Honoka'a Ah

Unwilling to get all of our laboriously dried gear wet again, we pulled over to assess our options. One miraculous phone call later, it turned out that we had parked across the street from the only hotel on the entire island with remotely affordable rates. Hotel Honoka'a Club is run by a sweet little woman from Maui.  She left a movie theater during the previews to come back to the hotel to check us in. And instead of doing so perfunctorily and rushing back to her movie, she waited until we were completely settled to return. She informed us of the hotel's history, town happenings, where to get groceries and where to buy sundries. Only when she was satisfied that we knew all of the advantages and disadvantages of all of our options in Honoka'a did she return to the theater. Of the options she gave us, we chose the the sports bar in town. Reminiscent of the television-adorned beer saloons of the northeast, it felt familiar. Its offerings were more exotic -- delicious edamame and alcoholic root beer floats. However, I don't think she realized that all we really wanted that evening was a roof.

On Sunday morning, we awoke to cocks crowing. The sun rose unencumbered by clouds. After a communal island breakfast of tropical fruits and a lot of recommendations about where to go and what to do for the remainder of out trip, we slathered on sunscreen and drove west - in the sunshine.
The afternoon was vacation bliss. We checked out Piilanihale Heiau, walked along the beach and snorkeled with innumberable fish. Consulting my guidebook later that evening, I identified LOTS of fish- cornetfish, angelfish, wrasses, parrot fish and even a snowflake eel. 

We were all loving the island life when we drove on to Kona airport with the wind blowing through our hair and our wet swimsuits flapping themselves dry out of the car's windows. We were confident that 15 minutes away on Maui the sun would still be shining like it was here on the Big Island.

And it was.

The sun shined as we island hopped to Maui. It shined as we drove to Lahaina and as we ate burgers and ice cream pie at Kimos on the waterfront. The sun shined as the wind rose.By the time we checked into the Westin at Ka'anapali the sun was still shining - though setting and the wind was really blowing. It blew almost as loud as the massive air conditioning unit outside of our hotel room.