Today was the last scheduled participant. We recruited the participant over 2 weeks ago, so I was suspicious that the participant would not remember or not be around. The husband of the woman I spoke with was home, and had just gotten back from a vacation. She had wanted me to talk with him, but she hadn't mentioned the project to her husband. He was reluctant at first, but my persistence paid off this time, and we were able to do his property. There are frogs in the area, so that means transects at night.
On the way back to the apartment, we stopped by Chris' bakery to get some malsadas. Good, but still not as good as Baker Tom's! We stopped by a scenic overlook just south of Kona to eat the malsadas, and read about a sacred 1 mile lava tube in the area.
Next, we went to the small blue painted church next to a beach park that has been over snorkeled, though tourists do their share to continue over snorkeling. Next to the church is a Heiau (temple) devoted to surfing. They would prey for good surfing waves here in days past.
We ate a small lunch and went to do work next to the ocean before going for a swim in the pool. The "no fun" pool..
One thing I will miss on the drive south of Kona is the smell of roasting coffee. Much like the smell of the breweries when driving into Milwaukee, roasting coffee reminds you that you're in Kona coffee country. At first, it smells a bit like burnt popcorn, but not as foul a smell as that. The other thing that's neat about this side of the island is the amount of sea turtles we've seen up close. Everyday that we walk along the ocean, you'll see them riding the waves, or poking their heads up for air. It's also neat to be able to watch the dolphins most mornings while eating breakfast. It makes me wonder how many people actually miss seeing these things (or smelling) as they travel around this part of the island.
The sun was starting to set on our drive to our last participant's house, and we caught the view at a scenic overlook.
When we went back to the participant's house to set up our nighttime measures, two of the little girls there followed me around and wanted to know if they could watch us, and wanted to know how late we were going to be there because they can stay up until 9 p.m. when they don't have school. They asked a lot of questions and were all excited to have entertainment that didn't involve the tv set for once.
Seth went up the road to a participant that had tons of frogs on their property to see if it would be okay to do another recording of the loud "bromeliad tree" on the front of her property. She said that was fine, but was hoping Seth would spray. Funny, because she had said before that it wasn't really worth it to do anything anymore because they are so bad...
We only heard a few frogs on the property, but lots off in the distance, as we were mostly on mud/lava rocks. Seth spotted a neat looking slug on the property.
We were finishing up with our sound measures on the individual points when I saw flashlights pointing at me "I see one of them!" (the kids said). I thought I heard one of the parents tell them to not bother us, and to go to the front yard, so I finished up what I was doing, and then went to the front yard to see if they wanted to see some frogs. The little girl and two boys were excited. I ended up donating the headlamp to the girl, since they only had one light between them. It was difficult to point things out without my light, but it was probably more fun for me to take them near the vegetation I'd seen them and then have them look, and find, the frogs. I got to hear all sorts of funny stories and enjoy the curiosity of the kids. Seth joined us and pointed out another frog, as well as a cane toad, which the kids squealed at. They didn't like the giant toad- and decided to try to squash it. We finally packed up, and headed out as the kids were heading to sleep.
Today we walked back out to the salt-water pool to see how tide was, but it wasn't any higher than we saw it before. I decided to head out and do some errands while Seth stayed at the apartment and did some reading.
After I got back from errands we ate a late lunch, I worked on packing up all of my bug funnels and organizing all of the field gear before we headed out to do some more errands, and then pick up the sticky traps from the last participant's property.
Too make a somewhat long story short- don't buy pies from the Mac Nut Pie company. We were given the wrong pie (we'd ordered one with chocolate chips, but we got a plain one), were told to come in and they would give us the right one since they messed up, but when we got there, there was a different worker who claimed we were supposed to bring back half the pie and then we would be able to get half off the chocolate chip pie. She wouldn't budge, but she did slip out pieces of information that were obvious her story changed and it was the meeting they had with the owners on Monday (day they are closed) that made her give us this line of BS. So, we left, never trying the chocolate pie, and vowing never to buy from them again. We had called as a courtesy to them, since we figured a huge batch of them may have been mis-labeled, but all we got was stuck in a traffic jam and lied to... not cool.
We watched the sunset while grilling out our dinner and eating by the ocean. I worked on making revisions to a manuscript I've been working on, and got it ready to submit the next day, after having a friend check if it was Window's compatible.
Today we had a meeting with the landscape director at a ritzy resort north of Kona at 9 a.m. We had also decided we'd go snorkeling, so we picked up snorkel gear before heading north. We arrived early so did some reading in the car before meeting her.
While we were waiting for her to finish with some work, we saw the participant who gave us the landscape director's contact information. We made small talk before heading in to meet with the director. We ended up talking for an hour and a half with the landscape director and learned all the ins and outs of dealing with the frogs on 800+ acres. She was not a big fan of the frogs, nor was the previous director. They do, indeed, have a coqui service that comes out regularly to take care of the frogs. Most of the residents don't like the frogs, but they also don't like having to pay to have the frogs removed. She suggested setting up a quarantine area, where any new plants need to be left for several days and nights to determine if there are any coqui frogs, since she says that most frogs are being brought in on plants that came with for new landscaping projects.
We headed north to Lapakahi State park, where we walked along an old Hawaiian Village trail before eating lunch. It was really windy here, but was a gorgeously sunny day. You could even see Maui (Haleakala to be exact), off in the distance, which was pretty cool.
We had read that this was a nice place to snorkel, but hadn't seen anyone out in the water. We asked a park ranger, and he said that the mornings are a bit better because the water is less choppy and it is less windy, but if we felt comfortable, the water should be fine. This is a conservation area, so they don't let you bring food and other extra items down to the cove. We snorkeled for a couple of hours and enjoyed seeing a number of different kinds of fish (including the state fish: humuhumunukunuku apu a'a), different kinds of coral, and Seth even saw a small octopus that was changing colors and quite skittish. We basically had the cove all to ourselves, which was great.
We headed south down to the Mauna Lani area (where the turtle release was) and we walked through a trail leading to some petroglyphs from ancient Hawaiians.
We also so a nice salt and pepper beach near the petroglyph trail.
We then walked around a park heading to a series of small ponds around the resort area. The views were gorgeous. We also came upon the "Secrets Pond" which appears to have been built by someone a while ago, then left for others to enjoy. There were lots of little fishies swimming about.
We sat and did some reading before heading to the nearby shopping center to watch a free hula performance. Due to some technical difficulties, the show started about 45 minutes late... The night was gorgeous, so I enjoyed the sunset and watching the stars come out. The show was good, but funny that they weren't able to have a backup plan to make it work without their videos.
It was about this time that I really noticed that my rump had gotten sunburned. Seth had mentioned that my butt was sticking out of the water when we were snorkeling, but I didn't think anything of it, since I had my suit on, and figured it was covered. I guess he has a wider definition of but, because he meant my upper thighs as well as my calves, so pretty much my whole leg. The pain was pad, so we went to get some aloe, and bought some icecream to wash down some of the pain. We watched some shows Seth had on the computer before crashing for the night.
Prior to the sunburn, the plan today was to rent kayaks at the Kealakekua state park and kayak out to the Captain Cook monument. Considering the pain factor, we decided to lay low around the apartment, work on packing, and getting ready for the tire appointment at 2 p.m.
We ate breakfast out by the oceanfront, and I worked on starting to clean up the apartment while Seth did some reading. We got a little lost on the way to the Firestone, but arrived finally and got everything squared away with my advisor's research credit card (which made the purchase tax exempt). They said it would be about an hour, so I decided to walk (hobble?) to the local market, where I picked up another white pineapple... yes, I am addicted to their sweetness, and this time it was only $1/pound, so I wouldn't have stopped at one if we weren't about to be moving to the other side of the island.
The car was finally finished almost 2 hours after we dropped it off (yay Hawaii time!). I noticed a sign indicating they would pay you up to $125 reimbursement for your last fuel purchase, if you bought 4 tires. The tires salesman had conveniently not mentioned this, so we asked him about it. He said he had meant to ask us about it, but we got the sense he was trying to make an extra buck or two by adding on roadside assistance and things we didn't need. We had the gas receipt back at the apartment, so we went and grabbed the biggest one from the last month, and saved almost $80 on tires. That was definitely worth it!
We ate some leftovers for dinner (including another banana split) and watched a movie, before cleaning some more and heading to sleep pretty late.
Today was moving day! No matter how little the stuff you have to haul around, moving is never fun, and we've now done it twice this summer... We managed to make it out of the apartment in a little over 2.5 hours, which seemed pretty good, since we still had some cleaning to do, I made eggs for breakfast, and Seth had to be creative to pile things in to get them to fit, and to allow us to unload in the proper order (since we were going to drop stuff off at the field station in Hilo).
We stopped by the southernmost bakery, Hana Hou, in the US to sample their sweet breads (including mango and guava flavored), and we decided to try their malsadas to compare to others we've had along the way. We tried the lilikoi, guava, mango, and chocolate filled. The lilikoi was delicious (because of the frosting), but we both still like Baker Tom's the best as his are filled. I would say this place takes second for the unique flavors of the dough and frosting. Yum!
We continued our drive and stopped by the Punalu'u Black Sand Beach. The endangered Hawksbill Turtles come here, and we caught a few glimpses of some turtles riding the waves. Hard to say if they were green turtles or Hawksbill, since I didn't see their faces that closely, but it sounds like there's a fair chance they were Hawksbill, which is pretty cool.
We continued along our drive all the way through the rear of Volcano National Park, and down to Kapoho, where we'll be spending our last few days on the island. We saw a number of Nenes walking alongside the road in part of the natural reserve area, which was pretty cool.
The woman who owns the house seems nice, and the room is a small little room, with adjoining bathroom, and kitchen area. There's an outside shower, and then also a full bathroom in the main living area of the house upstairs, as well as a kitchen. She chatted with us for a bit and invited us to a Harvest Party they were having that night. We had been hoping to go to a Pink Floyd Dark Side of the Moon showing at the local astronomy center, but they were sold out, so we thought we might show up at their party after we drove up to Hilo to deposit gear.
We dropped off some research gear in Hilo, then went to the Queen's park and ate our dinner and enjoyed the view from coconut island. This used to be part of Hilo, but one of the Tsunamis came and flooded most of the area a number of years ago. A coconut tree nearby shows heights of tsunamis in the area.
We arrived back in Kapoho around 7, and decided to head up to the party. With a few awkward introductions, I felt my introvert side really creeping out. Seth managed to strike up a conversation with a guy about computers, so I conveniently snuck downstairs for a breather. I decided to try braving the group again, since Seth was still up there, and I brought a bottle of wine up with me- a Symphony Mele white wine we'd gotten at the Volcano Winery. I had some, brought some for Seth, and then chatted the night away. I tried a piece of mango cake, which was interesting, after chatting all about the frogs with everyone, and chatting about human nature in general. It ended up being a fun night, but several of the people smoked, so I decided to try out the outside shower before heading to sleep. It was fun to shower with the coquis calling in the background!
Today was meant to be a lazy day. We went upstairs to eat breakfast on the lanai, and chatted more with the owners. We then decided to head back out to the lighthouse with the supposedly cleanest air around (since it travels so far over the ocean to get here from any close land mass), and breathe easy for a while, do some reading, and get caught up on other work.
We both finished books we'd been reading, then we drove over to Lava Tree State Park to check out the lava covered trees.
From here, we went back to the apartment, and decided to head out and see the lava flowing. Along the way, we stopped by a black sand beach where a local resident had been planting coconut trees (prior to dying of cancer) and then other residents caught on. We saw a couple of dolphins porpoising not too far from the shore, which is always such a magical sight.
You could see the lava plume from the beach, as well as from the road- pretty cool!
We ended up not making it into see the flow, since there was a cop manning the entrance, so we came back, watched some mythbusters, and got some sleep.
Today we decided to head up to the Maku'u market. I ran into a participant we talked to way back in May. I think he and his wife were impressed that I remembered their names. The market was interesting, as in many ways it was like a community garage sale, in that people could get booths and sell their old items, right alongside fresh produce. I picked up some more apple bananas for our last few days here.
We next headed out to Paradise Park to look at a house our landlord is building. Quite impressive!
We then decided to drive along the government beach road and check out some tide pools. We hiked along the Puna Trail out to a gorgeous view. We saw a millipede walking along with its legs bunched up funny. There were lots of little fishies in the pools, and the waves were pretty. There were only 2 other couples around, and Seth gave the ladies a scare, as he got somewhat close to a big wave, and it's easy to be swept out to sea here. We chatted with them for a while about coqui frogs, as the one woman lives in Volcano, and that community is quite vigilent about trying to erradicate them. It was neat to visit with them.
We continued along the beach road and came upon the first apartment we stayed at here on the island. The gate was open, and since the landlord told me the dog was no longer there, we decided not to stop. We did stop by Kahakai park to eat our lunch and enjoy the peaceful view of the ocean.
I, of course, had to have Seth stop so I could pick some guavas
We continued on until we arrived at a lava swimming pool. The road was easy to miss, and really looked like it had barely been cut out of the hala trees, but we descended anyways. We had to wait for one truck to exit (only wide enough for one car), but then didn't see any other cars while we were there. We did see another couple down the shoreline, but we think they may have been on their own property, and we only saw them the one time. We had the whole swimming pool to ourselves! I snorkeled around and explored while Seth read, and then we traded. I was happy it was more overcast, so I didn't need to worry about burning my bum again. We saw lots of different kinds of fish, crabs, sea weed, and a small warmer area in the pool that had bubbles coming out of the rocks.
We came back to the apartment, made some spaghetti, and went and ate out by the tidepools, while watching the clouds change colors as the sun set. Really pretty and peaceful!
We watched some mythbusters, stretched/exercised, and then headed out to watch the lava flow around 10 p.m.
The flow was quite pretty, and really was spitting up, but we didn't go all the way out, as there were a couple of lights from a distance, and we didn't know if they were friend or foe, so we didn't want to chance it. We decided to try again another night, but still enjoyed the flow from a distance for over an hour.