In another post to follow will be the sailing adventure of Brian across the Pacific... until then is our fabulous holiday at his destination. We, the kids and I with my mum, flew out to Hawaii to await the arrival of our sailors.
We went to the Big Island of Hawaii and stayed in a house in Kona. We traveled over to Hilo to meet up with them the day they arrived. We beached and traveled the island to see all the sights we could while we were there. It was Brian's first time to Hawaii so I wanted him to experience all that he could. He did NOT like the driving around the island, and he did not LOVE the locals life... but He did love the beaches and the time that we had to explore together as a family.
One day we traveled to see the Volcano National park, and then up to Akaka Falls and Waipio Valley. We ended up doing the whole island that day!
Natalie had to stop on the side of the road for her Coconut. She had been asking me for it the whole trip. I am not sure where she saw that she could drink out of a coconut, but she insisted that she had to do it while in Hawaii. The kids all tried it and none of them liked it. It was short lived, but at least they did it!
We beached it a lot. The first beach we tried to find was a doozie. We got dropped off by Dad who had an errand to run and we ended up having to walk 1.5 miles with all of our beach gear, all 3 kids, and Nana across hot sand, and lava rocks. It was not a well beaten path and it was hot that day. We got a good work out in and saw many sea turtles up on the sand that day. Needless to say, after that we stuck to the state beaches that had easy access!
The house we stayed in was up on the hill, which was great because it was away from a lot of the bustle of town. It was about 15 minutes from Kona and from the beach. We were able to swim since we had our own pool, and Courtney was able to nap almost daily...otherwise she would look like this:
Lots of lizards and gecko's for the kids to chase. Nat ended up catching about 5 and loved to hold them and "play" with them. The babies were the easiest to catch and apparently the easiest to kill... She accidentally killed about 3/4 of them. She brought one over and said, look mom he is sun tanning, totally innocent that she had killed the poor guy. She later layed him down and told me he was sleeping. I moved him and tossed him out. I didn't want her to be sad when she realized she had killed the thing.
The night we went over to Hilo to stay and wait for the boys in the morning, we ended up staying at the most beautiful bed and breakfast. The reservation was made online through Expedia and they messed it up. This place only allows 3 people per room and we were shocked when we arrived to one king bed and nothing else. I went to ask where the couch was that we were told they had... The owners were not happy about having 5 people in a room. They would have been even more upset had they learned that Courtney peed on a pillow and in the bed. We cleaned that one up and I just hoped they wouldn't catch it. Regardless, it was amazingly beautiful and if breakfast wasn't 40$ per person, we would have eaten the banana pancakes in the morning.
This picture below is so sweet to me. We had gone out on this rock wall to wait for the sailors to come into this bay. We spotted them coming from across the bay and this was the kids pointing to where they were. They kept hugging each other because they were so excited to see Dad!
We stopped at a few little shops and deli's/bakeries along the way around the island and each time, they were surprisingly Delicious! Brian got a hot pastrami everywhere we went and fell in love.
We also stopped at the lava tubes while we were at the Volcano National park. This was probably one of the coolest things I have ever seen. It was beautiful and amazing. On the way in, I was holding boots hand and tripped and fell, breaking my sandal...and pulling Boots down with me. I was fine, he scraped up his knees pretty bad. I wasn't allowed to hold any more hands that day. Sorry buddy! Momma is clumsy!
It was such a fun family vacation and I am so glad that we got to experience it as a family and with my Mom and Dad. They only changes I would have made would have been doing more! 2 weeks is a long time, but it went so so fast and it felt like we weren't able to do everything we wanted. We did end up going in ALMOST every day for a snow cone aka shave ice. They were Delicious. Brian now has dreams of opening up a Hawaiian Shave ice place here in Dallas. We shall see right? Seriously though, they were incredible.
Cant wait to go back to another Island so Brian can see more beauty of Hawaiian Islands. Hawaii was pretty, but it is not the prettiest island at all. Lava rock is only cool for about 1 minute... then you get over it and want to see Maui or something! I am not complaining, It was wonderful and amazing!
