Wonderland

Susan and Shannon are in the middle - we hiked with them last year

My dear friend, Susan, who we hiked with last year in Washington, did the Wonderland trail with a few gals when we were in Hawaii.  We were supposed to go but there was a catastrophic breakdown of the permitting system so they couldn't get a permit ahead of time. That meant they had to show up a ranger station and hope they got a permit.  They did!  But it was too risky for us to take off two weeks, fly to Washington and hope for a permit.  So we opted for the sure thing of relaxing on the beach instead.

Susan was instructed to think about us every day - which she did by wearing the friendship bracelet we gave her for last years hike.  Here is is with Mt Rainer in the background.

I loved my hour long debrief with Susan once she was off the trail.  And the story about these shoes was my favorite.  She lost one of her crocs - which are her camp shoes - while on the trail.  Camp shoes are critical because getting out of your hiking boots at the end of the day is necessary for your poor stinky, tired feet!  Once she noticed the shoe was gone, she ran back on the trail to look for it.  No luck.  So she designed a new shoe with items they had with them!  Pefect!  And she used it most of the trip....until they met a lady at a ranger station who told them about a pair of flip flops a trail angel left a few miles away.  Unfortunately it was  few miles in the wrong direction.  But later in the day as they were hiking they came upon a trail marker with the flip flops and a note say "I hope these will work for you"!  The lady drove to get the flip flops, found a trail that would cross their trail and hiked in to leave them for Susan!  Trail Magic strikes again!

Great Grandmothers

I keep forgetting to post this pic of our mom's with their Great Grandpups!  Love it!

Back to School

Drew and Amanda are back at school.  They spent last week in the first week of classes and getting settled into their new apartments.  I LOVE this pic of Amanda's bathroom.  Makes me giggle!

Butano State Park Backpacking

Jim and I did a quick over-nite backpack trip in Butano State Park (half way between Santa Cruz and Half Moon Bay)  We left our house at about 10:15 am on Saturday and were on the trail beginning the hike right at noon.

It was about 5 miles uphill to the trail camp and it took us about 2:45 minutes to get there.

We saw quite a few banana slugs but no other wild life.

It had a couple funny surfaces thru some areas that looked like it might get pretty swampy in the winter.  The trails were almost exclusively single track.

The scenery was beautiful - with lots of redwoods and sections of Douglas Fir and small oaks too.

There were some creeks a long the way but they were almost completely dry.   We did fill up one small bottle on the way in but brought the rest of our water with us.

We ended up at the top of the coast range.  Our camp site was completely in the tree canopy and had a lot of mosquitoes!

We had a little picnic when we got to our site - cheese, crackers, banana bread, grapes, nuts and an apple.  YUM!

It was a little chilly because we were sweaty from the hike.  So we went for another hike to warm up.  About a mile from the camp site was an abandoned air strip.  It was right out in the sun so we warmed up and dried off!

Abandoned air strip

Back at the camp, the mosquitoes were bugging us so we set up our camp chairs in our tent and hung out in there!  We continued with our tradition started last year at the Enchantments and had high tea!

This giant log served as a table.

Time for dinner!  We had burritos with fresh tomatoes, cheese and Taco Bell taco sauce!

There were two other campsites being used but they were well away from us.  It was super quiet and REALLY dark at nite!

We packed up the next morning and it took an hour and 50 minutes to hike out.

Volcano Road Trip

While in Hawaii we did a road trip down to the Volcano so that we could hike out and see the lava flowing into the ocean in the dark.  Since it is a 2+ hour drive from Kona, we booked rooms at the Volcano House, the historic hotel in the Volcanoes National Park.

When we got to the park, we did some site seeing - steam vents, Jagger Museum and the Thurston lava tube.  

Then we checked into our hotel and had some lunch before having a quick rest before our hike.

Volcano House - our rooms were far left on the ground floor

Our view from our room

Snack time on the lanai!

The hike to reach the lava was 4.25 miles one way.  But because we had to park so far away, it was about a 10 mile round trip hike.

We started at about 5:30 pm and hike a 16 minute mile on the way in.   We did about a 17 mile on the way out....we decided to take it easy.

Most of the hike was down a gravel road.  It was pretty flat and easy but we made it challenging by keeping our speed up.

We got there before it got dark.  So we checked it out and sat down to have sandwiches while we waited for it to get dark.

We were so close that you could feel the heat and the steam.

Picnic time!

We stayed until it was completely dark and checked it out some more and then hiked out.  We had headlamps with us so we could see on our way out.  It was one of the most incredible sites I have ever seen!

This was the view the next morning from the Volcano House.  It looked right out into the crater.  We had a big breakfast and then headed to Hilo where we visited the Tsunami Museum.  We were all fascinated by all that we had learned!

Hawaii August 2016

First morning - right after we arrived

View from our lanai

We were lucky enough to take an eleven day trip to Kona Hawaii.  Kona is one of my favorite places to travel to because it is easy and relaxing.

Keahaha Kai

We spent most days lounging on one of our three favorite beaches:  Keahaha Kai, Hapuna or Magic Sands.  Our routine was as follows:

Wake up
Watch some olympics and eat breakfast
Laze around
Pack the coolers
Head to the beach
Stay there til dinner time
Head home and make dinner or go out to dinner
Play nibs
Watch olympics
Go to bed
Repeat

At the snorkeling spot - Puako

We did do one road trip to the volcano that I will cover in another blog post.

Selfie at Puako

Coming out of the water at Puako

Boogie boarding at Hapuna

Happiness on the beach

Unfortunately, Amanda stepped on banded longspined urchin (commonly called Vana by Hawaiians) at Hapuna.  Luckily Drew saved her by pulling out the spines....while almost drowning her with his zest for helping.  We talked to the lifeguards who said she would get better by herself so we ignored it!  And it got better!

See the banded longspined urchin, above the crawfish looking thing

Sunset from the cabin

In front of Original Thai - yum!

It was such a great trip that when we talked about it, we had a hard time pinpointing our favorite event.  But we narrowed down on the top 5:

1.  Hiking to see the lava flow at the volcano
2.  Swimming with the manta rays (which Grace insisted on calling manatees!)
3.  Eating the yummiest Thai food we ever had
4.  Playing nibs
5.  Hanging on the beach for hours and hours each day

At Two Step

We also did quite a bit of snorkeling, including at Two Step and a new spot call Puako.

At Two Step

Waiting for our boat to the manta rays

Swimming with the manta rays was AMAZING.  I had not really thought about what it might be like so I had no preconceived notions.  But Jim's cousin Susan told us they loved it and they have never steered us wrong -- so we blindly went!  We had manta rays that are up to 1600 pounds swimming within a foot of us.  It was crazy cool!

From the condo - this is where I drank tea each morning

Road trip!

Sushi lunch - note the boogie board table

We had some great picnics on the beach - sushi, bagel sandwiches and cheese and crackers!  Plus we had one pineapple each day we were there!

Shaved ice

Grace left two days early so she could go to her first day of school.  So she took a red eye on Sunday nite, got picked up at the airport on Monday at 9:19 am and went straight to her first day as a Junior.   Her choice of the day for her last day was to get shaved ice.  So we stopped after the beach, got them and sat on the sea wall in Kona and ate them up!  YUM!