A Hawaiian Kaleidoscope - The Big Island: Volcanoes, Mauna Loa Climb, Heiaus and Beach Relaxation - February 2012

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The next morning - Friday - dawned warm and hazy. Not that surprising, considering that we were on the north-west coast of the Big Island of Hawai'i: the leeward side, almost always dry, and mostly sunny. This was quite apparent when looking at the landscape outside the bounds of the well-watered grounds of Waikoloa. Everything was arid and brown.

We were a bit tired of the continuous and random appearance of showers and rain, though, so we were happy for a few days of guaranteed warm and sun. The objective for today was simple: go back down to Hapuna Beach State Park and relax in the sun, maybe do a bit of swimming and snorkeling, read the newspaper or a book, and that was all. Normal people vacation stuff.

Paniolo Greens

Kitchen volcano view

Paniolo Greens living room

Golfers, Paniolo Greens

Paniolo Turkey

Colorful turkey gobbledystuff

We made ourselves a tasty breakfast of bacon and eggs, then gathered our beach stuff up and drove down to Hapuna Beach. We got a little off-course on the way, but were rewarded by driving by a very quaint historical church. We arrived at the beach at about 9:30am - fairly early by beach-going standards - and were rewarded with a mostly-empty scene. We had our pick of spots upon which to set up.

courtesy BConnell

Paniolo Turkey

Hokuloa United Church

courtesy BConnell

Hapuna Beach

There's not much to say about the rest of the morning and early afternoon: we alternated between laying around in the warm sun, and going for short swims in the water. The surf was quite mild and the beach has a very nice, clean base of sand with no rocks or dropoffs along most of its length.

We had originally thought to include a bit of snorkeling in our day, but the little beach gear outlet on the nearby grounds only had the non-dry type snorkels, and they were quite a bit more expensive that the dry ones we had rented from Boss Frog's back on Maui. So, we passed on the snorkeling.

courtesy BConnell

Along the Ala Kahakai Trail

In the early afternoon, we had had enough of simply lying around, and decided to explore a little ways along the coast. We discovered a trail heading north from the north end of the beach. We followed it for perhaps half a mile or so, passing by some old Hawaiian archaeological sites, very expensive Hawai'i seafront properties, and some nice rocky shoreline with fish-filled tidal pools. We discovered afterwards that this trail was part of the Ala Kahakai Trail - a National Historic Trail that extends along the length of the western Hawaiian coast.

courtesy BConnell

Cautionary signs gone wild!

View north along Kohala

Tidal Pool

courtesy BConnell

Fancy Oceanfront Property

Hapuna Beach

After returning to Hapuna Beach and spending a bit more time soaking up the sun's rays, we decided to go for a little drive to the north, just to see what we could see.

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