February 10, 2017 – Hilo to Waikola Village
After two days in Hilo and wrestling with a shower that arbitrarily switched temperatures causing the victim to yelp and scramble out of the shower quickly, the group headed back to the sunny side of the island. (We know, we know anywhere we are is the sunny side of the island).
First stop – Star of the Sea Painted Church. Cultural Moment: The paintings tell the story of Father Damien Devester, a Belgian priest who helped leprosy patients on the island of Molokai and later died from the disease himself. The church used to be located in Kalapana, but after a lava flow came dangerously close to it in 1990, they church was moved. Note the “No Dogs Allowed” sign. They must have found out about the other church where the dogs hung out in the church.
They continued on to Richardson’s Ocean Center in Hilo. Cultural Moment: (Debbie is just going to make this up). People snorkel here and walk into the water to swim. They have bathrooms and people on tours so you need to run to the bathrooms before they beat you to the toilets. (Larry and Debbie so beat those 80 year olds). We also saw some turtles but not too close because they bite. (Debbie believes all signs.) The group picnicked here and watched a state worker on another picnic table sleep for an hour. (Debbie thinks that it was not a good use of the state’s money). After the state worker awakened, Debbie got some cool tips by watching 3 teenage girls take selfies for about 15 minutes. (Debbie says that it is a lot of work to pose for selfies).
After the turtles, lunch, sleeping and selfies, the next step was Pineapple Island. Well, actually not. Joyce told us that it was Pineapple Island but it is actually Coconut Island. (Debbie just discovered this tonight. Cultural Moment: Coconut Island, or Moku Ola is a small island in Hilo Bay, just offshore from Lili’uokalani Park and Gardens, in Hilo, off the island of Hawaii. It is a small park, and is connected to the main island via a footbridge. Legend tells that anyone who was sick or feeling ill would be healed by swimming around Moku Ola three times. In ancient times, Moku Ola was a pu’uhonua (place of refuge), where natives or warriors could ‘redeem’ themselves. It is a cool island and one could see fish or manta rays (Yes, Larry spotted them).
They left Hilo for the drive back. They passed the Botanical gardens which Debbie hears is very nice. If you remember, Les Cheap girls don’t like to spend money and couldn’t see paying $15.00 each for a garden tour. No, instead the group, walked straight down a trail (Note the word straight down implying one walks back up…) to travel along the botanical garden’s fence line to the beach. The gardens also had an employee sitting in the shade telling people they had to pay to go in. (Looks like a good retirement job to Debbie) As Larry and Debbie huffed back up the trail to exit, a lady asked how hard the trail was because her husband didn’t want to get out of the car. The husband looked younger than the Larry and Debie and he looked grumpy. Larry and Debbie told him that it was a great hike and he could run up and down with no problem. As they sped away, they saw him stomping off down the trail in their rear-view mirror. (He really couldn’t run up and down and will be doing some huffing.)
Next stop? Water Falls! Cultural Moment: Akaka Falls State Park has two beautiful waterfalls, the Kahuna and Akaka Falls, visitors can see, along with beautiful lush plants and trees. After the visit, everyone went to the town next to the waterfalls with lots of stores. Debbie seems to have lost all sense of cheapness in this town, she started looking at hand painted sarongs for $200. Larry had to help her put away the check book. The lady was working Debbie hard. She even tried to body block Larry when he said that he had found one cheaper in another store. (Larry got the stink eye that day). Debbie was able to walk away with only purchasing a bag of macadamia cookies.
Cultural Moment: A plaque at Laupahoehoe Point Park memorializes the 24 people killed in the April Fool’s Day 1946 tsunami. The giant waves rose to 56 feet above sea level sweeping away a schoolhouse on the point along with 21 school children. Tsunami alarms were installed along the coast to warn of impending tsunami waves.
The final stop was at Tex’s Drive in for malasadas. (Debbie has been talking about this for days). What is a malasada? Food Moment: A malasada is a Portuguese confection, made of egg-sized balls of yeast dough that are deep-fried in oil and coated with granulated sugar. (Debbie says don’t get anything else at Tex’s but Malasadas are mighty fine!)
Total drive time is approximately 90 minutes from the west side to the east. The group made it in 6 hours.
I bet those gardens were so cool, they probably had all of these rare orchids and pineapple …bushes…trees…and plumerias!