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shannon_aAfter a few minutes of pretending to read the book, I lay it on my chest. It's Orb Sceptre Throne, a book in search of punctuation marks. I haven't even gotten to the Sceptre yet.
I've resisted the urge so far, trying to soak in every minute of sunshine and tropical joy on this trip, but we've scheduled today as downtime, and I can't resist any more.
I nap.
Six Hours Earlier.
The early morning is the usual. We breakfast. We walk at the golf course.
I can tell how much the FitBit has changed my patterns from the way that I make a point of walking every day. By 9pm, I'll be just shy of 11,000 steps, which has been pretty standard for the trip.
For a while, we try and make plans to visit Waimea, but we fail mainly because of JoJo's late opening time of 11.30. There seems no way to run up there, then run back to eat lunch without everything smashing into each other.
So instead, we talk for a while then eat lunch.
As my dad has said a few times: vacation is all about figuring out our next meal as soon as we finish with the last one.
The afternoon disappears into the nap. But then at 3pm we're heading out for the main event of the day: the Kauai museum and then (as my dad predicted) another meal.
The Kauai Museum is horribly organized. I bounce from wall to wall learning about things in a random order. I see some interesting paintings of a chief's son returning to Kauai, and only later learn who he is. The sorting of things between rooms is equally chaotic, other than the fact that the Asian material is upstairs.
But I'm never exactly sure why there's a whole floor of Asian artifacts in a Kauai museum.
I am the most fascinated, unsurprisingly, by the history. I want to learn more about the civil wars that formed the Kingdom of Hawaii, and I'm hoping that James Michener's book covers that. I'm always reluctant to read books that ridiculously long. Hawaii is ~1100 pages, which is even longer than Orb Sceptre Throne. However, I might make an exception for this one.
For now I just enjoy my own visions of these ancient stories played out across these islands that I've visited so often.
I'm also fascinated by a topographic map of Hawaii that shows many of the settlements and pathways of the ancient Hawaii people. I'm shocked to see they settled in all the river valleys which are largely abandoned now, as modern people instead settle on the coast. I'd love to know why. I'm equally fascinated by pathways that go straight over the mountains in the middle of Kauai, but I'm sure they're sadly gone now too.
Some of the Asian stuff I complain about is actually pretty neat too, particularly some Filipino weaponry.
I'm less fascinated by the surfing room, which is oddly enough the first thing you see when you enter the "History of Kauai" building.
My eye-rolling at the surfing room is ironic because we're eating dinner at Duke's, named after Duke Kahanamoku, who popularized surfing. It's at the Marriott in Lihue, so of course I want to look around first.
The pool is particularly fascinating because it's large and magnificent, with lots of Roman pillars, beautiful balconies, and a menagerie of stone animals vomiting into the pool.
Which is a totally appetizing thing to see before dinner.
They're just vomiting water, fortunately.
We get a table looking out over Nawiliwili Bay. It's absolutely magnificent. The beach and bay spread out before us, and beyond them are some magnificent headlands. The only restaurant we've eaten at that compares is the St. Regis on Hanalei Bay.
It's hard for the food to match that view, but it does. I have Shrimp Scampi which is extremely tasty ... but I'm glad I'm not eating something that rich on the night before we leave.
We'll have more success with JoJo's tomorrow, and that'll largely complete the Kauai checklist.
I've resisted the urge so far, trying to soak in every minute of sunshine and tropical joy on this trip, but we've scheduled today as downtime, and I can't resist any more.
I nap.
Six Hours Earlier.
The early morning is the usual. We breakfast. We walk at the golf course.
I can tell how much the FitBit has changed my patterns from the way that I make a point of walking every day. By 9pm, I'll be just shy of 11,000 steps, which has been pretty standard for the trip.
For a while, we try and make plans to visit Waimea, but we fail mainly because of JoJo's late opening time of 11.30. There seems no way to run up there, then run back to eat lunch without everything smashing into each other.
So instead, we talk for a while then eat lunch.
As my dad has said a few times: vacation is all about figuring out our next meal as soon as we finish with the last one.
The afternoon disappears into the nap. But then at 3pm we're heading out for the main event of the day: the Kauai museum and then (as my dad predicted) another meal.
The Kauai Museum is horribly organized. I bounce from wall to wall learning about things in a random order. I see some interesting paintings of a chief's son returning to Kauai, and only later learn who he is. The sorting of things between rooms is equally chaotic, other than the fact that the Asian material is upstairs.
But I'm never exactly sure why there's a whole floor of Asian artifacts in a Kauai museum.
I am the most fascinated, unsurprisingly, by the history. I want to learn more about the civil wars that formed the Kingdom of Hawaii, and I'm hoping that James Michener's book covers that. I'm always reluctant to read books that ridiculously long. Hawaii is ~1100 pages, which is even longer than Orb Sceptre Throne. However, I might make an exception for this one.
For now I just enjoy my own visions of these ancient stories played out across these islands that I've visited so often.
I'm also fascinated by a topographic map of Hawaii that shows many of the settlements and pathways of the ancient Hawaii people. I'm shocked to see they settled in all the river valleys which are largely abandoned now, as modern people instead settle on the coast. I'd love to know why. I'm equally fascinated by pathways that go straight over the mountains in the middle of Kauai, but I'm sure they're sadly gone now too.
Some of the Asian stuff I complain about is actually pretty neat too, particularly some Filipino weaponry.
I'm less fascinated by the surfing room, which is oddly enough the first thing you see when you enter the "History of Kauai" building.
My eye-rolling at the surfing room is ironic because we're eating dinner at Duke's, named after Duke Kahanamoku, who popularized surfing. It's at the Marriott in Lihue, so of course I want to look around first.
The pool is particularly fascinating because it's large and magnificent, with lots of Roman pillars, beautiful balconies, and a menagerie of stone animals vomiting into the pool.
Which is a totally appetizing thing to see before dinner.
They're just vomiting water, fortunately.
We get a table looking out over Nawiliwili Bay. It's absolutely magnificent. The beach and bay spread out before us, and beyond them are some magnificent headlands. The only restaurant we've eaten at that compares is the St. Regis on Hanalei Bay.
It's hard for the food to match that view, but it does. I have Shrimp Scampi which is extremely tasty ... but I'm glad I'm not eating something that rich on the night before we leave.
We'll have more success with JoJo's tomorrow, and that'll largely complete the Kauai checklist.