Kohala Coast

Ahh. We are ending our trip in resort country. I’m hoping that finalizes our relaxation process. I don’t know if we will even leave the resort to be honest, but there are a few things around here to do if we feel up to it. Our hotel is actually located near a ancient fish ponds (read: birds) and a petroglyph field and there are free tours of it daily at 10:30, but we may be able to see this on our own schedule. Though we will be staying on a great beach for snorkeling etc, word is that Hapuna beach just up the way is the best beach on the island (and has been named by magazines as the best beach in the world), so we may want to drive up there for some of our fun in the surf. Doug said it has nice waves and to go early. I’ve also heard that it is really fun to visit all the resorts and see the grounds. The nearby Hilton has quite a lot of art and other cool stuff to see on the property. There’s a luau. Hmm. Honestly though, I am thinking of just camping at the resort beach these last precious few hours in Hawaii. Kiholo Bay is recommended for snorkeling. A water tour group is based at our hotel, so it won’t be too late to get on a boat tour. We can do a snorkel, sunset sail or rent a kayak from them.

Hilo – Waterfalls and Tigers and Gardens, Oh My!

Hilo is a fairly large town, world renown for its farmer’s market. I can’t wait to see what fruits they have! But overall I think we will mostly explore this towns restaurants rather than sights. We probably will want to enjoy the Lili’uokalani Japanese Garden and adjacent Coconut Island. For a fruit picnic maybe?

Downtown, Wailoa State Park features a pretty pond, King Kamehameha Statue and an arts center. Other artsy spots include the East Hawaii Cultural Center (free) and the local gallery scene. If it’s raining, there are quite a few museums here. We will probably skip the Pacific Tsunami Museum. I don’t need to be paranoid about the weather. The Lyman Museum might be worth a look at least at the cool house it’s in. Same with the free Mokupapapa Discovery Center on coral reefs. The somewhat pricey Imiloa Astronomy Center does actually look worth the cost.

The real attractions in the Hilo area are seriously waterfalls, tigers, and gardens. In addition to the waterfall we are staying at, there are 2 more in town (Rainbow and Pee Pee Falls with Boiling Pots) and one with a great hike about outside 45 minutes north (Akaka). All are highly recommended sights. Hilo is also home to a fine zoo featuring Namaste, the white tiger. As for gardens, we already covered Lili’uokalani, in addition there’s the World Botanical Gardens and the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden, plus Nani Mau and Pua Mau. But those are the big ones. My coworker said the Hawaii Tropical Botanical Garden was her favorite sight on the island. Also apparently waterfalls and gardens equal rain. We will want to bring the Gettysburg Umbrella on this trip.

I don’t know how we are going to time our days in Hilo to include outside sights and which outside sights we’ll end up doing as we drive on. An hour and a half north of Hilo is the Waipio Valley – or Valley of Kings, it’s both gorgeous and virtually inaccessible by car. But we are thinking about trying to do the horseback tour as a way to see it. There's also a shuttle and wagon tour, but they don't come as highly recommended. I think it's going to be awfully difficult to pick and choose what we actually do, since we clearly won't have time for everything and timing things out to drive efficiently is going to be tricky too. If we do opt to do the helicopter trip to the volcano, it leaves from Hilo, so that would cut into some of our time here. Well like two hours of it.

Hilo also boasts some good eats – vanilla lunch in an orchard anyone? Sumptuous Thai takeout, great sushi, and the Seaside Restaurant overlooks a good birding pond. People rave about the plate lunch portions at Café 100 and Café Pesto is known for fresh gourmet bites. Amazingly, Ken’s House of Pancakes is frequently mentioned as a must eat. This will be pretty welcome to us after our time in South Point, where restaurants are pretty scarce and we will likely be doing all of our own cooking. I think we will want to buy a small styrofoam cooler, since I can't live on beef jerky and doritos (aka stuff we did not need to worry about spoiling in the heat) the way we did on our honeymoon. LOL! Also this prompted me to figure out how we might score lunch in the volcano area, and apparently there are quite a few options. We will still probably want that cooler.

The Puna District and the Lava Viewing Conundrum

Billed as the “real” Big Island, the Puna District offers a lot of great natural attractions and small town charm. I had planned on stopping here en route to Hilo, but given that this is where the lava flow is and that it is way off the beaten path, we may want to come here for the second half of our volcano day – or even most of our volcano day since we could also try again with the volcano when we are en route to our hotel in Hilo. The lava viewing site here is about an 1.5 from our hotel in South Point and we would want to try to see the lava in the evening. We could also drive here from our Hilo hotel if it comes to it, but there's a lot to do in that area too. Such problems for a girl to have.

The conundrum illustrated geographically:

What are the other cool things to do in Puna? Pahoa Town – a charming place to grab snacks or do a little shopping. People rave about the Mexican restaurant Luquin's here. Liloki margaritas for me and pigs raised by the restaurateur for the ultimate in locally grown for Charlie.

Lava Tree State Monument – dubbed "Pele’s sculpture garden," these are some cool petrified trees.

Mackenzie State Park – has an ironwood forest, therefore may have interesting birds.

Ahalanui Park – has a geothermically warmed pool for swimming.

Waiopae Ponds – awesome snorkeling at interconnected tide pools. Some of the best on the island.

Kahopo Pool – another geothermically warmed pool, way lesser known than the Ahalanui Park, couldn't even find a picture. Cape Kumukahi Light House - No picture of these either, but it's near the sea pool and is home to the world's freshest air.

Steam caves – naturally occurring saunas courtesy of the volcano. As cool as this sounds, it does kind of freak me out.

See all these things on the map: Another solution to our timing conundrum might be to just do the helicopter tour. People tell me it’s the best money you can spend on the island and it’s not as pricey as I would have thought. Flights leave every hour until 4:30 pm from Hilo. We miss out on the night viewing, but I don't know that we need it given we get so close to the lava. I'm still not sure how that would time out in our itinerary, but it would be cool. I also still kind of want to go kayaking and horseback riding too. And maybe on a catamaran. Yikes. No money for food on this trip! LOL.

Kona Coffee

Since Charlie and I are coffee's biggest fans, we will probably want to take in a coffee plantation tour. I believe Kona is the only place in the United States that coffee is grown, which is really the number one reason why I could never do the 100 mile diet despite wanting to be a green girl. Hmm. I'm not going to think too hard about that, but instead say that wikipedia identifies Kona Coffee as the most expensive and sought after in the world. Yum. It's grown on the volcanic slopes of Hualalai and Mauna Loa, which makes it more exciting by nature.

BTW the native Hawaiian language has several fewer letters than the alphabet we use. I am absolutely mystified as to how to pronounce most of the words. If I were going to say Hualalai aloud while driving, I would say look for the H word with several A's and good luck figuring out which H word I mean. Or maybe I would just spell it.

So coffee, obviously we will be drinking Kona every morning, but we might want to do a coffee plantation tour and there are several options:
Mountain Thunder is actually clear on their website about what time tours happen and what happens on a tour. I like that.
Kona Joe's might be a good place to stop on our drive south to our next overnight spot, but you have to call ahead to request the actual tour and then you have to pay.
Kona Blue Sky Coffee Visitor's Center is quite close to our Kona residence, so this would be an easy stop to make. It's not clear from the website what is at the visitor's center though.
Kona Lea Plantation is further south, Kona Lea Plantation sounds awesome - it's organic, plus they have a tour and a flock of geese.
Kona Coffee also has macadamia nuts going for it, it's pretty far south.
Though I question the name, Bong Brothers has a road side stand that sounds like it's worth stopping at for Hawaiian treats and Kona coffee.

Some of the further south places would be better visited while driving to our hotel in Punaluu, but some might be good to check out in between beaches on our water day.

Water Fun on the Kona Coast

Kona has a few great options for water fun - tiny White Sands Beach for boogie boarding or snorkeling at Kahaluu Beach Park, which is very popular and may require an early start to get a spot. If we opt for these DIY adventures, we might want to pick up Banh Mi in town at Ba-Le Sandwich Shop, before we hit the beach. Another from land option is further south near the place of refuge, called two-step beach.

From what I've read, there are quite few more snorkel options if you boat to the snorkel location. The Kealakekua Bay is supposedly awesome and full of fish, but only one company seems to go there daily and the boat is motorized and their website annoys me. Plus I don't know that we will want to go on another tour. The plus side to touring though is we don't have to pack our own gear, BYOGear would likely mean no carry-on luggage option for the flight.

Kayaking also seems like a super fun option. Aloha Kayak offers tours of Keahou Bay or the City of Refuge. These include lava tubes and caves as well as snorkel stops. Again this is another tour, but perhaps a bit more independent and no gear required.

Also intriguing are the night time Manta Ray snorkels. Hmm. That sounds rather unique, but how do you see at night and how close do the rays come? I know they aren't sting rays, but I worry a little since the death of the crocodile hunter. Yet, I don't want to pass up an opportunity to see something cool. It seems like several companies offer the night time snorkels at varying prices, but I can't tell if in the end you are going with the same dive shop on all of them. Kona Honu Divers is currently offering a package that you can use at different times, which includes both an evening manta ray snorkel and a morning dolphin snorkel. But this package doesn't time out as well as I'd like with our time in Kona.

Birding the Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge

The Big Island is one of the best for birding and we are not going to miss out! We have scheduled a tour in to the refuge with Hawaii Forest and Trail. The refuge is only accessible with a special permit and 4x4 vehicle. We are going with a naturalist to help us identify some of Hawaii's endemic birds. Endemic birds are those that are only found in one geography, so Hawaii's endemics are only found in the Hawaiian Islands and most are endangered.

This trip is going to be pretty hardcore. We meet at 6 am and drive 3 hours into the mountain, to go on a 4 hour jungle hike. I couldn't be more excited.

This is a map of where we are going:


This will not be the first trip of this type that we have arranged while traveling, but frustratingly the other 2 we have arranged were cancelled and we were left to bird on our own. We saw some birds, but never anything as good as what we can see on a trip like this. SO. This time I've got a plan B in place, I've been in contact with a local naturalist who can at least take us near the site if the trip falls through.