Wednesday

On Wednesday we drove north toward the Kohala Coast and the town Waimea.

We stopped at a beautiful beach along the way called Hupana. The Travel Channel rated this beach in its top 10 beaches in the world (according to the people here in Hawaii). The beach was beautiful…white soft sand and beautiful clear blue water. I could have stayed on that beach for hours with a book…It was sunny and beautiful.

As we continued north a ways, we ran out of road. The road just ended without warning.

We parked and got out to see incredible cliffs, gorgeous blue water surrounded by what looked like a rain forrest. This place was amazing.

We were again not prepared to hike, but Mike went anyway.  We stayed at the top of the cliffs and enjoyed the breathtaking views from there. Mike reported back that the views from the bottom were even more incredible.

While the three of us waited at the top, we met a family visiting from Nottingham, England. They really traveled quite a distance to experience Hawaii. 5-6 hours in the car from Nottingham to London/Heathrow. The next day they took an 11 hour flight from London to Los Angeles. The next day they took a 5 hour flight from Los Angeles to Oahu…and then a 45-50 minute flight from Oahu to the Big Island. And I thought our one flight was long…yikes!

We left Nopolulu Trail and drove to Waimea. On our way, we were able to stop and take in the amazing views. We were far away from the beach…and high up in a mountain, but we could still see the Pacific. It was so pretty…the vegetation is so cool and all the green is amazing. There are black lava fields all over the island. It’s very cool.

Waimea is “Cowboy Country”. It is where the island’s cattle are raised before they are sent to the mainland to be fattened and butchered. We asked a few people where we should eat, and those few people all told us to eat at a little Italian place in town called Solimenes. The food was yummy…it was a good choice. 

Anthony even used his bread to "mop" his plate.  This is something that he NEVER does.  When I do it he always has to comment about how unnecessary it is.

Funny enough, Waimea was windy and cold. It reminded me of Flagstaff. It was very strange to be that cold in Hawaii, but this island experiences almost every climate on earth…in fact the only two climates the island doesn’t have are arctic and sub-arctic. The peak of Mauna Kea even gets snow in the winter. That would be cool to see.

By the time we made it back to the condo, we were all exhausted. It’s sad to me that I just want to sleep on vacation. Especially this vacation. We have been going, going, going…we’ll need a vacation from this vacation. There is so much to see and do on this island. I had read over and over again how much larger this island is compared to the others, but I didn’t understand it until we were here.