We started out our trip to Hawaii by flying from Ballina to Sydney then from Sydney to Honolulu then to Hawaii (Big Island) arriving before we left. We stayed the first 4 nights in a little place north of the airport up the coast at Kameula in a new tiny house - wonderful . The next day we drove up the coast to a Lapakahi Historical National park and saw the remains of an early Hawaiian fishing village. We drove on through Hawi town and hiked down a volcanic canyon to the Polulu Valley and the ocean. Very scenic.
The second day we drove across the island and visited the highlands of Hawaii and explored the high country a bit and visited the scenic Akaka Falls. The following day we visited a petroglyph reserve and saw ancient rock carvings, and then had our first swim and snorkel at Puako Beach. We also sampled malasadas, deep fried filled donuts fresh out of the fryer, yummy and fattening.
Thursday we drove across the island to visit the beautiful Hawaii Tropical Bioreserve and Gardens, north of Hilo on the west side of the island.
We continued on to to a little village called Volcano which was on the edge of the active volcanic areas in Hawaii. There were eruptions only 6 months ago but they ceased before we arrived. We hiked around the Kilauea Iki crater in Volcano National Park, down into the crater itself, and also walked through a lava tube which was formed during an earlier eruption. We did see some evidence of volcanic activity, which was steam and sulfur gas being released through cracks in the ground. The next day in the area we attended a lecture at the Kahuku area of Volcano National Park on the 'Ohi'a tree - a native Hawaiian tree that lives up to 1000 years and hence has cultural significance. We also took a short hike through this new National Park area, assumed from a large ranch where they are renaturalizing (word?) the land.
It was then time to move on to Bobbie's week long Swim Faster camp activity and moved into the main town called Kona. Here we planned to use the public transport (a free trolley bus that ran the length of the town) but found that it did not stick to its hourly schedule and was either a half an hour behind schedule or 15 minutes ahead of schedule and very difficult to meet unless you had a lot of patience. We broke down and rented a car so that we could get around Kona and visit the many beautiful snorkeling beaches and meet the swim camp schedule. This also allowed Bill to visit his friends Walter and Suzanne who he hadn't seen for almost 35 years.
The swim camp exceeded expectations, and Bill even managed to tag along to a couple of very nice ocean swimming and coral and fish viewing experiences.
It was then time to move on to Maui after a short one hour flight and spend some time with Bobbie's sister Naomi and her daughter Tash. This involved swimming and touring the sights of Maui.
This island is very much a tourist Island and we managed to go snorkeling in a different spot almost every day. The beaches were always quiet and calm in the morning but in the afternoon tended to cloud over and the chop and waves at the beaches quite rough.
Here we also managed to visit the volcanic highlands. Bobbie and Bill participated in an organized cycle down Haleakala Mountain. Needless to say, the bicycles had very good disc brakes but only one gear because you never had to pedal!
Another day we drove up above the clouds to the top of the volcano and did some hiking on the Volcano's slope. Swimming with turtles was another highlight on Maui.
Next, we move on to Kuwai Island continuing our visit with Naomi and Tash.
