Trying to Catch the Sun

We got up early again yesterday--This time at 5:30 to give us time to drive over to the Kilauea Lighthouse.  While it's not all that far away, we still wanted to be there in time to catch transitional sun rays as (or if) they touched the lighthouse itself.  Sue thought that if we got there early enough we could avoid paying the $5 entrance fee.  I said there must be a gate somewhere at a place like that, but in my mind I couldn't come up with where it would be.  Neither of us remembered seeing one.  Well, we got there fine, but as I guessed, there was a gate.  It was at the upper parking lot where we had parked for the distance shots of the lighthouse when we were there on Monday.  Anyway, we parked in the dim light and got out... And were treated to a magical experience:  The air was filled with swooping birds, some of which were only barely missing the tops of our heads!  There were two sounds filling the air:  The cries of the abundance of the different birds that were all around in the trees and nests, and the whooshing, whistling sounds that the swooping birds were making as they dove and rose around us at the viewpoint.  The whole thing was an amazing experience for sure--Hard to put into words.  When we looked up there were lots and lots of soaring birds, barely visible as they caught the air currents and hovered, wings held still.  The sunrise was a bust, but the experience was anything but!

On the way back home we stopped and filled a couple bags with coral from a local beach.  Maggie is using coral as ground cover around the house, and because Kauai is surrounded by coral there is no shortage of it.  When we got home I spent a couple hours playing catch-up with the giant blog post I made.

When we hit the road close to lunchtime, we started stopping at tourist traps.  We were on the hunt for cool stuff.  You know--Tourist stuff... The stuff that you can point to or wear at home that says, "I was in Kauai... Sorry you were stuck in Washington."  One thing that is really big in the tourist trade here is anything related to chickens or roosters.  T-shirts, mugs, signs--You name it.  Anything you can think of will probably be available with a rooster on it... Be it comedic, artistic, or just a picture.  After all... Chickens are everywhere here.

We made a stop at a local spot that had a Marriott next to it.  There were lots of places for surfboard rentals for all the visitors that decide they don't like being healthy and pain-free.  For those that long to inhale gulps of salt water and wear themselves out, there were lots of vendors standing by to cater to their wishes.

We wandered around the Marriott hotel while we were there, in search of photo opportunities.   Let me tell you--This Marriott hotel was the epitome of overindulgence and opulence.  It was horribly overdone with gaudy art museum-like flair.  Marble, statues, and everything else you can think of.  We did get some interesting pictures of the fowl that wandered the grounds freely, as well as the multitude of fancy flora that were no doubt carefully arranged by some sort of landscape engineer.  Funny thing though--No matter how fancy your grounds and architecture, here in Kauai there is one thing that will always be there:  Da chickens.  This is a common site at the beach at the Marriott.  To put it in perspective, the grass between the cobblestone sidewalk and the beach sand is fine, fine grass.  Seriously, it's golf green quality.  But that doesn't matter to da chickens...

We stopped at a favorite spot near the airport that we were at a few days ago and enjoyed a beer and some munchies as we watched the waves crashing.  I would like to think that it's a fairly unknown spot because each time we've been there it's relatively empty.

Let me back up for a second.  A few days ago I was surfing the web for whatever reason, and happened across some sort of link to a festival of some sort that had a free hula show.  I didn't get the details written down or anything, but I did show it to Suzie and she thought it might be interesting too.  Okay, fast-forward to yesterday again.  While we were sitting at the beach with our munchies we were discussing the hula thing.  "Too bad we can't remember where it was taking place at." Neither of us could come up with the details and we were sorry we didn't write it down because it was due to start at 5pm (10 minutes from then).  We did the, "Oh well" and decided to head home.  On the way back home from there, we had just gotten up to speed when we came to a Hotel sign.  "That might be it!" Suzie pointed.  I yanked the wheel and we turned in.  I inquired at the desk of the hotel office and the guy said, "Yeah, it just started."  He motioned out towards the beachfront courtyard.  Cool! We parked and grabbed our cameras.

While the hula portion of the show was okay, it wasn't real locals performing the shows, and weren't really authentic (Sue pointed out things that they did or didn't do to make it apparent).  The music and singing, however, were very good.  I really enjoyed that part of it.  Either way, it was a fun thing to stop and do, and we had excellent seats on the ground at the edge of the swimming pool.  Here are a few shots of the event:

Another full day in the life of a tourist!