the day, making it a perfect day for golf, not too hot, it did sprinkle at times, but never turned into anything. 

There was an abundance of wildlife along the fairways.  I did a little research because the Hawaiian wildlife seemed strange to me. When I saw hundreds of little yellow birds, I thought of my Mom, her favorite song was always, "Yellow Bird."  I was leaning out of the cart every chance I got trying to snap one good shot of them before they would fly away.  Then there were the Hawaiian Geese, (Nene's) baby lambs and sheep, black goats and beautiful big turkeys strutting their colorful feathers.  There were times when we were hitting our ball with a turkey or sheep standing right there next to us.

There were a couple of very unique trees throughout, one being the Monkey Pod Tree, that looks a lot like a member of the Bonsai family and the Hong Kong Orchid.

We've visited a number of remarkable places over the past couple of days.  Hapuna Beach and Mauna Kea Beach are two of the few white sand beaches on the west coast of the Big Island. 

Hapuna Beach has been named the Number One beach in America by Conde Nast Traveler Magazine.  There's a park associated with Hapuna Beach, free to residents of Hawaii and $5 for visitors, and a picnic area, camping, restrooms and showers.  The beach has a smoothie bar, snack shack and nice restrooms for changing into your bathing suit.  There were a lot of people boogie boarding and body surfing.  The waves were big, as they have been throughout our whole trip.  It's located just between the Mauna Kea Resort and the Mauna Lani Resort on the Kohala coastline. 

There's a walking trail that runs behind Hapuna Beach along the cliffs and you can see the island of Maui on a clear day.  We stopped by Mauna Kea and viewed their fabulous golf course and took pictures of the private beach they have for residents.  Just for the fun of it, we checked to see what the nightly rate to stay there was,  and found out it was $450/night!  Yikes!  We won't be staying there anytime soon, however we did have a drink in their ocean front bar, The Copper Bar.  

We found a real hidden treasure along the way home that we wouldn't have found on our own.  Thanks to the Valet at the Mauna Kea, he suggested eating at the Pesto Café.  It's in the Kawaihae Shopping Center.  The menu features fresh local seafood, pizzas, salads and has an Asian flavor for pastas and risottos.  Jean and I had the Hebi fish on a salad.  Hebi is a spearfish and they describe it as a nutty, citrus and chicken-like.  It's firm and cooks up white.  

We've eaten a lot of fish on this trip, but still not having had our fill, stopped at the Hale I'A Da Fish House after lunch.  Our friends Rod and Sandy Kehl recommended this little hole in the wall, renowned for fresh fish.  Jean picked up some Monchong to cook for dinner the next night.   

The beautiful Kona Sheraton was another place we stopped and got in on some more great views.

We were finishing up our packing this morning when I looked at my phone to find an email from United Airlines.  It said our flight was going to be delayed and we wouldn't be leaving now until the following day.  So... sadly we are forced to spend another whole day in Paradise.  We are very grateful that Ed and Jean were staying an additional two nights, so our accommodations were not impacted.  Imagine the poor folks that had checked out of their hotel.

Oh well, you have to take what life throws at you.  Did I mention that United upgraded us to First Class for our inconvenience on our return flights to Las Vegas?

Kona By The Sea

Honest to God this is our view right outside our lanai. We are now staying at the Keauhou Surf and Racquet Club.  The Brown's left on Thursday for Honolulu and we are now sharing a two bedroom condo with the Morken's near Kona about 30 miles from Waikoloa.  I have to say I've never stayed anywhere that was this close to the water. We are loving it.

My blog got off to a late start as my computer evidently adopted the "Hang Loose" mode right off the bat.  But not to worry, I'll see if I can get caught up now. 

We played two rounds of golf, one on the Kings and the other on the Beach course.  Both courses share the same Club House at the Waikoloa Resort. They're both beautiful but the Beach was especially gorgeous with its signature hole, number 7. Surrounded by the water, it made for a pretty spectacular view. The course had a lot of sand and even more than sand, was a lot of the black lava throughout the fairways.  My ball found it all.  It was a tough couple of days of golf but luckily we had lunch and a cold drink to look forward to afterwards.

 

We stopped at "The Three Fat Pig's" restaurant for Happy Hour after our round of golf on the Beach Course.  Mai Tai's and Pina Colada's were the house specialty and they did not disappoint.

 
Dinner at a beach restaurant called Lava Lava was another highlight of our trip.  All dining was outside next to the water, the food was delicious with half our group having barbeque ribs and the other half fresh local fish.

 Lava Lava was a little on the pricey side but there was a father and son duo singing Leonard Cohen, Simon and Garfunkel and some Van Morrison, so with their beautiful voices, accompanied by the sound of the waves we all agreed it was worth it.  The waiters and waitresses were very friendly and welcoming and I would definitely recommend an evening at Lava Lava if you come to the Big Island. 

We spent one day driving down to Kealakekua Bay where we thought we would find the Captain Cook Monument.  After traveling miles of winding, narrow roads we arrived at a beautiful area that is a State Historical Park.  it's on the south side of the island closer to where our second condo is.  We never found the monument but did get some good pictures.   When we were looking at the pictures later, Jean pointed out that the Captain Cook Monument was visible in our photos across the bay.  Don't think we would have gotten there by car.

On the way back to the condo we stopped for lunch at Patz Pies and found the best pizza we've ever had, well, 2nd to Harris Pizza in Rock Island.  The sign you see below is what drew us in there, fun place with excellent pizza that went very well with a cold "Big Wave" local draft beer.  We weren't sure we wanted to try their "decent" wine!

Funny thing happened when we went Sam Choy's restaurant for a Chinese dinner.  The waiter brought us water, and delayed taking our drink order, which turned out to be a good thing.  We opened the menu to find $40 lamb and steak, etc., but nothing on the menu resembling a Chinese dish.  We were looking forward to something more like Kung Pao Chicken. 

We decided to go somewhere else that was more comfortable.  I'm sure the food would have been good, but we were in the mood for an atmosphere that was a little more casual. We ended up at The Tropics Ale House, an Irish Pub for fish tacos and a Guinness - much more appealing to our mind set for the evening. 

The fish here on the island is delicious, they use Ahi and Ono for fish tacos and also for their fish and chips. Another popular fish is Monchong, it's a white flacky mild deep sea fish and we had that a time or two.

Even with all the running around we've done we've spent a lot of time right here on this beautiful lanai, watching and listening to the waves. I'm finding it very meditative as I listen to the rhythm and at times actually feel the sea is speaking to only me. There seems to be a spirit out there, you can almost see it in one of the pictures below,  where the sun is glistening on the water, as the sun was coming down. Incredible vacation indeed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Captivated By Kona

Three AM wakeup call, but neither of us were complaining since our long awaited trip to Hawaii had finally arrived.  It's been quite a few years since we've been to Hawaii and usually we went to Maui. This time we are going to spend 10 days on the Big Island's Kona Coast with our friends Ed and Jean Morken and Dwight and Lillian Brown.  The flight to L.A. was a short 45 minute trip with a very bumpy landing.  At one moment we were looking out the window wondering how the pilot sees when he's going through all those clouds,  the next thing we knew the ground had come up to meet us.  We weren't the only ones who yelped, as most of the passengers thought like we did, that we were still well in the air going through clouds not landing in all that fog.

When you look at the pictures below you may wonder why I was already off the plane when we landed in Kona and able to take that photo of Denny coming off the plane, it's because First Class passengers exit first!  While we were in L.A. they called my name and told me that there was one seat left in First Class and it was mine if I wanted it.  I really didn't want to sit up there alone, but Denny insisted I take it and enjoy.  He had our friends to visit with so I decided to do it.

 

As it turned out, I'm thinking it was meant to be that they called my name instead of his because I sat next to a man from Hong Kong who was a sports photo journalist and had traveled all over the world.  We had a great conversation about all the countries and golf courses we both have played.  I told him about my travel blog.  He was very complimentary and encouraged me to start sending photos and articles into local newspapers.  I was very inspired by the time we landed in Kona.

We collected our luggage and got our rental car and immediately went to the restaurant a friend from home had recommended.  The restaurant was called "Bite Me."  He suggested we order whatever the "catch of the day" fish sandwich was and a Longboard beer.  It really was a great way to begin our trip, sitting there at the water, looking out at the boats and yachts, eating as he said it would be, a delicious Ahi sandwich and savoring a cold brew. 

Onward to the next "must" stop when you go to Hawaii with other couples and are staying in a condo - Costco.  We had to stock up on our breakfast food, coffee, bagels, cheerios and bananas, not to mention the wine and Pina Colada mix for our evening cocktail hour. Staying in that first night was a good idea in view of having gotten up early and the long travel day. 

The condo is beautiful - we have a two bedroom unit that we are sharing with Lil and Dwight.  Jean and Ed have a condo of their own in a nearby set of villas. The balcony is perfect and overlooks one of the golf courses. There are two championship courses on the Waikoloa resort, (The Kings and the Beach) and the concierge booked tee times for us on each.

The Big Island is very beautiful as is all of Hawaii.  Landing at the Kona airport gives you a not so gracious feeling of darkness, because of the mounds of black lava that remains since the eruption of the Kilauea Volcano from the 1800's, however the Waikoloa area where we're staying is full of sunshine and the weather has been perfect.  The few days we've been here have had temperatures in the low 80's and there always seems to be a slight breeze.  The landscape is gorgeous with plants that grow from everywhere, through brick walls and even through the rocks of lava throughout the island. The volcano continues to erupt today and is one of the main attractions for visitors to explore. It is more easily accessible from Hilo, on the other side of the island.

Our first full day was spent walking around the grounds of the magical Hilton Waikoloa Hotel, which is just down the road from our condo.  It's acres and acres of tropical gardens, lagoons, swimming pools and another area where you can swim with the Dolphins.  We probably won't be doing that but it is fun to watch the kids as they do.  There are a lot of "high-end" shops, artwork and a tram that takes you around the whole property.  There is a lovely flow of Polynesian and Asian culture throughout~ simply stunning statues and waterfalls.

That evening, we had our drink on the balcony before going to dinner and were entertained by a group of goats that came down off the hill onto the golf course and practically in our front yard, hanging out on the lava.  We ate at the Seafood Grill, which is about 15 minutes north of Waikoloa, watched a bright red sun drop into the ocean and called it an early night, resting up, gearing up for our first round of golf.